What's a word or concept in your language that does not translate very well to English?
Asking non-native English speakers.
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In Spanish.
Sobremesa, the period you stay at the table after lunch or dinner having a coffee or some drinks while chatting.
Aprovechar, is basically the opposite of to waste. So depending on the context is to take advantage of something, to make the most of, make a good use, give a second use or reuse leftovers for something else.
Estrenar: to use/wear something brand new for the very first time. Sometimes when you are estrenando white shoes your classmates in school would try to step on them so they no longer look new.
The old-school English word for aprovechar was "thrift" or being thrifty. These days I hear it used mostly in the specific sense of saving cash. I don't often hear it much anymore in terms of conserving resources, but that is where it came from, and if you use it in that sense people will understand you.
As for sobremesa, that's not something I've enjoyed enough for it to have its own word, unfortunately.
It's weird there's no English word for that, now that you point it out, since it's a pretty common thing.
Botellon: just drinking and socializing outside, usually something a group of underage kids/young people would do. Not a party, not simply getting drunk. Like hanging out but with some alcohol.
Second one is "appreciate" in English.
Not really. "Aproverchar" means more like "I have this things that I would normally throw out but I will used for X instead". You wouldn't say "I had some left over chicken so I appreciated it to make corquetas".
Closer to "appropriate" (the verb, not the adjective) but still not quite, it's too formal
It's not quite that either. The spanish word for "appropriate" is "apropiar", and the meaning is the same. Aprovechar has a different meaning.
I second the person before you, that is literally
appreciate (a thing)Does it count if English just steals your words?
Schadenfreude, Zeitgeist, Weltanschauung, Kindergarten.
Doppelganger, wanderlust, poltergeist...
Stein... oh wait no, spiel.. oops not quite
Blitzkrieg?
Blitzkrieg translates pretty well doesn't it? Fast war?
Lightning being the literal translation but used in the same way as fast.
I always assumed lightning war was just a way of making it sound more interesting, I didn't realise blitz just meant lightning
Perhaps if the meaning is different or altered from the actual word.
The problem is when they steal a word and then change the meaning.
You don't want to go down that road.
"beamer, handy, mobbing, shooting..."
English words, yes? What about them?
I guess you don't speak German, as those are now German words that you might not be able to guess their meanings
Looking forward to "woonerf."
Angst, although that one became more of a false friend: Fear of the unknown vs Teenage BS
Zeitgeist works well as "spirit of the times"; Weltanschauung as "worldview"; and Kindergarten as "pre-school".
That's what English does. Why do you think OP is asking?
It's what every language does, to some extent. You'd really struggle to say, "I was working from home, sending emails and providing feedback, and during a meeting with my team and the marketing manager, the internet died" in German without stuffing the sentence to the brim with English loanwords.
The french: Je ne suis pas d'accord
Plenty in French too! And this is just English; my point is that loanwords are super common.
Russian is more productive than English, so there's a bunch of "we just smushed a bunch of prefixes and suffixes on it" words that don't have a great English equivalent, like недоперепить -- to drink quite a lot but not succeed at drinking too much. I don't think we properly have листопад which is the equivalent of "snowfall" but for autumn leaves. I really miss успевать -- to successfully have enough time to do something. There's also кипяток -- water that has been boiled but then slightly cooled, like 200-205 degrees F. The canonical examples are тоска , which is a kind of melancholy longing, and авось which expresses optimism but I basically never heard anyone actually say.
Never hearing anyone express optimism feels like a very Russian stereotype.
It does seem on-brand.
I think авось has a general meaning similar to "god willing", or "with some luck", not simply some optimism. Like "авось успеем" -> "with some luck, we can make it in time". I do agree it's an old-fashioned word which I haven't really heard in a while.
As someone who speaks the exact bare minimum amount of Russian to get by in Estonia (so basically hello, please, thank you, fuck you, good bye), there's a couple Russian words of the "not in front of your babushka" type that IMO lose a bit of character when translated to the English phrases that mean the same thing:
похуй - universal answer whenever someone raises a concern
хуйня - very versatile word
I'll let you do the honor of translating them.
So, pretty much anything and sometimes exact opposite thing 🥲
Pretty much.
In the context of how I hear it used in Estonia at least, it both means something is very annoying, or it means it's so unimportant it doesn't matter. It also just means "thingamajig". I suspect there are use cases I can't think of right now or ones that I don't even know.
