inshalla, walla, and the God-words in every sentence

Ask a mechanic in Nablus whether your car will be ready by Thursday. You won't get a clean yes. You'll get inshalla, and a small shrug.

Four little words like this run through Palestinian conversation so constantly that you'll hear all of them in your first hour off the bus. They started life as religious phrases. By now they're closer to conversational glue, the stuff that fills the gaps and softens the corners. Get comfortable tossing them in and you sound a lot less like a textbook.

inshalla: for anything that hasn't happened yet

inshalla means "if God wills," and it lands on anything you hope for or plan. The future practically demands it. You're not making a hard promise, you're leaving room for the world to disagree. ra7 niji bukra, inshalla (we'll come tomorrow, hopefully).

On its own, as an answer, it means "probably, we'll see." Someone asks you to call them later and you say inshalla. And when a parent says inshalla to a kid begging for ice cream, everyone in the room knows it means no.

It also works as a blessing. Your friend's exam is tomorrow, so you say inshalla tinja7 (hopefully you'll pass). This is one of the few of these words that crosses straight into MSA untouched, so you'll hear it on the news as readily as at the bus stop.

il-7amdilla: the answer to "how are you?"

Someone asks keef 7aalak (how are you). The textbook hands you mabsooT▶ (fine, pleased), and you'll hear that too. But the first thing out of most mouths is il-7amdilla, "praise God," doing the everyday job of "good, thanks." Often that's the whole reply. il-7amdilla, and on with the day.

That 7 sitting in the middle is the breathy throat-h. Say it low, not like an English h.

Stack it when you want more: il-7amdilla, kull ishi tamaam▶ (thank God, everything's fine). There's also a warmer cousin you'll meet when someone gets back from a trip or out of the hospital: il-7amdilla 3a-salaame, roughly "thank God you're back safe." The reply to that is usually just il-7amdilla again.

walla: "really?" and "I swear"

walla is "by God," and it swings two ways depending on your tone.

Lift it into a question and walla▶? means "really? for real?" A friend tells you the corner bakery burned down, you say walla?

Flatten it out and it becomes the spoken underline. walla ma ba3rafsh (honestly, I have no idea). il-akel zaaki, walla (the food's delicious, I swear). It's also how you dig in when someone doubts your story. One firm walla and you mean it.

mabrook: every kind of congratulations

New baby, new car, new job, an exam passed, a wedding. All of it gets mabrook▶ (congratulations).

• mabrook in-najaa7 — congrats on passing
• when the neighbor's son tjawwaz (got married), you say mabrook
• want to lay it on thick? alf mabrook, literally a thousand congratulations

And mabrook expects an answer. The standard one is allah ybaarek feek (God bless you), or feeki to a woman. Learn the pair together, because you'll trade them constantly. It does the same kind of social work that tfaDDal does at the front door.

Do you have to be religious to say them?

No. Not even slightly. A Christian shopkeeper in Bethlehem reaches for inshalla as readily as a Muslim one in Hebron. These words drifted away from the mosque a long time ago and settled into plain speech. People say them out of habit, people say them dry and ironic, people who don't pray say them all day.

You can watch the drift happen in yalla▶ (come on, let's go), which is just ya allah worn smooth. Nobody hears a prayer in it. It's "let's move."

Sprinkling them in

Next time someone asks you keef 7aalak, don't build a sentence. Just say il-7amdilla and watch them ease up. You'll have sounded like you'd been around a while.