# untranslatable words/phrases



## linguist786

Just interested to see:
Are there any words or phrases in your languages that is really based on culture (or other things), and is a little difficult to put into english and needs explaining? 

I sometimes find it difficult to explain to someone what something means (in English, from Gujarati), simply because it's a very "cultural" thing, and it wouldn't have the same "feeling" in english as it does in the original language.

Here's one in Gujarati:

"Je bole, enaa bor vechai" - (lit. "whoever speaks, his 'bor' (a type of fruit) will sell"). This is trying to say that you have to "speak up if you want to get somewhere in life"


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## ElCamaron

Hello Linguist,

I guess it happens with many recipe names. For instance, in Spain we have "Gazpacho" which is a very nice kind of cold soup made of tomato, garlic, green peper, onion, oil and cucumber (if I remember fine ...). I don´t think there is just one word to say that in other languages ...

Bye for now!


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## Whodunit

As you can read and understand some German, you'll be satisfied with this link, I think. 

There are tons of German words that can't be translated, for instance those of the Nazi regime and some philosophical words.


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## Bienvenidos

There's a lot in Farsi, most of them being insults  

*Chishmit syo us. *
Literal: You have a black eye.
But it doesn't mean you have a black eye in Farsi, it means you're dark, as in you are very greedy, or self-serving, or you're rude and don't care for others. Hard to translate

*Murg tura mímon cuna.*
Literal: May death make you his guest.
This phrase is obviously not polite, and it basically means that I hope you die soon, but it's a fancy, sort of less direct way to say it. It's one of those "you'll see it in dramatic movies" phrases.

*Gushna ustí.*
Literal: You're hungry
Depending on the context, this can mean you're hungry in Farsi, but it generally means "you're greedy", as in you're so hungry; it's not that you don't have any food, it's that you have so much that you don't want to share anything with anyone

*Shikumit chuspída.*
Literal: Your stomach has stuck.
This phrase basically means you're skinny, that you're stomach is kind of "stuck" (it's not getting any bigger) but not stuck as in "I'm stuck in traffic", but stuck as in "the gum is stuck (attached, due to adhesiveness) to the paper. 

*Bien*


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## optimistique

In Dutch we have among many others:

*gezellig* = is mostly said of a social situation (a party, a meeting, a bar, a restaurant, a house etc.), it means that the atmosphere is good, it means cousy too and that you're having a good time. It can also be said of a person, and then that is someone that you have a good time with, a social person etc. There are many words that can describe a part of it, but never the whole spectrum of the word.

*gedogen = *I have been told that the concept of this verb is really incomprehensible in many languages/cultures. It means to allow something that is forbidden (logic!). You might know that softdrugs are allowed in the Netherlands while they're forbidden at the same time (not in small doses however, I don't know the exact details).
*
polder = *a former lake that has been drained dry, after there were put dikes (also borrowed from Dutch '*dijk'*??) around it.

*wel* = the opposite of '_not_'. In English it can be expressed by stressing the verb: "_He hasn't done it, but I have_*'.* You cannot express it in a separate word however (which can be annoying sometimes IMO) except for 'do' or 'does', but that's not the same. I know in German you can sometimes use 'schon', but that also means 'already', so I'm often not sure. And I use 'bien' in French, but I don't know if I've assigned it that meaning myself, or if it's really French.

*toch = *Dutch has a lot of small modular adverbs (like '_wel_') that often put me with my back against the wall in attempting to translate them. Many languages just don't use any equivalents at all. *Toch* can be similar in meaning to 'wel', only that at first you thought that it wasn't the case and then it appeared to be *** the case (<- there you would use 'toch' in Dutch, and "_after all_" is not the same).

PS: the German "sauerkraut" is not completely intranslatable. In Dutch we say "zuurkool". We also have "braadworst" en "curryworst".


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## Brazilian dude

Sauerkraut in Portuguese is chucrute.

Brazilian dude


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## lazarus1907

Nothing is untranslatable, but I have a word that I always quote in these ocasions (a word I use in real life every now and then): *gentilicio

*According to serious dictionaries, like Collins, the translation is "*name of the inhabitants of a country or region etc*".

*Pesado* is another word that causes a lot of confusion, as it can be translated as boring, annoying, lengthy, repetitive and insistent depending on the context and the speaker´s intention.

There are lots of words like these, both in Spanish and English.


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## Brazilian dude

You can easily translate Spanish gentilicio into Portuguese gentilício.  

Brazilian dude


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## ronanpoirier

Portuguese:

* Saudades - *it is the feeling you feel when you miss someone. 
Eu tenho/sinto saudades de ti = I miss you.

Try to get this way: _love_ is the feeling you feel when you _love _someone, then _saudades_ is the feeling you feel when you _miss_ someone! 

I read at a magazine the 10 most untranslatabe words (using English as the main language) and _saudades_ was in it.


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## avalon2004

There is a word in Greek that lacks an exact translation in English: *κέφι/kefi*, which basically means anything to do with being "in high spirit".. For example there is the phrase είμαι στα _κέφια_ μου/eimai sta _kefia_ mou, which would translate something like "I'm in a good mood", but I think it's somewhat stronger.
Come to think of it, there's also the phrase *ευ ζην/ev zin* which has similar connotations, though it translates quite nicely into English as "the good life".


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## adremd

cursi (spanish)


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## Mutichou

Brazilian dude said:
			
		

> You can easily translate Spanish gentilicio into Portuguese gentilício.


In French, this word can be translated *gentilé*.

However, I don't see any untranslatable words in French...


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## Whodunit

Mutichou said:
			
		

> However, I don't see any untranslatable words in French...


 
I'm not sure, but what about "dont"? It can't be translated as "whose" in most cases:

J'ai un chain dont *les* poux courent partout dans la maison.
I have a dog whose lice run all over the house.

So, what about "les"? It belongs to "dont", so it can't be translated directly.


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## cherine

Whodunit said:
			
		

> J'ai un chien dont *les* poux courent partout dans la maison.
> I have a dog whose lice run all over the house.


D'abord une petite correction (chien) et non pas (chain).
Ensuite, et surtout, the "les" is not exactly an untranslateble "word", first because it is not a word  second because even if it's translatable into English it can still be translated into other languages, like Arabic for example


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## Whodunit

cherine said:
			
		

> D'abord une petite correction (chien) et non pas (chain).