Shaka, when the walls fell
Timba, his arms wide
Sokath, his eyes uncovered!
Darmok and Jalaad, at the bar.
Jalaad in the bathroom the next morning.
Doch
There exists no english equivalent for doch, it has multiple functions, the most known one being an expression that emphatically negates a previous sentiment.
"Does not!"
"Does too!!"
Which created one of the most long lived german memes.
"It should not be that way, but it was."
But doch can do so much more.
Came here for doch. Its one of my favourite words im using arguing with AFD voters and works every time its like a spell.
It fills a big gap in English because there is no single English word to unambiguously answer a question like:
“So you don’t want me to come over this afternoon?”
There would be, if people were able to understand the concept of single negation. But in practice, any single word answer to that question will likely lead to confusion or misunderstanding.
In JavaScript,
this.Buddhist devs meditate frequently on the differences and similarities between
thisandselfGuten Appetit! (German term equivalent to "cheers" for drinking - but for eating.)
That one is really interesting, because a lot of languages has it, from guten apetit, through dobrou chuť to itadakimasu. But english was out of school that day I suppose.
English stole 'Bon Apetit" from French fair and square!
As English often does - if it makes sense in another language and is easy for English speakers to understand the context it's used, they're quite happy stealing it. Especially French.
Loanwords are a thing in every language, especially English loanwords.
That's because English isn't a language, it's three other languages in a trenchcoat, stealing stuff from every other language.
Celtic, western Germanic (Angles, Saxons, Frisian), Latin, northern Germanic (Danish, Norse), and in 1066 finally French (which is a mixing bowl in its own right). The trenchcoat is way more crowded than you think.
Sacrebleu !
Did you mean itadakimasu?
Because that is what you say in Japanese when you start eating but interestingly it doesn't mean "Guten Appetit" (basically "have a nice meal") but "I am (thankfully) going to receive (a nice meal)". While "Guten Appetit" is about others who are eating alongside you, "itadakimasu" is about the speaker.
Wasn't itadakimasu religious in origin? Making it something more like the prayer before the food that English-speaking Christians do - "Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts, which we are about to receive..."?
I wouldn't know. The verb is itadaku which is a humble form of the verb morau, meaning "to receive". The imasu part is basically just polite grammar. If there is anything religious about it, it's obscure.
Good appetite?Oh, looked it up, it's not used in the same manner as German, i never knew 😃
Mahlzeit has no English translation
Head isu!
Gezellig in Dutch. Used to describe a situation that's cosy and fun togetherness. Can also be used to describe a place that looks inviting (to have that good time in). I guess 😃
It's the word extroverts use to blackmail people into coming to social gatherings.
GezelligGeselligSisu. Its a mix of courage, determination, resilience, keeping your nerve, doing a scary or difficult thing even though you know that odds of succeeding are low. Its also done quietly, no complaining or boasting about it. You can mutter some curse words quietly to yourself.
Closest English word for it might be "guts" or "grit". But those don't really explain it completely.
Finnish.
As your southern neighbour, I knew someone would have to mention sisu.
Now someone needs to explain Finland's national emotion, vitutus.
Oh yeah! Vitutus is a great word indeed. I should have used that one lol.
Ismo Alanko Säätiö has a song called Vittu Kun Vituttaa, I would have linked a youtube link here but youtube thinks its age-inapproriate and demands a log in. So I recommend you find it on your preferred music service, https://lyricstranslate.com/en/vittu-kun-vituttaa-fuck-im-so-pissed.html
I know this one. From the title of the movie about one of your lads exacting cinematic vengeance on Nazis.
Beautiful stuff. 💛
I haven't seen that one. Heard its good fun.
Well worth the watch. 👍
Personally I found it way too gory
Yeah I'm leaning on that way as well. I'm not big on these heroic gore festival movies. I'm glad a Finnish movie was successful internationally, but probably not my thing. I might watch it in the next 15 years.
What is the difference between grit and sisu? As in, for you, grit is (this set of qualities) vs sisu is (this set of qualities)?
I am asking because the qualities you used so far... They are grit.
Is this the difference? Everything looks grit to me.
Yep, sounds like "grit".
Theres a sort of Finnish flavor to it. Just like theres grit, then theres Aussie grit. Its kind of difficult to put into words, "grit" is just a part of "sisu", theres more to it.
