ضباب
“ضباب” (даабааб) — fog in Arabic. Noun, level A2. The d is emphatic, and the long aa stretches: "dhaabaab", not "dhabab". In a live sentence: “في الصباح ضباب كثيف على الطريق” — In the morning there is thick fog on the road. Written with the characters ض, ب, ا, ب. A word from the everyday Arabic course, level A2.
In short
| Written in Arabic | ضباب |
| Read in Latin letters | даабааб |
| Translation | fog |
| Part of speech | noun |
| Level | A2 |
How to pronounce it
The d is emphatic, and the long aa stretches: "dhaabaab", not "dhabab"
Why it looks that way
Morning fog over the road is dhaabaab as-sabaah. The doubled aa is the mark of length: the word stretches, like the fog itself along the valley
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- في الصباح ضباب كثيف على الطريقфи ас-сабаах даабааб кясииф аля ат-тариикIn the morning there is thick fog on the road
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “fog” in Arabic?
«ضباب», read “даабааб”. The d is emphatic, and the long aa stretches: "dhaabaab", not "dhabab". In a live sentence: “في الصباح ضباب كثيف على الطريق” — In the morning there is thick fog on the road. Noun, level A2; written with the characters ض, ب, ا, ب.
How is “ضباب” written in Latin letters?
даабааб. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
Morning fog over the road is dhaabaab as-sabaah. The doubled aa is the mark of length: the word stretches, like the fog itself along the valley. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.