 
Shukran djaziilan. 



> Ensuite, et surtout, the "les" is not exactly an untranslateble "word", first because it is not a word


 
I was rather referring to the expression "dont + article" that does not exist in many languages. They usually omit the article.



> second because even if it's translatable into English it can still be translated into other languages, like Arabic for example


 
I don't understand "translatable". Did you mean "untranslatable"? 

And what do you mean by that it can be translated directly into Arabic. How would you say "le chien dont les poux" in Arabic?


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## cherine

3afuan 



			
				Whodunit said:
			
		

> I was rather referring to the expression "dont + article" that *does not exist in many languages*. They usually omit the article.


That's exactly what I mean. The fact that an expression can be translated into at least one other language means -to me at least- that it is translatable.
For me, an untranslatable word/expression is what doesn't have an equivalent in any other language.



> I don't understand "translatable". Did you mean "untranslatable"?


Yes, you're right. Sorry, my mistake.



> And what do you mean by that it can be translated directly into Arabic. How would you say "le chien dont les poux" in Arabic?


الكلب الذى بقـُّه even if it sounds a bit strange but it exists. الهاء in بقه sort of translate the "les".


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## Sulizhen

The first word that comes to my mind when reading this is "aquel" in Galician. One of the meanings of this word is the same as the Spanish one, "that". But it has another meaning too, that is quite difficult to translate, since it depends on the context, on the thing/person you're referring to, the intonation... For example, if you say that "esta moza ten un aquel" (this girl has an "aquel"), you're saying that she has something that makes her attractive to you. You can also say that "esa rapaza é moi aquelada" (that girl is very "aquelada"), which could mean that she is ingenious, but could also mean that she's shy, for example. You can say that something has an "aquel"; but it could mean that it has something imprecise, that can be weird, curious or just a quality. Usually it has a positive nuance. In fact, this is not an intranslatable word, but it has nor a very clear equivalence in English/Spanish.

I've read somewhere that there are two concepts in German, related to the nostalgic feeling, that are difficult to translate -I don't know if this is true or not, because I can't speak German. These terms are _Heimweh _and _Fernweh_. The first one is supposed to describe a feeling like homesickness, and the second one is supposed to define the nostalgia that certain people feel when missing places they already don't know, when they have nostalgia for the distance. It would be interesting to know if this is true, specially the second one, since it looks strange to me not to have a word for this in Spanish, I've met many people that "suffer" from something similar to it...


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## Brazilian dude

> "esta moza ten un aquel" (this girl has an "aquel"),


Or as you say in _English_ "that girl has a certain je ne sais quoi".

Brazilian dude


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## Sulizhen

adremd said:
			
		

> cursi (spanish)



I've always translated "cursi" as "cheesy"...


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## Honour

ronanpoirier said:
			
		

> Portuguese:
> *Saudades - *it is the feeling you feel when you miss someone.
> Eu tenho/sinto saudades de ti = I miss you
> 
> Try to get this way: _love_ is the feeling you feel when you _love _someone, then _saudades_ is the feeling you feel when you _miss_ someone!
> 
> I read at a magazine the 10 most untranslatabe words (using English as the main language) and _saudades_ was in it.


interestingly, we have their exact translations in Turkish
_aşk(a'shk)_ is the feeling when you are in love with someone and the verb expressing to love is _sevmek_. _Özlem_(_hasret_ is its synonym) is the feeling you feel when you miss someone. _Özlemek_ is the verb standing for to miss.


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## Tatzingo

adremd said:
			
		

> cursi (spanish)



Hello,

Can't this be translated as one of the following;

Cheap, tacky, commercial, cheesy, Kitsch?

Tatz.


			
				Sulizhen said:
			
		

> You can say that something has an "aquel"; but it could mean that it has something imprecise, that can be weird, curious or just a quality.



Hi!

You've provided an ideal translation yourself with the word "quality" which would seem to cover all those situations that you've described.

Tatz.


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## Whodunit

Sulizhen said:
			
		

> I've read somewhere that there are two concepts in German, related to the nostalgic feeling, that are difficult to translate -I don't know if this is true or not, because I can't speak German. These terms are _Heimweh _and _Fernweh_.


 
Heimweh = homesickness/morriña

I agree about "Fernweh" that it doesn't exist in most languages. In English (wanderlust) or Spanish (nostalgia de países lejanos) you have to circumscribe it.


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## Sulizhen

Tatzingo said:
			
		

> Hi!
> 
> You've provided an ideal translation yourself with the word "quality" which would seem to cover all those situations that you've described.
> 
> Tatz.



Hi 

Essencially, it's a quality, but you cannot use "quality" as a real equivalent of "aquel". I mean, you cannot say "this girl has a certain quality", for example... The features of the quality will be given by the context, the situation and so on... (I hope I have explained it well, I'm very bad when it comes to explain this kind of things ...). Actually, it could even be translated (as somebody has said yet, Brazilian dude, I think) as a "je ne sais quoi", but it doesn't really cover all the meanings that the word can have...



			
				whodunit said:
			
		

> Heimweh = homesickness/morriña
> 
> I agree about "Fernweh" that it doesn't exist in most languages. In English (wanderlust) or Spanish (nostalgia de países lejanos) you have to circumscribe it.



Some people still think that "morriña" has no equivalents in other languages, but I sincerely believe that it's nothing more than homesickness, with the difference that Galician people are said to be more... hmmm... homesick than other people -but I guess that nostalgia and homesickness cannot be measured anyway, don't matter where you come from.

So... Can "Fernweh" be -more or less- translated as "wanderlust"? When reading the paragraph that described it (I'm not really sure, but I think I read it in _China for Hypochondriacs_, by José Ovejero), I figured it out as something more... I don't know how to describe it... more intense, more "visceral", something deeper than just the will of knowing other places. But, as I've said, I cannot speak German, so that was just my impression... It's an interesting concept, and the word sounds nice too


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## nuno

In portuguese the word _"Saudade"_ means (let me see...) the feeling of missing someone and in other languages i think there is no translation. I think this word only exists in Portuguese, maybe Spanish too...