Sorry, but if you can't articulate the difference I don't believe there is one.
Okay.
Or, hear me out, the word/concept doesn't translate into English well which is why the difference is hard to articulate in English
https://rayaandthelastdragon.fandom.com/wiki/Sisu#cite_note-7
So humble bravery.
Yes but with determination, perseverance and some other stuff added into it.
Kindergarten
This is proof that Germans do have humour!
That is correct, but we spell it without the second "u".
And capitalized
That's how you get kids:
Sow the seed, wait a few years until they are sprouting. Then you pick them up and keep them at home until mature.
German: Tja
Can mean nesrly anything from schadenfreude to deep empathy
Isn't that literally "oh, well"? And the intonation changes if thats empathy or schadenfreude.
Curiously, schadenfreude does not translate to English well :)
The closest English word to shadenfreude is epicaricasy, I believe.
Fjøs is where farm animals are kept. "Barn" is more general and translates to "Låve", while Fjøs doesn't really have an English translation.
Nisse is a mythological creature that is part goblin, part santa, part Gnome, but not really either of them. They're usually benign and pretty cool.
Hygge (noun) /hyggelig (adjective) means having a cosy, lighthearted or fun atmosphere, usually in company of others
EDIT: By the way, Nissen lives in the Låve
Hygge became too popular so that's started making it's way into English. Hopefully that one sticks around. The pronunciation will never be correct though. Nisse sounds awesome though.
What's the difference between a Låve and a Fjøs?
Fjøs is specifically where animals are kept. Låve is more generic, but it's usually where you store stuff such as hay and produce. Sometimes the two are combined into one building and It's common to refer to the ground floor as Fjøs, and the floor above as Låve.
Fjoøs ≈ Paddock or Corral ?
Kind of, but referring more to the building itself.
Animal pen or animal barn.
That one I could never understand why Danish people think it's not "safe and cozy". Everytime they told me about hygge, or described it, etc, it was always safe and cozy. Like a damn Gryffindor common room.
Both of those translations require multiple words. And no, the gryffindor dining room is not hyggelig.
Also, it's not only in danish. Somehow the word became famous as a Danish word.
Hygge seems similar to the english "pleasant", as having a pleasant time or being a pleasant person.
Nisse in the låve sounds like elf on the shelf, but also like it's opposite.
お疲れ様 (good job+"you look tired"+"I an acknowledging this and presenting recognition of your effort")
Keigo modifiers. ご覧 vs 見る. They both mean "look". One is, somehow, more polite.
Kansai dialect. しばいたろか ("wanna get smacked?" but it's playful) or まいど ("thanks" but also "nice to see you again" and "hello" but only in specific contexts between specific people. Mess it up and you'll probably hear the other Kansai term previously described.)
I am having trouble understanding your point here. While cool info I think you might've misunderstood the assignment?
Thank you for the effort? You look tired, must've been a hard day?
This is the best example you have in your comment.
Every language has more and less polite/formal ways to ask about something. "Where do you live" is less polite/formal than "where do you reside".
I am not sure if dialects are words or concepts that dont translate well. The examples you used are more idiomatic rather than unique.
しばいたろうか？
German: Konjunktiv I and II. Most people first learning German will hear the Konjunktiv II in its usage similar to a subjunctive in english ("Wenn das so wäre" - "If it were that way"), but it does so much more. You can switch full sentences to the Konjunktiv II, but that immediately implies that you doubt the statement being presented. For instance, if you say "er hätte es vergessen", you're essentially saying "he allegedly forgot it, but I really doubt it", just by using the Konjunktiv II.
Then, there's the Konjunktiv I, which is similar, but instead of voicing your disapproval, you're staying completely neutral. Taking the example from before, it would be "er habe es vergessen", with which you're saying, "he allegedly forgot it, and I neither support nor disavow that statement" - again, all only with a change of verb form. It's wonderful when you're relaying something someone else said without adding your own evaluation.
I never thought to include German Konjunktiv in this list, but yes, you are right. It may not be a word or phrase, but it is in the spirit of this discussion.
"Kombinować" very Polish word for a very Polish a activity/philosophy. To make things work / get something done / take care of something in way that work for us, but are not the expected way to do things (though, 'kombinowanie' is often actually expected). It might be doing a job using the tools that are available and not thise that should be used, it might be a genuine invention, It might be using your contacts for favour (like getting a doctor appointment), it might be plain cheating.
