Modern spoken Hebrew has many words borrowed from other languages, especially from Arabic (aHla okhel “great food”), English (oTo “car, auto”) and Yiddish (shpritz “spray, sprinkle”). The word oToTo is an adverb borrowed from Yiddish oToT, similar to chiq-chaq, meaning “right away, one-two-three, in a jiffy”* (as from the German Zickzack, comes zigzag, like a lightning). The latter serves as the name of several Israeli companies that offer quick service, including an American textbook for studying Hebrew: “Chik-chak!: A gateway to modern Hebrew grammar,” by Lewis Glinert (1991).
*At times just: chiq or bechiq. An opposite, but less common, Yiddish expression is Chap-lapp “a sloppy work, done too fast”; Arabic khafif “light, wishy-washy,” and one who does such work is a khafifnik. Reduplication may be used for both bad and good things: ooey-gooey, hanky-panky, hoity-toity, but also lovey-dovey, super-duper, tip-top (used in Hebrew, as well).
Yona Sabar is a professor of Hebrew and Aramaic in the department of Near Eastern Languages & Cultures at UCLA