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## Whodunit

Sulizhen said:
			
		

> So... Can "Fernweh" be -more or less- translated as "wanderlust"? When reading the paragraph that described it (I'm not really sure, but I think I read it in _China for Hypochondriacs_, by José Ovejero), I figured it out as something more... I don't know how to describe it... more intense, more "visceral", something deeper than just the will of knowing other places. But, as I've said, I cannot speak German, so that was just my impression... It's an interesting concept, and the word sounds nice too


 
I can't describe it. You should go to the German forum and ask your question there. 

It's just a feeling that always makes you want to travel and discover new countries. A feeling that might not exist in other cultures.


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## Brazilian dude

Morrinha, not a word you see every day in Brazil.  According to my dictionary, it means, among other things, melancholy, sandness.  It may have other acceptations in Galicia. Which leads to this question?  Do you guys in Galicia and we here in Brazil speak the same language?  I've read things that say yes and things that say no.  When I read anything in Galician, I probably understand around 98%, but it doesn't look like the exact same thing to me.

Brazilian dude


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## Sulizhen

nuno said:
			
		

> In portuguese the word _"Saudade"_ means (let me see...) the feeling of missing someone and in other languages i think there is no translation. I think this word only exists in Portuguese, maybe Spanish too...



In Galician it does exist the same word, "saudade"/"soidade". It's employed to describe a frame of mind, a feeling that we have when we miss someone or something. This could be a friend, your partner, your homeland... or something more... metaphysical. In some cases it means the same as "morriña".



			
				Brazilian dude said:
			
		

> Morrinha, not a word you see every day in Brazil. According to my dictionary, it means, among other things, melancholy, sandness. It may have other acceptations in Galicia. Which leads to this question? Do you guys in Galicia and we here in Brazil speak the same language? I've read things that say yes and things that say no. When I read anything in Galician, I probably understand around 98%, but it doesn't look like the exact same thing to me.


 
Hmmm... I just can talk about the Portuguese spoken in Portugal, because I'm not really sure about the linguistic differences between Portugal and Brazil. Portuguese and Galician were the same language until 12nd-13rd Century. Then, Portuguese became the national language of Portugal and Galician was influenced by the "unifying process" in Spain. So, I'm at the same point as you: I can understand pretty well written Portuguese (except certain vocabulary and so on), but it doesn't happen the same with spoken Portuguese -it has more sounds than Galician. Anyway, I think I'm approaching an off-topic... uh...


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## Sulizhen

Whodunit said:
			
		

> I can't describe it. You should go to the German forum and ask your question there.
> 
> It's just a feeling that always makes you want to travel and discover new countries. A feeling that might not exist in other cultures.



I understand what it means, but I'm sure it would take more than two or three words to translate it. It's a very philosophical concept...


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## adremd

Tatzingo said:
			
		

> Hello,
> 
> Can't this be translated as one of the following;
> 
> Cheap, tacky, commercial, cheesy, Kitsch?
> 
> Tatz.


How would you or anyone else translate something like this.... «Yo soy tan cursi que no sólo pronuncio la "d" final (suave)....»

I never heard of "Kitsch" though but I must say I looked it up and I love that word!  I believe "cursi" is common in Spanish but Kitsch defnitely is not in English.


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## Aldo Berrios

In Chilean Spanish, I like the word *choca*, meaning the tea-time (both afternoon meal and breakfast). There is a derivated word *choquero*, which is the tea cup. The verb is *tomar choca*. 
It is mainly used by workers.
Although you can easily translate this into tea, the word has a familiar warmth, typical of words with the africate /tsh/, at least in Chilean Spanish.


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## Whodunit

adremd said:
			
		

> I never heard of "Kitsch" though but I must say I looked it up and I love that word! I believe "cursi" is common in Spanish but Kitsch defnitely is not in English.


 
"Kitsch" is a German word that means "junk". It is often listed as one of of the "German words in English" (such as schadenfreude, doppelganger), but I have never read it in English context.


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## Tatzingo

Sulizhen said:
			
		

> Hi
> 
> Essencially, it's a quality, but you cannot use "quality" as a real equivalent of "aquel". I mean, you cannot say "this girl has a certain quality", for example...



Hi,

Actually, you can, and we do say that. The sentence makes perfect sense. In this sense, "quality" would take the meaning of a "je ne sais quoi" or maybe an "x-factor", essentially, a special "something" that she possesses.

Correct me if i'm wrong!

Tatz.


			
				Whodunit said:
			
		

> "Kitsch" is a German word that means "junk". It is often listed as one of of the "German words in English" (such as schadenfreude, doppelganger), but I have never read it in English context.



Hi,

But i have, and i can tell you that we do use it!

Tatz.


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## Krümelmonster

@ Optimistique: Some of the words you mentioned exist in German, for example "gesellig" (gezellig) and if I understood your explanation correctly, then you could translate "wel" also with the German "wohl" (but "wohl" has a bunch of other possibilities to use )


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## optimistique

Krümelmonster said:
			
		

> @ Optimistique: Some of the words you mentioned exist in German, for example "gesellig" (gezellig) and if I understood your explanation correctly, then you could translate "wel" also with the German "wohl" (but "wohl" has a bunch of other possibilities to use )



About the "wel" I already started another topic and you're very probably right!

About 'ge(z/s)ellig'; maybe it's possible that this is a word that you borrowed from us? I don't know, but it would explain why 'gezellig' is mentioned all the time as THE prototype of an intranslatable Dutch word.

And besides, let us have that little pleasure!  Of all thousands of words Dutch borrowed from German, German seems to have borrowed hardly any word from Dutch (even English and French have more borrowings from Dutch, sage ich, nicht wissenschaftlich verantwortet wahrscheinlich, aber so kommt es mir vor).


And speaking of borrowings from German, '*heimwee*' can be used beside it's real meaning as really wanting to go back to a place you have been, but where you are not at the time of speaking. In other words: longing to go back to another place.  
I don't know if it can be used in German in this meaning (or any other language has a word for it?), because otherwise it would make it an intranslatable word, wouldn't it?


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## TimeHP

> In portuguese the word _"Saudade"_ means (let me see...) the feeling of missing someone and in other languages i think there is no translation. I think this word only exists in Portuguese, maybe Spanish too...


 
In Italian we have two words: _mancanza _and _nostalgia._
_Sente la sua mancanza - Sente nostalgia di lui _
_Sente la mancanza di casa  - Sente nostalgia di casa_
Ciao


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## Krümelmonster

@ Optimistique: I don't think that "gesellig" is a borrowed word, for we have a whole "word-family" of it (Gesellschaft, Geselle...). I'm sorry, I didn't want to steal your intranslatable word 
Perhaps we stole the whole word-family of you, then there would be much more to be proud for you...