A little bit like 'hacking' and also can be a good thing or a bad thing.
"Wykombinuję coś" = "don't worry I will take care of that" "Co za kombinator" = "what a cheaty bastard"
Dude, the word you're looking for in English is to hustle.
Source: am Polish.
In Spanish that would be "picaresca" and Spanish people also think it's something that doesn't really exist in other cultures.
There's also scheming, but i don't think either one is a 1 to 1 equivalent.
Scheming nie działa, bo kombinowanie to dużo więcej niż samo knucie planów :)
But I am also not so sure that kombinować is a good example because the other meanings are because it's a homonym.
I am having trouble providing what actually OP asked for.
A few years ago I'd say Maori "mana", but the kids now call it "aura" and it's a direct concept translation.
close cousin to jury-rig
Czech edition of the world is: zbastlit and the resulting product is bastl.
Dreich - there is no direct English equivalent. It's weather that's wet and cold and dark and grey and unchanging. It can also mean depressing and tedious for obvious reasons.
Dreary
Dreary is not necessarily wet or cold.
I would never call hot weather “dreary”
Maybe not, but dark, grey, overcast weather might well be dreary. But it wouldn't be dreich.
Ah, so there has to be active precipitation.
I love it, but if I were to translate it to English, I'd say "miserable". Works for weather (miserable weather is wet and cold and dark and bleh), and it covers the other use cases?
Gloomy
Gloomy is not necessarily wet or cold.
Javertus. (Danish)
It's a thing that sticks out, and you don't know what it is, but it has the function of sticking out. Like a naturally occurring bulgy peak or other unknown long shape coming out of something else.
It's most often used as slang for penis, but otherwise it might be found on trees or wooden objects.
झूठा खाना/पानी (Jhootha khana/pani)
Food/water that is cosumed by someone else and hence is unsuitable for eating/drinking. Especially for religious or devotional rituals.
In the similar vein, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prasada
"Half-eaten food".
Bukkake.
It's just the noun-form of the verb "kakeru", in this context, to pour or splash a liquid, with the intensifier "bu" in front of it to suggest it's done forcefully. Like in bukkake udon, where the broth is splashed onto the udon noodles.
It also has a certain other, rather more precisely defined, meaning.
Yeah that's what I'm jerking off to.
I'm having real trouble thinking of any in Estonian that truly don't have a good translation, there's only one I can think of on the spot like this.
Midagi läbi ussimunni ajama - Literally translated: to drive* something through a worm's dick. Commonly used in car repairs and other similar contexts: Some space is super narrow and you need to put something it through exactly at the correct angle. Can be used with "goes through" as well (käib läbi ussimunni), but even then it's generally still describing some sort of activity, not someone literally walking through a tight spot. I can't think of an English expression that's truly equivalent, though I could just be missing something.
* ajama itself means to drive as in "drive insane" or "steer a herd of cattle", not "drive a car". But also "sitta ajama" = "to bullshit".
Chez
It’s a preposition meaning “at the home/house/place” but can also be use figuratively. Really super cool.
My first room share 'Chez Penez' makes so much more sense now.
Lanche, the meal between lunch and dinner
"Linner" in English, as the obvious counterpart to "brunch."
"Lanche" is completely separate entity from "jantar" (dinner).
When mixed, we call it a "lanche ajantarado" (dinnery lanche).
After that we can have "ceia" which is a late, after dinner meal.
In proper, British English, daily meals are as follows
Lanche is an afternoon tea.
What language is that?
Portuguese
We have "uzsonna" for this in Hungarian, but it's mostly just young kids who have this meal :)
Another common example in Portuguese is "saudade". It's the feeling you have when you're missing something or someone.
Similar thread long ago, there was a word Somewhere in northern Europe that meant something like "aimlessly hitting your penis on things". .
Do you mean the Dutch word "swaffelen" or "zwaffelen"?
Sounds like it yeah! I'm a big fan of the concept.
Apparently its from Netherlands?
It at the very least got popular in the Netherlands. This was due to a youtube upload from 2008 of a Dutch student who was proud to be the first person to swaffel the Taj Mahal. This resulted in more people swinging their dicks against various monuments.
