Jak sie masz? Dobrze?

Last night I attended something rare for Alexandria, a party with live music by a very good young Egyptian DJ from Cairo - NEOBYRD. The bar - Hooligans - was packed, even though it was a Wednesday, there were many familiar faces (including some of the many fans of our amazing Amy, whose pictures of Alexandria illustrated the set), some unfamiliar ones a well, including quite unexpected doubles of Jay and Silent Bob (even if Silent Bob, in this version,  resembling a neo-nazi Salafi - boasting a shiny bold head and a striking red beard, and both of them on acid, rather then bongo). All in all, it was a very good party and a great success for the organizers. Well done, girls!

After the concert, I exchanged a few words with the DJ, and the conversation went more or less like this:

- Hey, good show!

- Thank you. Are you from Germany?

- Poland.

- Jak sie masz? Dobrze?

- Wow, you had a Polish girlfriend or what?

- Yes. But she was half Polish-half Egyptian. 

- Aha, cool.

So many Egyptians fire this formula at me, once they hear the word "Poland", it's lead me to wonder if there is a secret army of Polish girls roaming the country, teaching Egyptian guys to say "Jak sie masz? Dobrze?!" ... Of course the explanation is probably much less exciting than that. "Jak sie masz? Dobrze?" simply means "How are you? Well?" and there wouldn't be anything especially strange about Egyptian guys knowing how to say it (I guess it's better than what the Americans usually say, anyway: "Kielbasa. Kurwa. Kocham cie.", which translates into "Sausage. Fuck. I love you"), except that this is something that nobody in Poland would normally ever say ... The reason being that such a greeting, while theoretically being proper Polish, in fact, does not exist in the culture or mentality ... And this is something Egyptians would never understand, because in their culture no greeting is complete without an exchange of "how are you" said in at least 3 different ways ...

Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (1/12) Movie CLIP - Another Day at the Quick Stop (2001)