|
 |
Negative traits attributed to others | ||
Tags: Cultural Identity | Idiom | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| Saif Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5406 days ago 122 posts - 208 votes  Speaks: English*, Arabic (Levantine)*, French | Message 9 of 74 03 May 2010 at 4:21am | IP Logged | ||
|
A "Puerto Rican shower" is spraying Axe all over your body in replace of a shower.
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Tally Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Israel Joined 5402 days ago 135 posts - 176 votes Speaks: English*, Modern Hebrew* Studies: French | Message 10 of 74 03 May 2010 at 10:00am | IP Logged | ||
|
How about 'French kiss'?
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Tally Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Israel Joined 5402 days ago 135 posts - 176 votes Speaks: English*, Modern Hebrew* Studies: French | Message 11 of 74 03 May 2010 at 10:01am | IP Logged | ||
|
Oh wait that's not negative but still...
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5128 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 12 of 74 03 May 2010 at 10:06am | IP Logged | ||
You are probably right!! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Danac Diglot Senior Member Denmark Joined 5142 days ago 162 posts - 257 votes Speaks: Danish*, English Studies: German, Serbo-Croatian, French, Russian, Esperanto | Message 13 of 74 03 May 2010 at 3:18pm | IP Logged | ||
|
We have some terms like this in Danish, too...
If we want to say that someone was very drunk, we might say that person was "grønlænderstiv" or "svenskerstiv", meaning "drunk as a Greenlander/Swede". A very stubborn or firm belief in something is called "tyrkertro", Turkish faith. Often, it will be negative in use. An unmarried couple living together could be said to "leve på polsk", ie. "living in Polish". You might say that something is "en by i Rusland" (a town in Russia), thereby implying that there is a general lack of this, or that it is unknown. Something like "Kundeservice var en by i Rusland", ie. costumer service was a town in Russia, ie. there was no customer service, or very poor customer service. Edited by Danac on 03 May 2010 at 4:09pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Tally Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Israel Joined 5402 days ago 135 posts - 176 votes Speaks: English*, Modern Hebrew* Studies: French | Message 14 of 74 03 May 2010 at 3:39pm | IP Logged | ||
|
Wow that's a lot! :)
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Danac Diglot Senior Member Denmark Joined 5142 days ago 162 posts - 257 votes Speaks: Danish*, English Studies: German, Serbo-Croatian, French, Russian, Esperanto | Message 15 of 74 03 May 2010 at 5:57pm | IP Logged | ||
Well, there's more to come. I knew there had to be something I'd forgotten, so here's some more. "Han har ikke en kinamands chance" translates to "he doesn't have a Chinaman's chance", and it means "he doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell". You can also go on a "fransk visit" which is a "French visit". It basically means a short visit, and isn't really negative or positive. If you swear a lot, you could "bande som en tyrk", which is "swear like a Turk". If everything is going very badly, it would be "at gå helt ad Pommern til", which means "going to Pomerania". And if you look like "døden fra Lübeck", the Death from Lübeck, you look very ill or sick. Most of these expressions tend to be slightly on the archaic side, but might still be used occasionally. Edited by Danac on 03 May 2010 at 8:40pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| nogoodnik Senior Member United States Joined 5363 days ago 372 posts - 461 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Modern Hebrew, Biblical Hebrew, Russian, French | Message 16 of 74 03 May 2010 at 8:32pm | IP Logged | ||
|
In Yiddish there are those lovable but light-minded jews of Chelm who are the subjects of tons of jokes. I never thought Chelm actually existed, but apparently it's a city in Poland.
Here's an example in English: Two men of Chelm went out for a walk, when suddenly it began to rain. "Quick," said one. "Open your umbrella." "It won't help," said his friend. "My umbrella is full of holes." "Then why did you bring it?" "I didn't think it would rain!" Chelmer yiddin zeynen nit klug! 4 persons have voted this message useful |
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
