boukhar بخار
Moroccan Darija · noun
“boukhar” (بخار) is a noun in Moroccan Darija meaning water vapor, steam.
Meanings
- water vapor, steam
- condensation, mist
Usage
Boukhar means the steam that rises from a pot, a hot dish, or a hammam room. It is used with the article: lboukhar. Typical verbs are tle3 ("to rise") and khrej ("to come out"). It is often encountered in cooking, in connection with steaming, notably of couscous. The pitfall is its closeness to bkhour, "incense", which is a completely different word. The spellings bokhar and bo5ar represent the same pronunciation.
Example
البخار كيطلع من الكاميلة
lboukhar kayTla3 mn lgamila
“Steam is rising from the pot.”
How to write it in Latin letters
In Arabizi, Darija written in Latin letters, you will find “boukhar” but also “bokhar”, “bo5ar” and “bou5ar”. No spelling is official: people write the sounds as they hear them.
Digits stand in for Arabic letters that have no Latin equivalent: 5 is kha (خ), like the ch in Scottish loch.