So if you see a popular monument, remember that it is likely a Dutch person filmed themselves while wacking their dick against it and put it on youtube somewhere.
In British English it's called "Dicking things" (Sarah Millican has a comedy video about it IIRC?) :P
I know this was asking for non-English to English but I keep seeing the title as I scroll and thinking that English has a few words that don't translate even to itself because they have no actual meaning/definition. Words like "the," and "a." They're more like grammatical tools than real "words."
the - definite article. a - indefinite article.
See German for some more fun articles.
The Hungarian adjective "ügyes". It's used to describe someone when they do something ably/skillfully/cleverly. (Doesn't necessarily imply a learned ability, can be innate.) It usually implies an activity involving manual dexterity, but can also be used for mental problem-solving.
When used as an exclamation, it basically means "Well done!"
Żal
In Polish it means a feeling of sadness, regret, being unable to accept the reality. It's often compared to grief, but it's not confined to losing someone. When you look at the past, regretting your life choices, you feel żal.
sorrow
Kinda a reversal, but I'm curious if other languages have a word as versatile as English's "fuck". Like obviously other languages have words for the verb of making sex, but is it common for it to also be a noun, adjective, or adverb to the point where you could have it as every other word and it still be grammatically correct?
In Dutch, the word "kanker" can be used as verb, noun or adjective. Example: Die kanker hoer kan opkankeren met die kanker van haar. Which best translates to something like: That fucking whore can fuck off with that shit of hers. Except that the Dutch version is wayyyyy more rude and inappropriate.
https://youtu.be/fM_ItkV6fYI
Fuck the fucking fuckers.
"Come the fuck in or fuck the fuck off"
It always felt weird to me that English has no distinct phrase to express non-romantic affection.
English speakers use "I love you", but in Italian (and many other languages) you'd make a distinction between a romantic partner and a friend/relative/whatever.
Ti amo = I love you, said for example to your partner, signifies a deep emotional bond, not something you usually say lightly.
Ti voglio bene = I love you, but less charges, more in a "I feel good about you" way
I always appreciated Spanish's Te quiero vs te amo to express to friends my feelings for them, much better than "I love you, no homo".
Hinh in Burmese. The closest equivalent is curry, and while all curries are hinh, not every hinh is curry. It basically means something you eat with the rice.
Way too many for Chinese (think every Chinese dish you know), but the one world I think about the most in this context these days is 老百姓 (lao3 bai3 xing4) (Also see a somewhat related Wikipedia article). Direct translation is "ol' hundred surnames"
It's... a non-formal word for the "commoners" or the "average person". This is a concept I don't hear in mainstream media that much nowadays. I don't think most news or mainstream media even refers to say the entirety of the lower to middle social class in one word... (Note that it is different from "Average Joe", which does have a Chinese counterpart which translates to "Zhang three Li four")
On top of it, the whole concept of "a hundred surnames" representing most of society is kind of absurd in English-speaking countries. Societies with historical Chinese influences tend to have lots of ppl share the same surnames
I recently came across a word that I couldn't find a translation for. In Swedish, the word "skallgång" refers to the act of walking in a line formation in a search party.
Hygge=gezelligheid
Doch
Zwedgsche (this fruit is often translated as sour cherry but it isnt a sour cherry) Zipfelklatscher
German and high german dialects
You could at least describe the words... not everybody speaks German
I do honestly have no idea how one would describe "Zipfelklatscher"... ^^" Or "Doch"
I had to look it up. "Doch" is the equivalent of "is too!" in English. For example "That cat is stupid!", "Is not!", "Is too!".
And Zipfelklatscher is just a wanker: Zipfel = penis, Klatscher = slapper --> penis-slapper --> wanker.
Keeping in mind that any and all concepts in this world can be explained and understood by anyone and everyone - and that when this is untrue, only a lack of language and experience are at work - these do not have straightforward counterparts in English with the exact same nuance, I think:
Japanese
潔い、木漏れ日、懐かしい、いただきます、ごちそうさま、よろしく、お疲れ様、儚い、ぼけ、つっこみ、花見、紅葉狩り
Swedish
Mångata, lagom, fika, smörgåsbord, ombudsman, klämdag, skadeglädje, orka (verb or exclamation)
Hungarian
Meglehetős(en), káröröm
Meglehetősen = rather?
like when used as an adjective "this is rather large"
That's a great counterpart/translation! Nice! :D