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## Cereth

as many others had said before on other threads it´s very difficult to translate: the verb in spanish "chingar" due to its many meanings (many people say it´s similar than english f*ck but i don´t think so)..
also verb *"enchilar"* which can mean that you ate chili or something very spicy and your tongue swells up while your eyes cry, it can also mean that you are very mad about a situation and you want to start a fight or a discussion with that person is causing you trouble (a rage kind of feeling)... it can also mean that you add chili to some food..

that´s what i remember now...

see ya


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## übermönch

yiddish contains a lot of intranslatable words like asochenwey, just like ny other dialects or rural languages. In russian there's mat words which also cannot be translated with one word in most cases.


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## jónico

Browsing through this cool thread, and from my own experience, I notice that lots of special emotion words are hard to translate except maybe into a language that is a very close cousin in the Big Old Language Family Tree (I won't even get into where one langauge stops being that language and starts being another one--it gets messy sometimes!). Anyway, a lot of words describing people and personalities don't make the translation jump very easy, and certainly not in all semantic fields (i.e., "cursi" is sometimes kinda cheesy, but English is at a loss for one word to describe a person (like "Eres más cursi que...". 
Not many verbs here in the thread. Maybe something like Swedish 'betrivs' ("Jag betrivs här"). 

How about these things on my keyboard: >>> and <<<? In Spanish they're called _corchetes...._


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## adremd

In English, they're called angle brackets like less than (<) and greater than (>).  Yes, very good thread indeed. 

One Spanish verb I have a hard time translating is «desasnar».  I know what it means (in Spanish) but just can't find a word in English for it.


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## Alice_in_Wonderland

In Swedish we have "lagom" = not too much, not too little, just right.


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## optimistique

Krümelmonster said:
			
		

> @ Optimistique: I don't think that "gesellig" is a borrowed word, for we have a whole "word-family" of it (Gesellschaft, Geselle...). I'm sorry, I didn't want to steal your intranslatable word
> Perhaps we stole the whole word-family of you, then there would be much more to be proud for you...



Hmm.. Well, we do have 'Gezelschap' too. And 'vergezellen', so who knows


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## waterbuf

Hi there,

With Dutch and German words like HEIMWEE and Heimweh, it is less a
question of borrowing than of two languages being ultimately but two
different "dialects" of thet same language.  The fact that the areas in
which the two are/were spoken became official countries raised the
"dialects" to the status of official languages. 

As for *heimwee, *the German counterpart can refer to places other than
one's home(town); it can refer even to people and things:

     Ich hab so Heimweh nach dem Kurfuerstendamm;


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## Sepia

optimistique said:
			
		

> In Dutch we have among many others:
> 
> *gezellig* = is mostly said of a social situation (a party, a meeting, a bar, a restaurant, a house etc.), it means that the atmosphere is good, it means cousy too and that you're having a good time. It can also be said of a person, and then that is someone that you have a good time with, a social person etc. There are many words that can describe a part of it, but never the whole spectrum of the word.


This covers about 100% the Danish word "hyggelig" - a word which Danes always claim has no equivalent in any other language.


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## Whodunit

And the German word "gemütlich" (sometimes it means cozy). It is not translatable into English, which is confirmed if you have a look in the Merriam Webster (it does list "gemütlich"!).


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## Sepia

I doubt it would be understood anywhere in the anglophone world but in New York, though.


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## Krümelmonster

@waterbuf: I don't think that it is that usual to use "Heimweh" as in "Ich hab so Heimweh nach dem Kurfuerstendamm", you'd rather use "Sehnsucht"...


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## optimistique

Whodunit said:
			
		

> And the German word "gemütlich" (sometimes it means cozy). It is not translatable into English, which is confirmed if you have a look in the Merriam Webster (it does list "gemütlich"!).



But I would translate 'gemütlich' with '*aangenaam*' or in certain cases with '*gemoedelijk*' (!) (whose meanings are in the same line of '_gezellig_' but they're not really it).


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## Krümelmonster

Well, "gemütlich" is also used as "gesellig" mor often than  as "angenehm"  
If you go on like that it will be very difficult for us to tell the others that German and Dutch are two languages and not dialects of the same language...


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## Molka

Hungarian: Halali vagy! 
Literally: you are deadly
Actually this is an appreciative exclamation, something like: you are so cool that the pleasure of talking to you / being with you is killing me, which is exceptionally good feeling.
Don't take my remark as black humour, but the suicidal rate is quite high in Hungary. A great Hungarian novelist (1st half of 20th century), Antal SZERB, talks about dying as an erotic act.


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## Whodunit

Sepia said:
			
		

> I doubt it would be understood anywhere in the anglophone world but in New York, though.


 
That's why we can classify it under "untranslatable words" (at least into English and Romance languages). 

By the way, Krümelmonster is right that we have angenehm and gesellig too. I don't use the latter, and the former corresponds to gemütlich in some way.


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## optimistique

waterbuf said:
			
		

> Hi there,
> 
> With Dutch and German words like HEIMWEE and Heimweh, it is less a
> question of borrowing than of two languages being ultimately but two
> different "dialects" of thet same language.  The fact that the areas in
> which the two are/were spoken became official countries raised the
> "dialects" to the status of official languages.
> 
> As for *heimwee, *the German counterpart can refer to places other than
> one's home(town); it can refer even to people and things:
> 
> Ich hab so Heimweh nach dem Kurfuerstendamm;



At the risk of getting off-topic:

I have looked it up a bit and you're right that both 'heim/heem' and 'wee' were real Middle-Dutch words. Still the expression 'Heimwee' is a germanism, not because the words were not existing Dutch, but because the expression became in use in Dutch through German. It's possible that Heimwee was Dutch, got in unuse and then in use again thanks to German. I don't know, just a possibility, but even then people call it a germanism.


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## emma42

Post 33 brought up "Kitsch", "schadenfreude" and "doppelganger".  As Tatzingo said, all these words are used often in British English.

I am particularly interested in "schadenfreude", which means (I hope I am right here) - a feeling of pleasure in another person's misfortune.  It is telling that the English feel it necessary to borrow such a word and to use it so frequently(!).  Do any other forer@s  have a similar word in their languages?


