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Did you know that...? (language trivia) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| Adamdm Groupie Australia Joined 5441 days ago 62 posts - 89 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Japanese, Dari, German, Spanish, Russian, Arabic (Written) | Message 41 of 90 02 June 2010 at 9:09am | IP Logged | ||||||||
This looks like the Chinese term for rice wine (mi jiu, in pinyin, but sounds pretty much like "Me Joe")
The botanical Latin word for the kind of fruit that an orange is is "hesperidium", which means "from the land in the region of the setting sun", the "Hesperidies", which was (depending on where and when used) sometimes a reference to Iberia. The botanical Latin name of the peach is _Prunus persica_, where "prunus" means "plum", and "persica" means "of Persia". The tomato's Latin generic name was _Lycopersicon_, which means "wolf peach" (there actually is a species of canid in South America whose main food is a wild close relative of the tomato). I had imagined that the fruit called "persimmon" would have a Persian/peach origin, but my dictionary cites it aws being from Algonquian "pasimenan", meaning a an artificially dried fruit! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Adamdm Groupie Australia Joined 5441 days ago 62 posts - 89 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Japanese, Dari, German, Spanish, Russian, Arabic (Written) | Message 42 of 90 02 June 2010 at 9:18am | IP Logged | ||||||||
The Japanese language suggests that the Japanese do not generally expect a lot of nice things to happen. Whereas the common greeting in many languages is often one or other of "[have a] good day" or "how are you/are things going for you?", as far as I can work out, "konichi wa" means literally "in regard to today". Nothing positive (admittedly, nothing negative, either). Just an acknowledgement that today is today. Have a day, everyone :| 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| MäcØSŸ Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5813 days ago 259 posts - 392 votes Speaks: Italian*, EnglishC2 Studies: German | Message 43 of 90 02 June 2010 at 9:53am | IP Logged | ||||||||
That’s really cool, and it’s the same in Swedish! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| MäcØSŸ Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5813 days ago 259 posts - 392 votes Speaks: Italian*, EnglishC2 Studies: German | Message 44 of 90 02 June 2010 at 9:58am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Botswana: the motto of the country is “pula”, which means rain in Tswana but it’s also the colloquial Romanian word for penis. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| j0nas Triglot Groupie Norway Joined 5546 days ago 46 posts - 70 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, German | Message 45 of 90 02 June 2010 at 10:06am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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"pula" is also the infinitiv of "to f*ck" in Norwegian Nynorsk and a number of Norwegian
dialects. ("pule" in Norwegian Bokmål and some other dialects.) 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| ReneeMona Diglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 5339 days ago 864 posts - 1274 votes Speaks: Dutch*, EnglishC2 Studies: French | Message 46 of 90 02 June 2010 at 11:18am | IP Logged | ||||||||
It's not the De Van Dale anymore but it was at some point. This is what Wikipedia has to say about it and this is where I found the information. It is of course not often used in daily life but apparently a Flemish writer used it in one of his novels and it was in the dictionary until a couple of years ago. If you take it apart it means: sand = sand zeep = soap sode = I have no idea what this means and neither does my Dutch-English dictionary. I'm thinking it might be related to sodomie/sodomy since it's also popularly used in combination with flikker which is a derogatory term for a homosexual. This would certainly give the expression "iemand op z'n sodeflikker geven" a whole new meaning to me. Sode is used in a couple of swearwords: sodeflikker, sodemieter and sodeju. None of these are very offensive and sodeju is actually a quite popular alternative among the older generation to the more vulgar "godverdomme". mineraal = mineral water = water steen = stone stralen = to beam or radiate but it can apparently also mean to fail an exam. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| chirel Triglot Senior Member Finland Joined 5314 days ago 125 posts - 159 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English, Swedish Studies: French | Message 47 of 90 02 June 2010 at 12:39pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
In Finnish "pula" is the lack or need of something or being in trouble. Actually more often the latter than the former. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Danac Diglot Senior Member Denmark Joined 5352 days ago 162 posts - 257 votes Speaks: Danish*, English Studies: German, Serbo-Croatian, French, Russian, Esperanto | Message 48 of 90 02 June 2010 at 5:19pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
It's the word that keeps on giving. It's also a city in Croatia. :) The obscene meaning of the word is the same in Danish, although it's spelt "pule". 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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