For example: The word "Kitaab". The dictionaries say the "aa" is pronounced as the a in the English word "Bad". But everywhere I hear this sound spoken, it sounds more like the "e" in "Bed" with a very slight "a" sound mixed in. Which is right?
Also: I have access to far more learning material for Eastern Arabic than Egyptian. Would also learning the Eastern Arabic help with Egyptian or just confuse things?
Also: I've not looked into reading and writing very much, but it looks to me that different dictionaries and websites have different ways of writing Egyptian Arabic using the English alphabet and numbers/symbols for the sounds we don't have in English. This would make learning to read and write Arabic difficult for me, as I'd have to learn how the word is spelled with English characters in order to translate to the Arabic Characters. Is there a standard way? I've not looked at any lessons here but the audio ones. I downloaded them all so I can listen to them, and I printed the transcripts, though I generally only use those the first time, just to help me to know what is being said. Would it make more sense to do the reading/writing lessons AS I do the audio ones? At the moment I have NO ability whatsoever to read or write Arabic
I have a few questions :)
