how to say “hamster” in Hebrew

Correction to earlier post: A couple of readers pointed out to me that while Israel’s diamond exchange is located in Ramat Gan, the stock exchange is in Tel Aviv. This information is now reflected in the corresponding post. אַכְזָבָה[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/אכזבה-1.mp3″ /] Disappointment is that feeling we get after being let down after we had formed an expectation….

[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/לכעוס-1.m4a” /]לִכְעוֹס In English, most emotion words are adjectives: sad, happy, angry, afraid, excited, etc. In Hebrew, most of these words either are verbs or could be verbs, so that we have: לשמוח[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/לכעוס-2.m4a” /] – to rejoice or to be happy (להיות שמח[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/לכעוס-3.m4a” /] – literally, to be happy – is more common) לפחד[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/לכעוס-4.m4a” /]…

[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/לרוקן-1.m4a” /]לְרוֹקֵן If you’ve got basic Hebrew down, you may know the Hebrew word for empty – ריק[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/לרוקן-2.m4a” /] for masculine objects and ריקה[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/לרוקן-3.m4a” /] for feminine ones. For example: [audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/לרוקן-4.m4a” /]למה הכוס שלך ריקה? Why is your (a male’s) glass empty? Modern Hebrew takes this Biblical word and plugs it into…

[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/פרא-אדם-1.m4a” /]פֶּרֶא אָדָם Earlier this week we saw that the Hebrew word פרוע[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/פרא-אדם-2.m4a” /] means wild or loose. Though the letters א[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/פרא-אדם-3.m4a” /] and ע[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/פרא-אדם-4.m4a” /] had two (well, actually three) distinct sounds in Biblical Hebrew, these were close enough that sometimes an א might replace an ע. This seems to be the case with the word…