I know what you mean. I tried finding a good translation for "Itj færra nålles", but it doesn't even make much sense in Norwegian. It literally translates to something like "Don't go do something one way or the other", but it really means "Take care"/"Don't get yourself into trouble".
Whoa, where's that expression from? For all I know it can be anywhere between Trondheim and Romsdalen. That's my guess anyways
It's from Trøndelag. I grew up in Trondheim, and never used it myself, but I heard it being used every now and then, especially by older people.
Here in Californy, the only real diversity in languages is English and Spanish. Instead of guessing what isn't in other languages, I will quote Demetri Martin's special sayings. (He's on a TV show for those of you who dont know.)
This place is a snail's A**hole
Hard to find
You're farting next to a waterfall
You're doing somthing bad, but no one will notice
Short-Sleeved Magicion
You can always see what's coming next with this guy
Log Twoddleing
Making it seem like something really dirtty when it is infact: Nothing
All of the Australian idioms posted so far are also British ones. I've often heard of things that people think of as being stereotypically Australian which are actually just as common in Britain
(Apart from "let's put another shrimp on the barbie", which I happen to know that you guys say, like, all the time)
A situation or person that has bad vibes or intentions
Tener la caña. To have a cane.
To have a hangover
A few in portuguese
Um cara chato. A boring face
A boring guy
Um jeitinho brasileiro. A brazilian small way.
To give an unortodox solution to a problem, without caring too much for rules or thinking outside the box if you prefer
Cada macaco no seu galho. Each monkey in its own branch.
It's something along the lines of live and let live. Mind your own business and don't care if other people do crazy stuff. As long as they don't annoy you it's OK.
The weird thing is that it's used by people who aren't catholic. It's kind of like "unorthodox" is used by people who aren't orthodox.
I guess it's mostly for been almost a culture which was developed with Catholic Roots.
There's a lunfardo word (Lunfardo is a special slang from the Ports of Argentina and Uruguay and was adapted in Chile by criminals. That's for long time ago, and now it's common use in almost all Social Classes here) which is "Pulento", meaning something which is Awesome. Then there's some people which call God "El Pulento" (The Pulento).
"Tienes cara de poto" - Literally "You have an ass face"
Something bad happened to that person (He didn't sleep or he's angry or whathever) and it's show
Funny, we have a very similar one for more or less the same meaning (more the no sleep one though), but we'll say "avoir la tête DANS le cul" ("to have one's head up one's butt")
I love rhyming slang, even though i never bothered memorizing any of it.
I'll try to remember that one, tho
Ever heard of Terry Pratchett's spin on it ?
¿La dura?
The hard one? Really?
We might say "avoir la gaulle" for that one, and i never quite understood it myself (la gaulle (or gaule ? can't remember) is basically the what France was called in the roman empire period. So "to have the france/gaule/country ?? i'm sure it comes from something totally unrelated, but it still sounds pretty weird).
We might say "avoir la gaulle" for that one, and i never quite understood it myself (la gaulle (or gaule ? can't remember) is basically the what France was called in the roman empire period. So "to have the france/gaule/country ?? i'm sure it comes from something totally unrelated, but it still sounds pretty weird).
"Gaulle" is the old country name, "gaule" is in the expression and is the word for a fishing rod. The expression makes perfect sense, except it means having an erection, and not "Really?" like the one you quoted. I think you have a dirty mind
"Gaulle" is the old country name, "gaule" is in the expression and is the word for a fishing rod. The expression makes perfect sense, except it means having an erection, and not "Really?" like the one you quoted.
Oh right, it does make a lot of sense sense after all.
So spelling and fishing can actually be useful, i guess :eek:
I think you have a dirty mind
Hey, who doesn't ?
Slang rarely deals with "undirty" topics anyway.
@Kroms You won't know it even in Arabic. It's basically from my dad's hometown, and, interestingly enough, Ethiopia! There were quite a few people of Ethiopian descent who lived there, or had been at some time, so they probably brought it with them.
There's another expression from his town that goes, "Where's your ear, ya Habishi?" (Habishi being a family name and the word for an Ethiopian. There are a lot of names like this in the Gulf.) That expression is what you say
when someone came up with a really complicated way to do something, or took the long way to get home. It supposedly comes from when an adult asked a little kid where their ear was, and the child wrapped their arm around their head to grab their opposite ear. Of course there's well folk knowledge in my father's town that a kid can't grab their ear like that until they're four. Younger than that and their arms are too short to reach, so maybe the kid was just showing off how big they'd gotten?
