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- "أَنْتَ غَنِيّ بِسَبَب إيجاري…
"أَنْتَ غَنِيّ بِسَبَب إيجاري يا أُسْتاذ."
Translation:You are rich because of my rent, sir.
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964
Funny. I have just realized that أُسْتاذ sounds so similar to Spanish usted, the formal version of you. Only that usted is a short form of the baroque courtesy vuestra merced > vuesa merced > usted.
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Apparently, according to Wiktionary, "أُسْتاذ" is actually borrowed from Persian, the word being "استاد" (ostad), which means "skilled person," "master," "expert," or "craftsman." It has gone on to be borrowed in many languages in addition to Arabic, including Hindustani (उस्ताद), Malay (ustaz), and Turkish (usta).
It's bizarre that Duolingo has decided to make their Arabic program MSA with a whole bunch of colloquial words sprinkled in, because this Arabic is in no way Egyptian Arabic.
It doesn't just mean "teacher". It's a title of honor in a somewhat general sense.
Even so: in English English, "sir" hasn't been used in that way for about a hundred years. (American English is different). I wish the English translations could be more idiomatic: it means that, when you are trying to find an English translation, you have to really think hard about what awful obsolete phrasing duolingo might be expecting.
because أُسْتاذ can mean various things. In this context it's just a formal way to address someone, like sir or ma'am.
Professor means teacher and sir both. But here 'sir' is accurate because the speaker is saying the sentence in a condescending tone. Think how we say 'mister' or 'woman' in english at the end of a sentence. It has the same affect.