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## cyanista

emma42 said:
			
		

> I am particularly interested in "schadenfreude", which means (I hope I am right here) - a feeling of pleasure in another person's misfortune.  It is telling that the English feel it necessary to borrow such a word and to use it so frequently(!).  Do any other forer@s  have a similar word in their languages?



Russian does have a corresponding word - злорадство. Plus a verb and an adjective. Do you think it tells something about the Russian national character?


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## waterbuf

emma42 said:
			
		

> Post 33 brought up "Kitsch", "schadenfreude" and "doppelganger". As Tatzingo said, all these words are used often in British English.
> 
> I am particularly interested in "schadenfreude", which means (I hope I am right here) - a feeling of pleasure in another person's misfortune. It is telling that the English feel it necessary to borrow such a word and to use it so frequently(!). Do any other forer@s have a similar word in their languages?



You are right, Emma42, very right.  That's what it means.  And I share your interest in SCHADENFREUDE.

TELLING, yes, that English should borrow the term and use it so freqhently; but it is even more TELLING that German BOASTS the specific term, non? TELLING that the Germans, so to speak, put the conceopt on the linguistic map. Not knocking German(s). I am German-Canadian. 

A language reflects the collective experience of the people who speak it. Intranslatables highlight this fact. A linguist myself who am at home in half a dozen languages, I don't know of any language other than German that has a precise equivalent of SCHADENFREUDE.  I wonder whether this means that the Germans are better at SCHADENFREUDE than the peoples surrounding them or are merely more aware of the sentiment.

Liebe Gruesse,

waterbuf2000


----------



## Tisia

Bienvenidos said:
			
		

> There's a lot in Farsi, most of them being insults
> 
> *Chishmit syo us. *
> Literal: You have a black eye.
> But it doesn't mean you have a black eye in Farsi, it means you're dark, as in you are very greedy, or self-serving, or you're rude and don't care for others. Hard to translate................
> *Bien*


Hello everyone

In Iran (maybe Afghanistan as well, I don't know) when someone drinks or eats something, the other one may say "*Nushe janet*" which could be tranlated as "*May it give a healthy nutrition to youe soul*".  It doesn't sound as sweet as in the Persian sentence. Every time I tell my friends that, they want me to translate to English, oh you don't know how wearying it is

Regards
Tisia


----------



## emma42

Waterbuf - cyanista says there is an equivalent word in Russian, so maybe you'll feel better now.  I didn't want to say that it was "telling" that the word was German, given our history! (cultural sensitivity).


----------



## Henryk

What about a "Morgenmuffel"? That's someone who's not able to get going in the morning (they are usually terribly grumpy when they get up).


----------



## Molka

emma42 said:
			
		

> Post 33 brought up "Kitsch", "schadenfreude" and "doppelganger". As Tatzingo said, all these words are used often in British English.
> 
> I am particularly interested in "schadenfreude", which means (I hope I am right here) - a feeling of pleasure in another person's misfortune. It is telling that the English feel it necessary to borrow such a word and to use it so frequently(!). Do any other forer@s have a similar word in their languages?


 
Although my German is absolutely poor, I think this expression is the equivalent of the Hungarian _káröröm (kár = loss, damage; öröm = happiness)._ In my oppninion this is a supra-national feeling. In spite of the fact that this word does not exist in some of the languages, does not mean that there are no phrases that would express the very same human attitude (for ex. gloat over somebody's misfortune, or: His enemies were quick to gloat at his humiliation. - from Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary). We can ponder why some nations say it out so openly, but I don't think this is bad. In addition, it is easier to overcome something if you can name it. So no need to worry!
Regards
Molka


----------



## Pivra

Anyone already put "ganas" in Spanish as in "tener ganas"??


----------



## optimistique

emma42 said:
			
		

> I am particularly interested in "schadenfreude", which means (I hope I am right here) - a feeling of pleasure in another person's misfortune.  It is telling that the English feel it necessary to borrow such a word and to use it so frequently(!).  Do any other forer@s  have a similar word in their languages?



This sounds like the Dutch *'leedvermaak'*. (which means something as 'misery fun' (-> fun about misery) or something alike).
I'm sorry but I'm afraid it's not typically German.

Which reminds me: in Dutch we have the word *ramptoerist* (catastrophe tourist). An example: there's a car crash and all the other drivers slow down or even stop to see what has happened. Then they're _ramptoeristen_.
Do any other languages have a word for this fenomen?


----------



## Bienvenidos

Tisia said:
			
		

> Hello everyone
> 
> In Iran (maybe Afghanistan as well, I don't know) when someone drinks or eats something, the other one may say "*Nushe janet*" which could be tranlated as "*May it give a healthy nutrition to youe soul*".  It doesn't sound as sweet as in the Persian sentence. Every time I tell my friends that, they want me to translate to English, oh you don't know how wearying it is
> 
> Regards
> Tisia



Tisia, I love that phrase! It's so polite and sweet, and genuninely caring...unfortunately it's hard to say it in the same sense in English when the English phrase is ten words long!  Thanks for sharing. Just reading "Nushe janet" makes me smile.  

*Bien*


----------



## D0lph1n

wow indonesian have many !  

the words i remember is "manja" meaning type of atittude where someone is depend on another person. this can be both cute and annoying attitude (depend on how extreme the level is  )

for example

a flirty+childish voice is a manja voice, leaning your head on someone else shoulder when you are not tired is a manja attitude, pouting your mouth also another type of manja attitude

well maybe it can be defined as asking attention from someone else but in childish, flirty and joking way !  

it's not only used in romantic relationship but also with your family.


----------



## shaloo

I donno if someone has already posted this:

In Telugu, we have Prasaadam (Prasaad in hindi) which means the food first offered to God and then it is distributed to all the devotees around.
I've been thinking hard but could'nt get a word for it in English.

Another one is Pu*n*yam(hard *n*) which means, ...the best I can say is merit achieved by a person due to her good deeds on earth, that can help 
her achieve a better life after this one.

Moksham is another one.....that means.....mmm....you will not have another life after this one and that you will unite yourself in God. This again depends on your punyam (merit) acquired in this life.....

There are a lot of words like these....must think a bit more....