And the hyena one means ...
It's raining while it's sunny with a blue sky. A rare occurrence, but it happened here just yesterday, in fact.
I think the idea behind that one is that hyenas are odd/unlucky creatures so a weird, super rare day would be their kind of day.
Of course there's well folk knowledge in my father's town that a kid can't grab their ear like that until they're four. Younger than that and their arms are too short to reach
¿La dura?
Anyone got an under-4 child we can borrow to support the spirit of scientific enquiry? I want to know whether this is true or not!
It's raining while it's sunny with a blue sky. A rare occurrence, but it happened here just yesterday, in fact.
I think the idea behind that one is that hyenas are odd/unlucky creatures so a weird, super rare day would be their kind of day.
In French, "God's marrying his daughter and beating his wife".
EDIT: also weather related, if something super weird happened, you say "it's going to snow!" (the reasoning being that since it doesn't snow often, not even every year, it's something rare).
Or if someone sings poorly you say it's going to rain (their singing will make it rain), I'm not sure how common that is elsewhere. That's the whole thing behind how the bard in Astérix (Assurancetourix) makes it rain when he sings.
In French, "God's marrying his daughter and beating his wife".
EDIT: also weather related, if something super weird happened, you say "it's going to snow!" (the reasoning being that since it doesn't snow often, not even every year, it's something rare).
Or if someone sings poorly you say it's going to rain (their singing will make it rain), I'm not sure how common that is elsewhere. That's the whole thing behind how the bard in Astérix (Assurancetourix) makes it rain when he sings.
I'm pretty damn sure i never heard the first two The first one especially sounds pretty weird to me.
Where in france did you live ? Maybe those two are more local ones.
Where in france did you live ? Maybe those two are more local ones.
Paris. And I heard at least the second one very often. Really, you've never heard something lke "Quoi, t'as fait la vaisselle ? Hé bah, il va neiger !"
The first one is a bit old I guess, I've only heard it from older people.
Maybe i did and forgot.
It does make sense, but just wouldn't have thought of it (and we probably get even less snow around here than in paris).
Then again, maybe that's just where i'm from. People from anywhere else all assure us that we've got a whole bunch of words and expressions no one else uses, but i never noticed a difference myself.
It generally means something huge/important but that nobody talks about and people seem to try to ignore. Never heard it used for a person though.
Yeah. It's sometimes used in politics when they address lots of small issues first, before moving on to a bigger policy "and now we come to the elephant in the room".
That's why that one Gus Van Sant movie is titled "Elephant".
I'm sure there's also one about an elephant in a porcelain store (expression, not a movie), meaning an accident about to happen or something like that.
And while we're speaking of animals, don't sell the bear's hide before you shoot it, and don't look a given horse in the mouth.
Comments
Holding a bull by its horns -
Stretching a leg, or stretching a paw -
It's from Trøndelag. I grew up in Trondheim, and never used it myself, but I heard it being used every now and then, especially by older people.
This place is a snail's A**hole
(Apart from "let's put another shrimp on the barbie", which I happen to know that you guys say, like, all the time)
I heard that it was pretty much all they could say
jaysus gosh and begara
They also have to say "mate" between clauses. Not only is it a natural part of their speech, but it's actually the law over there.
But you live in England, the word "mate" is pretty much a punctuation mark to you lot
Here we have a couple of ones. The one I remember now is "Go to the Backyard of the Silent People" (Ir al patio de los callados)
Also: "Go to the peak of the hill" (Ándate a la punta del cerro)
¿La dura? The hard one?
Mala onda... Bad wave...
Tener la caña. To have a cane.
A few in portuguese
Um cara chato. A boring face
Um jeitinho brasileiro. A brazilian small way.
Cada macaco no seu galho. Each monkey in its own branch.
And when someone answers, "la dura" it's a reafirmation of
And remember another one.
Al tiro! at the shooting/pulling
lol right! Al tiro is used a lot over here. :-D
Something that's not catholic
The weird thing is that it's used by people who aren't catholic. It's kind of like "unorthodox" is used by people who aren't orthodox.
I guess it's mostly for been almost a culture which was developed with Catholic Roots.
