It could also just be English if you only speak English.
In Khmer, there’s a phrase “មិនដឹងខ្យល់” which literally translates to “Doesn’t know wind” as in they’re so dumb they don’t even know what wind is.
I guess it’s kind of like calling someone an air head but from a different angle.
There’s an expression in French, “enculage de mouches”. Literally means “fucking flies in the ass” and, figuratively, refers to being impossibly pedantic and nitpicky. Closest equivalent in English would be “splitting hairs” I think
Oh we got that here too “flue knepperi” fly fucking
When I was young, myself and a group of friends were being accosted by a disheveled man on our walk home from the bar. We didn’t really understand what he was saying, but we were able to discern one phrase, as he told us to “Put the pussy on a chain wax”
We had no idea what it meant, and thought it was hilarious, so we’d oft repeat it at random.
Thinking about it now, I suddenly realize what he meant. He was referring to the woman in our group, telling us to pimp her out, by putting her up against a chain-link fence that were so plentiful in rough neighborhoods where we grew up.
So now I’m telling you, so that if you ever encounter this gentleman, you’ll know what he’s talking about 😶👍
If you ever see that guy, you better draxx them sclounce!
Argentine here! Some of my favourites:
" Para andar a los pedos más vale cagarse "
Roughly translates to: “better shit yourself instead of going farting around” Worth noting: “andar a los pedos” also means being in a hurry.
" A caballo regalado no se le mira los dientes "
Roughly translates to: “Don’t look at the teeth of a gifted horse”, meaning you don’t look for defects in things that have been handed to you.
" Siempre hay un roto para un descosido "
I think the English equivalent is “there’s a lid for every pot”.
" Lo atamos con alambre "
Translates to: “tie it down with wire”. Usually refers to get something going even if it’s barebones or a shaky fix.
I’ll be thinking of more and maybe drop another comment later.
I like the horse one way more than the English saying “don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” Yours makes way more sense
“Don’t look at the teeth of a gifted horse”
“don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” Yours makes way more sense
Um, it’s the same statement: One could be a direct translation of the other. How can one make more sense?
One is phrased with specificity, implying the action is extremely particular. The other one makes it sound like the horse is likely to bite you if you’re looking in its mouth too closely
I always thought it was about how good were the horse’s teeth, since older horses usually get dental health issues and that usually has to do with how much care it had and / or it’s age.
“I have to see a man about a horse.”
It means you’re going to the bathroom.
I’ve heard the size of the animal denotes how long they will take and/or how urgently they need to leave.
Brb, I gotta go take a Brontosaurus.
Ukrainian “не лізь поперед батька в пекло” (“don’t rush to hell before your father”) - a mix of “don’t be foolish / try to prove yourself / hurt yourself doing so” and also “let experienced people do their job / lead”.
Also Ukrainian “або пан або пропав” (“Either [you become] a lord, or you disappear”), an important risky choice, or sometimes used as YOLO of yesteryear.
“Correo de las brujas” translates to “the witches’ mail” and means gossip or rumors. Kind of like “heard it through the grapevine” or a “a little birdie told me”
“Jeg bryr meg katta”
literally “I care like a cat”, meaning “I don’t care in the slightest and talking more about it is an insult to my time”.
It’s fallen mostly out of use, but I’m hanging on.
That’s such a cool phrase though
are you perchance Norwegian? jeg lærer norsk (faren min er norsk, det er teknisk sett andrespråket mitt men jeg bruker det ikke mye. nå jeg lærer mer)
hvis du er dansk, jeg beklager at forveksler de to, men hvis du er norsk, det er hyggelig å se folk som snakker språket
ikke bry deg, dansk bruker “mig”. jeg glemte
Haha, ikke noe problem. Godt observert!
Hehe. Selv om vi nordmenn er litt brutale i språket og ofte tolkes som uhøflige, så betyr «ikke bry deg» noe sånt som «mind your own business». «Glem det» (never mind) fungerer kanskje bedre.
tusen takk! jeg har hørt „nieważne” i polsk også, som betyr “det er ikke viktig”, og jeg tror at det er «неважно» med samme betydning
Muntlig ville jeg nok brukt det. «(det er) ikke så viktig, kom på at ….»