Shaloo


----------



## shaloo

D0lph1n said:
			
		

> wow indonesian have many !
> 
> the words i remember is *"manja"* meaning type of atittude where someone is depend on another person. this can be both cute and annoying attitude (depend on how extreme the level is  )
> 
> for example
> 
> a flirty+childish voice is a manja voice, leaning your head on someone else shoulder when you are not tired is a manja attitude, pouting your mouth also another type of manja attitude
> 
> well maybe it can be defined as asking attention from someone else but in childish, flirty and joking way !
> 
> it's not only used in romantic relationship but also with your family.


 
Well Dolph1n, I guess we have a Telugu word for the same kinda behavior.
It is ............... *chilipi(chi - li - pi).*

The meaning and then.....the situations it is used in....everything is the same, except that it doesn't mean a really annoying attitude. Its used like for...flirting, childish attitude(like a boyfriend/husband acting (_chilipi), _cutely asking for attention,etc...

Shaloo


----------



## gorilla

This is a bit different but:
The lack of gender is hard to translate from Hungarian to English.
"Ő" means both he and she.
The other direction is problematic as well. You can't translate he and she, you can only say girl, boy, man, woman. Or simply ő if it's not ambigous.

It's extremely hard to say this in Hungarian: "He saw her." It would be "Látta" or "Látta őt." But both can mean both "he saw her" and "she saw him". (And even he saw it, She saw her etc!)

The other direction: "Látta.": It can mean "He/she/it saw him/her/it. 9 possible combinations... Really ambigous.


----------



## robbie_SWE

The Romanian word "*dor*" is similar to the Portuguese word "_saudade_". "*Dor*" isn't translatable, it means: _"I miss you so much that it aches in my heart and soul"_. 

In Swedish we have one word that is said not to exist in any other language. The word is "*lagom*" and it's more a philosophy than a word. One could say that it means "_total adequacy, materialistically and spiritually_", but that's just scraping the surface.  

 robbie


----------



## ukuca

I remember that our prime minister said "şşşş hop biz kasımpaşalıyız!" at a meeting for the negotiations with EU and all the interpreters looked each other surprisingly and they couldn't translate it. It was possible perhaps but saying such a thing in a meeeting like that was funny 
Kasımpaşa is a quarter of Beyoglu (Istanbul) known by its rough and tough bully guys, and this sentence means "Whoa! we're from Kasimpaşa, mind your step"


----------



## Xerinola

ronanpoirier said:
			
		

> Portuguese:
> 
> *Saudades - *it is the feeling you feel when you miss someone.
> Eu tenho/sinto saudades de ti = I miss you.
> 
> Try to get this way: _love_ is the feeling you feel when you _love _someone, then _saudades_ is the feeling you feel when you _miss_ someone!
> 
> I read at a magazine the 10 most untranslatabe words (using English as the main language) and _saudades_ was in it.


 
Hi!
I think that saudades can be "nostalgia" in spanish, do you agree?or somebody agree?


----------



## Sepia

Whodunit said:
			
		

> That's why we can classify it under "untranslatable words" (at least into English and Romance languages).
> 
> ...



But obviously not intranslatable into quite a few other Germanic languages - still with the exception of English - 

And there are a whole lot of other languages. 

What I might consider intranslatable, though, would probably be some of those approx. 200 words for different tones of Green, that exist in more than one native-American language.


----------



## Tensai

lots of Mandarin and Cantonese can not be translated into English, especially proverbs, and swear words, in Chinese we have a very large amount of swear words, Chinese swear words are some of the most aggressive and creative swear words in all languages, in fact, in Hong Kong we say that swearing is a culture


----------



## adremd

Like?  Wow, I thought when I was younger someone told me that they don't curse in Chinese (Mandarin/Cantonese,etc).  But I must be confusing it with another language.  Interesting...


----------



## reiziger

optimistique said:
			
		

> Which reminds me: in Dutch we have the word *ramptoerist* (catastrophe tourist). An example: there's a car crash and all the other drivers slow down or even stop to see what has happened. Then they're _ramptoeristen_.
> Do any other languages have a word for this fenomen?


I'd translate that into English as a *rubbernecker *(referring to how elastic their necks get as they stretch their heads to look at the accident ). You can tell who's a rubbernecker by how they slow down and turn to watch the ambulances or car crashes as they drive by.

Another Dutch word (or phrase?) that I've always had a hard time translating (to English, at least) was *zin in*. You can say '_ik heb echt zin in_' and mean 'I'm really looking forward to it', 'I want to do it', or 'I see the benefit in doing this', where _it_ and _this_ is x, y, or z. But on the other hand, you can say '_ik heb geen zin in_' (lit. I do not want to do it) and not specify what _it_ is, and give the impression you just don't want to get out of bed and life live that morning.

At the same time, it's not just _wanting_ to do something, it can also be having the _urge_ to get out and do something.

Yeesh. These untranslatables are by nature hard to describe.


----------



## vince

adremd said:
			
		

> Like?  Wow, I thought when I was younger someone told me that they don't curse in Chinese (Mandarin/Cantonese,etc).  But I must be confusing it with another language.  Interesting...



I once heard from someone that they don't curse in Mandarin. But I find that hard to believe - how can a language lack swear words?

Cantonese has many many swear words, many people know it for being vulgar.


----------



## skatoulitsa

So... I don't really know if this is translatable in english or not, but I don't know the word for it, and I always have trouble when I'm trying to express in english the following greek words:

γρουσούζης / γκαντέμης : a carrier of bad luck, but not only to himself but others as well. This is more than "unlucky" who is just someone with bad luck. We call somone that when we want to blame them for something bad that happened.

Along the same lines, I also don't know if there is a translation for "γουρλής" which is the exact opposite from the words above (someone who is a carrier of good luck to the people around him).


----------



## panjabigator

Many people consider Panjabi only useful for swearing 

Strangly enough, I never curse in Panjabi...I was never taught (lack of contact) although I'm plenty vulgar in English!


----------



## joanamcbarata

skatoulitsa said:


> γρουσούζης / γκαντέμης : a carrier of bad luck, but not only to himself but others as well. This is more than "unlucky" who is just someone with bad luck. We call somone that when we want to blame them for something bad that happened.


I don't speak greek, but can't it be "to be cursed"?


> Along the same lines, I also don't know if there is a translation for "γουρλής" which is the exact opposite from the words above (someone who is a carrier of good luck to the people around him).


and "blessed"?