There's a lunfardo word (Lunfardo is a special slang from the Ports of Argentina and Uruguay and was adapted in Chile by criminals. That's for long time ago, and now it's common use in almost all Social Classes here) which is "Pulento", meaning something which is Awesome. Then there's some people which call God "El Pulento" (The Pulento).
I'm so glad it's not just Aussies contributing these ugly stains to the otherwise rich and beautiful tapestry of the English language.
This one I think is specifically British:
Go for an oily -
Same thing with "that's not kosher".
Come to think of it, yeah.
I'm Spanish and I've never heard of them.
Funny, we have a very similar one for more or less the same meaning (more the no sleep one though), but we'll say "avoir la tête DANS le cul" ("to have one's head up one's butt")
French, the language of love, uh :rolleyes: ?
I love rhyming slang, even though i never bothered memorizing any of it.
I'll try to remember that one, tho
Ever heard of Terry Pratchett's spin on it ?
We might say "avoir la gaulle" for that one, and i never quite understood it myself (la gaulle (or gaule ? can't remember) is basically the what France was called in the roman empire period. So "to have the france/gaule/country ?? i'm sure it comes from something totally unrelated, but it still sounds pretty weird).
"Gaulle" is the old country name, "gaule" is in the expression and is the word for a fishing rod. The expression makes perfect sense, except it means having an erection, and not "Really?" like the one you quoted. I think you have a dirty mind
Oh right, it does make a lot of sense sense after all.
So spelling and fishing can actually be useful, i guess :eek:
Hey, who doesn't ?
Slang rarely deals with "undirty" topics anyway.
There's an expression that I think applies in this situation...
"Pot calling the kettle black"
Clerks in Britain:
Costumer enters:
"Pack of fags"
"You're a fag!"
"It's a cigarette mate."
"I'm not you're mate fag!"
Randal attacks the costumer.
Chilean. Nice to meet you.
(Some people say we're a botomless hole of slang. Doesn't help we have imported words from like 3 languajes ^^!)
We have a similar one like owls in the moss, but ours goes "there's a viper below the grass".
"He's got an egg"
"His coin drops"
"I'm cleaning my shovel"
"He's lying under the slipper"
There's another expression from his town that goes, "Where's your ear, ya Habishi?" (Habishi being a family name and the word for an Ethiopian. There are a lot of names like this in the Gulf.) That expression is what you say
And the hyena one means ...
¿La dura?
Anyone got an under-4 child we can borrow to support the spirit of scientific enquiry? I want to know whether this is true or not!
Thanks Lena, I'll probably need to use this knowledge to avert a life-threatening situation one day.
In other news, I learned a new British expression today:
Send to Coventry -
In French, "God's marrying his daughter and beating his wife".
EDIT: also weather related, if something super weird happened, you say "it's going to snow!" (the reasoning being that since it doesn't snow often, not even every year, it's something rare).
Or if someone sings poorly you say it's going to rain (their singing will make it rain), I'm not sure how common that is elsewhere. That's the whole thing behind how the bard in Astérix (Assurancetourix) makes it rain when he sings.
"There's eel under rock"
I'm pretty damn sure i never heard the first two
Where in france did you live ? Maybe those two are more local ones.
Paris. And I heard at least the second one very often. Really, you've never heard something lke "Quoi, t'as fait la vaisselle ? Hé bah, il va neiger !"
The first one is a bit old I guess, I've only heard it from older people.
It does make sense, but just wouldn't have thought of it (and we probably get even less snow around here than in paris).
Then again, maybe that's just where i'm from. People from anywhere else all assure us that we've got a whole bunch of words and expressions no one else uses, but i never noticed a difference myself.
Out of the frying pan, and into the fire:
my favorite is The Elephant in the Room.
I dont remember if it means the person stands out or the person should stand out but is being ignored
It generally means something huge/important but that nobody talks about and people seem to try to ignore. Never heard it used for a person though.
Yeah. It's sometimes used in politics when they address lots of small issues first, before moving on to a bigger policy "and now we come to the elephant in the room".
I'm sure there's also one about an elephant in a porcelain store (expression, not a movie), meaning an accident about to happen or something like that.
And while we're speaking of animals, don't sell the bear's hide before you shoot it, and don't look a given horse in the mouth.
Don't promise something if you doesn't know if you can do it, I guess.
Because only Chuck Norris can do that =P