3jeb عجب
Algerian Darja · verb
“3jeb” (عجب) is a verb in Algerian Darja meaning to please someone, be liked.
Meanings
- to please someone, be liked
- wonder, amazing thing (noun)
Usage
The verb 3jeb works like "to please" in English. The thing liked is the subject and the person is a suffixed pronoun: 3jebni "it pleased me", 3ejbatni "she/it pleased me", ma 3jebnich "it didn't please me". The pitfall is to copy "I like" with the person as subject: the construction has to be reversed. In the present, you say ya3jebni "it pleases me". The noun 3jeb or 3ajab is also used as an exclamation to say that something is surprising, often with a hint of reproach. It appears in the written formula 3ajab 3ojab "unheard-of thing".
Example
الماكلة عجباتني بزاف
el makla 3ejbatni bezzaf
“I really liked the food.”
How to write it in Latin letters
In Arabizi, Darija written in Latin letters, you will find “3jeb” but also “3jab”, “3ajab”, “ajeb” and “3ajeb”. No spelling is official: people write the sounds as they hear them.
Digits stand in for Arabic letters that have no Latin equivalent: 3 is ayn (ع), a voiced sound from deep in the throat with no English equivalent.
Type “3jeb” on the Arabic keyboard
In Moroccan Darija
Spelt the same way in Arabic, the word also exists in Moroccan Darija, where it means “to please someone, be liked”; “to impress, win over”: 3jeb in Moroccan.
In Tunisian Derja
Spelt the same way in Arabic, the word also exists in Tunisian Derja, where it means “to please, to appeal to someone”; “to amaze, surprise (fixed sense)”: 3jeb in Tunisian.