----------



## Nizo

Esperanto has a few interesting words that are particular to its culture and therefore hard to translate:

_samideano_:  a person who shares the same ideas.  Esperantists sometimes use this term to refer to each other and often close letters with a form of the same word (_samideane_).

_krokodili_:  to speak in one's native language in an Esperanto or other international environment.  If a bunch of Esperantists are together and two start speaking French between themselves, for example, they would be doing this.

_kabei_:  to suddenly and completely drop from the Esperanto movement after having been very active in it.  This verb comes from the name Kazimierz Bein, an Esperanto author and translator who suddenly quit his activities.


----------



## tenseconds

Well, I don't know enough languages to say if there is no translation for these words in any language, but there are three that I have found no translation for in the languages I have encountered:
"silly" (English)
"chicha" (Costa Rican Spanish)
"gigel" (Tagalog)


----------



## Lingvisten

I do not fully agree that words can be untranslatable. "Languages differ not in what they can convey, but in what they must convey" (Roman Jakobson). We can of course say, that a word is understanded differently in one country, than in another, due to different living conditions, culture and collective memories. A glass or a table would not look the exact same in fx. Japan and Germany (probably not a very good example). Then translation of anything is impossible. I think it was Nabokov who translated "Master and Magarita" into english, and made the explanation of the translation in the back of the book larger than the actual novel. The most important when translating is to translate meaning not words. Most of the words considered untranslatable is thought so, only because of the romantic idea, that language contains the essence of the peoples culture and spirit and therefore is unique.
It also seems, that whenever a person posts a word on this thread, a translation in another language shows up. 
beside all this. I think that German "Fernweh" can be translated into Danish "udlængsel".


----------



## alexacohen

"Xeitosa", Galician. 

A woman who may or may not be pretty, who may be or may be not attractive; but who pleases everybody with her sparkling personality, like champagne bubbles.
And it has nothing to do with sex appeal.


----------



## Maurice92

cherine said:


> the "les" is not exactly an untranslateble "word", first because it is not a word


"les" est bien un mot français, ce n'est pas un nom, c'est un article


----------



## alexacohen

skatoulitsa said:


> γρουσούζης / γκαντέμης : a carrier of bad luck, but not only to himself but others as well. This is more than "unlucky" who is just someone with bad luck. We call somone that when we want to blame them for something bad that happened.


That would be a "gafe" in Spanish. The definition fits exactly.


----------



## Zsanna

I think in Hungarian there are quite a lot of expressions that are difficult to give back in all their meaning but I'd rather stick now just to make some comments on the previous messages:

N° 44 - I think there is an equivalent for that in Hungarian: *felpaprikázott* or *paprikás* esp. mood (_hangulat_) (the difference between the two is that the first puts an accent on the fact that there was a process the person went thorugh to end up in such a mood meanwhile the second just gives a "motionless" description of the state)

N° 57 - *haláli* (= _deadly_ in the meaning of "very") + adj. wouldn't be bad although a bit close to the English "dead + adj.". (And they are not as suicidal as we are! )

N° 90 - *silly* has quite a lot of possibilities in Hungarian such as *lüke*, *lökött*, *idétlen*, even *szeles*, etc.


----------



## gotitadeleche

skatoulitsa said:


> So... I don't really know if this is translatable in english or not, but I don't know the word for it, and I always have trouble when I'm trying to express in english the following greek words:
> 
> γρουσούζης / γκαντέμης : a carrier of bad luck, but not only to himself but others as well. This is more than "unlucky" who is just someone with bad luck. We call somone that when we want to blame them for something bad that happened.
> 
> Along the same lines, I also don't know if there is a translation for "γουρλής" which is the exact opposite from the words above (someone who is a carrier of good luck to the people around him).



Sounds like a jinx.


----------



## J.F. de TROYES

optimistique said:


> In Dutch we have among many others:
> 
> *wel* = the opposite of '_not_'. In English it can be expressed by stressing the verb: "_He hasn't done it, but I have_*'.* You cannot express it in a separate word however (which can be annoying sometimes IMO) except for 'do' or 'does', but that's not the same. I know in German you can sometimes use 'schon', but that also means 'already', so I'm often not sure. And I use 'bien' in French, but I don't know if I've assigned it that meaning myself, or if it's really French.
> 
> PS: the German "sauerkraut" is not completely intranslatable. In Dutch we say "zuurkool". We also have "braadworst" en "curryworst".


Is'nt *"wel"* a little similar to the answer "Moi, si" as in "Il ne l'a pas fait, *moi si* " ( = " but I have") ?

"*Sauerkraut*" is transliterated into "*choucroute*", coming  from Alsacian: "sûrkrût", as this dish is as usual in Alsace as in Germany.


----------



## Hakro

robbie_SWE said:


> In Swedish we have one word that is said not to exist in any other language. The word is "*lagom*" and it's more a philosophy than a word. One could say that it means "_total adequacy, materialistically and spiritually_", but that's just scraping the surface.


As far as I understand the word "lagom", the Finnish word *parahultainen* includes all the same multiple meanings. This word is colloquial and a bit archaic but understandable for most of the Finns.


----------



## J.F. de TROYES

avalon2004 said:


> There is a word in Greek that lacks an exact translation in English: *kefi*, which basically means anything to do with being "in high spirit".. For example there is the phrase είμαι στα _κέφια_ μου/eimai sta _kefia_ mou, which would translate something like "I'm in a good mood", but I think it's somewhat stronger.
> Come to think of it, there's also the phrase */ev zin* which has similar connotations, though it translates quite nicely into English as "the good life".


 
I think  *κέφι* is close to the french word *"le moral"* (different of "la morale" which means "morality" or "ethic" : "Il a le moral" means "He is in good spirits" or to say it stronger " il a un moral d'acier" ( "a steel-spirit" )
As for "*ευ ζην "* we say " la belle vie".

It reminds me of a French phrase, a bit old-fashioned , but strange  : "Cette fille a *du chien *" ( chien = dog ) which means : "This girl has great charm".


----------



## Qcumber

Mutichou said:


> In French, this word can be translated *gentilé*.


What does it mean? It's not in my French-French dictionary (Le Petit Robert).