You’re mustard
English. It’s a good thing, means the person is awesome.
You’re mustard for teaching me this!
- Flat out like a lizard drinking
- We’re not here to fuck spiders
- As dry as a dead dingo’s donger
- Forty cents short of a shout
- A few kangaroos loose in the top paddock
What does we’re not here to fuck spiders refer to?
Besides the literal
It implies we are here to do something more productive than fucking spiders
We’re not here to fuck spiders
Borrowing this one
I don’t speak German, but I picked up a few phrases for work. They have a few idioms that I think of sometimes:
“Ich glaub, ich spinne” which means I think I’m crazy, but literally translates to “I think, I spider.” It’s a great visual metaphor, being overwhelmed by the threads going everywhere that you imagine you’re a spider spinning a web, and also you’ve entirely forgotten grammar.
“Bahnhof verstehen” or “Ich verstehe nur Bahnhof” means “I understand only the train station.” It’s something you say when you don’t understand anything, you’re completely lost, and you don’t give a shit becaue you just want to get the fuck home.
I might be off on those translations or the subtext, but that’s how I understood it.
and also you’ve entirely forgotten grammar.
That’s a misinterpretation. The German “spinne” is a proper verb in that sentence, like “to spin” in English.
So it can be what a spider does, but also what political doctors do, and the latter is the context here?
Not fluent at all, but I always parsed “Ich glaub, ich spinne” as “I feel like my head is spinning”
No, it’s not “spin” like a top or top be dizzy. There’s a bunch of meanings, and some are similar to those two, but none fit for dizzy.
“Head is spinning” is a metaphor. Literally tanslating metaphors doesn’t usually work, which is why this thread is interesting
The “Bahnhof verstehen” comes from the notion that many people learning a foreign language start with some simple sentences like “Can you tell me the way to the train station”. So people who only “Bahnhof verstehen” (OK, horrible grammar here) have not proceed past the first lesson.
My understanding is that is came from soldiers returning from WWI who did not speak enough German to communicate, but were seeking the trains home.
In Egyptian arabic we have
The world is a cucumber one day it’s in your hand, the other it’s in your ass
(Kama todeen todaan) Literal translation: As you give debt, you will owe debt. Alternative is as you judge you will be judged. Basically what goes around comes around
Do you have a feather on your head? When some one asks for special treatment, this is usually a response to that. Feather on his head is a reference to the sultan.
We stayed quiet so he came in with his donkey. Or we let him be, so he came with his donkey The proverb means don’t let people walk all over you
Show me the width of your shoulders Something I heard a lot growing up, basically means go away. To show the width of your shoulders, you show your back, hence the expression
The first one is absolutely hilarious!
Kill two birds with one stone.Get two birds stoned at once. 😎Stone two birds with one hit.
“Butt fuck Egypt (BFE),” when referring to being in the middle of nowhere or the far edges of a parking area. For example, Sally complained to her friend in the food court, “I had to park all the way in BFE. I’m dreading the walk back to the car.”
That’s actually quite an interestingly accurate one, considering that something like 95% of Egyptians live near the Nile River, and anywhere that is NOT near the Nile is desert wasteland.
Other accurate analogies would be anywhere in Canada that is NOT near its’ southern border, or nearly anywhere/everywhere in inland Australia, they call it the Outback for a reason.
Nice. In German we have “am Arsch der Welt”, lit. translating to “at the arse of the world” to refer to the middle of nowhere
Bruh where is this?
New England, at least. BFE is half the state of Maine, but also the furthest spots in the Hannaford parking lot.
Growing up in the Midwest, I’ve heard BFE countless times.
We use “bum fuck nowhere” in Michigan, at least in my experience.
Why Egypt specifically? I’ve heard the phrase bumfuck nowhere before.
C’est la vie. Because it is what it is.
