English	Transliteration	Arabic	
Sunday in Arabic	al-‘ahad	الأحد	
Monday in Arabic	al-‘ithnayn	الإثنين	
Tuesday in Arabic	al-thulaathaa’	الثلاثاء	
Wednesday in Arabic	al-‘arbi’aa’	الأربعاء	
Thursday in Arabic	al-khamees	الخميس	
Friday in Arabic	al-jum’ah	الجمعة	
Saturday in Arabic	al-sabt	السبت	

Facts about Friday and Saturday

Now, as you see, Friday in Arabic is not related to any number. It derives from the verb “to gather” (aljuma3a). In the Arabic-speaking regions, Islam has been the dominant religion historically speaking. Friday is the day of prayers and meeting with family and friends.

Interestingly, Saturday actually means “day of the sabbath”, and it’s actually from where we get the English word Sabbath. To clarify, Saturdays are the Sabbath day for Jews, where there is an abstinence from work or labor. It does not hold much meaning for the Muslim majority countries. The weekend consisted of Thursday and Friday in the Arab world. However, due to globalization and needing to interact with the western world for business purposes made a few countries shift the traditional Thursday – Friday weekend to Friday – Saturday.

There are still a few countries that practice the traditional weekend, like Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and Oman. However, Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Qatar, the Sudan, Syria, and the UAE use the Friday-Saturday weekend. What is interesting is that Lebanon, Morocco, and Tunisia actually use a Saturday-Sunday weekend. Lebanon actually used to be a Christian majority at some point (now it’s a 50-50 population), so having Saturday and Sunday makes sense.

In conclusion, Kaleela not only does it provide Modern Standard Arabic lessons, but also for commonly spoken dialects.