pronunciation of الثقافه (culture)

OK, I've been stumped on this one for many months now and I'm hoping someone can help...

In the "Relationship Advice" lesson,  ( https://members.rocketlanguages.com/members/arabic/lessons/728/6-4_relationship-advice ), the word الثقافه is used for 'culture'.  I looked it up in a dictionary and on google and it's definitely the correct spelling and translation.  In the audio however, I have listened to Amira and Hany say it over and over again and I swear it sounds like they're using an 's' sound instead of 'th'!   Everywhere I've looked, 'ث' is pronounced 'th' or sometimes 't', but never 's'.   Since I was listening in my car and for months I thought the were saying السقافه, but that doesn't appear to be a word at all!

So am I audio-hallucinating and hearing incorrectly?  Maybe it's just me?  Or is there some sort of rule or situation where 'ث' can be pronounced as 'س'?

On a different topic...  The first time they  reenact the conversation for the "Relationship Advice" lesson, they play the role-reversed mode instead of the normal one and then go on to discuss it as if it was the regular one!  Either the audio post processing engineer flipped it on accident, or Hany and Amira are playing a prank on the moderator :-)

Hello Ph0t0n
Thank you for your feedback.
Actually you're definitely not audio-hallucinating :) I might be surprising you with this but yes! Egyptians do pronounce most of the words that start with a ث in MSA as س and this is actually extremely common in Egyptian dialect. Some more examples are ثروة (meaning treasure) is pronounced as "Sarwah" and ثورة (meaning revolution) is pronounced as "Sawrah". And to make you more prepared, don't panic if you also find some words that start with ث in MSA pronounced as ت in Egyptian dialect. One of the examples can be ثانى (meaning second) which is pronounced as "Tani" in Egyptian dialect.
I'm sorry to say that unfortunately there is no specific rule for this as it's a dialect. All you have to do is to keep on listening and listening to Egyptians speaking together. You're already doing a great job!

Hello again Ph0t0n
You're right about the conversation. Actually my only explanation to this now is that it's beneficial to listen to the same conversation from both a male and a female to notice the difference that occurs to the pronouns when they are discussing the same issue.
However, I will definitely forward your concern to the person in charge and make sure that this switch has been intentional.
Thank you and best regards.

Hello Ph0t0n
Kindly note that your concern regarding the audio has been fixed.
Thank you for your feedback.

Thanks eiman-k-elmasry!!  That certainly explains a lot!  I already knew the ث could sound like ت, but I had no idea it could be س as well.  I wish I had known that earlier...  ثانية واحدة would have been much easier to memorize! :-)

So many things to learn, so little time.  Sometimes I love this language... and sometimes it drives me crazy - so many dialects and so many ways to say the same thing!

egyptians always breaking rules lol

as gim and tha

good post!