Denis cannot translate Span. *gentilicio* so only gives periphrastic equivalents:
1) qui appartient aux nations = that belongs to nations
2) relative à un lignage = that refers to an ancestry
3) qui indique la nationalité (adjectif) = that refers to a nationality (adjective)

According to Michener, a Spanish word that is very hard to translate is *duende*.


tenseconds said:


> "gigel" (Tagalog)


If you mean Tag. *gígil* it is "thrill". 
If you mean Taglish *gígel*, it is "giggle".
Both are translatable.
As regards Eng. silly, I'll pass.


----------



## J.F. de TROYES

Mutichou said:
			
		

> Citation:
> Posté par *Brazilian dude*
> You can easily translate Spanish gentilicio into Portuguese gentilício.
> 
> In French, this word can be translated *gentilé*.


 


Qcumber said:


> What does it mean? It's not in my French-French dictionary (Le Petit Robert).
> 
> Denis cannot translate Span. *gentilicio* so only gives periphrastic equivalents:
> 1) qui appartient aux nations = that belongs to nations
> 2) relative à un lignage = that refers to an ancestry
> 3) qui indique la nationalité (adjectif) = that refers to a nationality (adjective)


 I was about to say "right, never heard about "  when it occured to me to check it in dictionaries. As you say, first I did'nt find anything in the Petit-Robert, but  then I looked up the word in the last edition of the same dictionary in which surprisingly you can read : *"gentilé n. masc. **= dénomination des habitants d'un lieu, relativemant au nom de ce lieu "* !Denomination of the inhabitants of a place, in relation to the name of this place ). So I discovered that "Les Parisiens" are "le gentilé" of the inhabitants of Paris. "Le Petit Larousse" gives it too, but without a real definition.
Thanks, Mutichou


----------



## Nanon

Sepia said:


> What I might consider intranslatable, though, would probably be some of those approx. 200 words for different tones of Green, that exist in more than one native-American language.


 
 Or the words describing snow for the Inuit. Or...



ElCamaron said:


> I guess it happens with many recipe names. For instance, in Spain we have "Gazpacho"...





Mutichou said:


> However, I don't see any untranslatable words in French...


Well, try to translate the names of the (allegedly 365) French cheeses. Or Italian pasta. Or the varieties of Bulgarian yoghurt. Not that they are untranslatable - you can translate the recipe or you can explain, use footnotes etc. But of course you do not expect these words to have any exact equivalent.



Molka said:


> Hungarian: Halali vagy!
> Literally: you are deadly



Colloquial French: "Mortel !" "Trop mortel !" "J'adore ce mec, il est mortel / cette fille, elle est mortelle !" etc... (that rreminds me of a fil by Cédric Klapisch, "Chacun cherche son chat" / "When the cat's away" : one of the characters said "Mortel" all the time!)



skatoulitsa said:


> γρουσούζης / γκαντέμης : a carrier of bad luck, but not only to himself but others as well. This is more than "unlucky" who is just someone with bad luck.


Then I can offer another difficult-to-translate one, at least in just one word: "pavoso" in Venezuelan Spanish. It has to do with bad luck but sometimes also with bad taste (something so vulgar that you could get jinxed!)



J.F. de TROYES said:


> "gentilé n. masc. = dénomination des habitants d'un lieu, relativem*e*nt au nom de ce lieu"


C'est dans le Petit Robert... _Nom de lieu !!!_
(Je sais, c'est facile... mais je n'ai pas pu résister )


----------



## raptor

I found an interesting one that I don't know of a clean translation for:

(I don't know how to spell it in Arabic, but): al hissar : "isolation and encirclement by a hostile world"

Sounds kind of like the position a lot of wildlife is in 

raptor

Great thread!


----------



## Maurice92

raptor said:


> I found an interesting one that I don't know of a clean translation for:
> 
> (I don't know how to spell it in Arabic, but): al hissar : "isolation and encirclement by a hostile world"



In turkish, it means : fortress
Probably one comes from yhe other one.


----------



## Mahaodeh

raptor said:


> I found an interesting one that I don't know of a clean translation for:
> 
> (I don't know how to spell it in Arabic, but): al hissar : "isolation and encirclement by a hostile world"
> 
> Sounds kind of like the position a lot of wildlife is in
> 
> raptor
> 
> Great thread!


 
in a financial/political sense it is _blockade_, in a military sense it is _seige_, in a general sense it is sort of like _limitation_. I found it hard to translate it in the last sense.

For me, there are quite a few Arabic words that find hard (if not impossible) to translate; here are some:

- athkal أثكل (m.), thukla ثكلى (f.), is the a person that has lost a child (like widow is someone who has lost a husband/wife and orphan is someone who has lost a parent or both).

- Haya' حياء, is the feeling of being unable to do/say something in order not to be rude or insolent.

- najwa نجوى, is to talk quitely and in seceret about your inner feelings.

- qara قرى, is to prepare food and serve it to a gest (specifically).

- irtawa إرتوى, is the opposite of "to become thursty".

I only know Arabic and English (unfortunately) so maybe they can be translated to other languages, maybe not.


----------



## WadiH

Arabic طرب (_Tarab_): the unique sense of pleasure derived from listening to music (or, less commonly, poetry).


----------



## Kannan91

Malayalam: ഏനിക്ക് _enikk(u)_.This is a form of the first person singular pronoun that usually functions as the dative form. However, it is also sometimes put in front of conjugated verbs in place of the regular nominative form (ഞാന് ñān). This only happens when the English translation would be "I am/was/will be/etc. [adjective derived from a verb]", for example "I am hungry" (ഏനിക്ക് വിശക്കുന്നു _enikku viśakkunnu_). In Malayalam, instead of using the verb "to be" followed by the adjective, the verb from which the adjective would originate in English is conjugated. This pronoun has a multitude of other uses - for example, verbs are put in a special form when you say you want to do something and always follow this pronoun, as do nouns that you want. It is also always used before the verb "to have" except when this verb is used to form the perfect tense(to make things even more confusing unless you are a native, the verbs "to have" "to exist" "to be made" and "to come into existence" are all exactly the same, but this pronoun is only used when the verb means "to have"). There are couple more complicated usages, but I think that what I've already said is bad enough (this also applies for all other personal pronouns, singular and plural, all of which have a regular nominative and a "pseudo-dative" or whatever you want to call it form) It is impossible to translate this concept into English without using a lot of words as I did.


----------



## Mahaodeh

Wadi Hanifa said:


> Arabic طرب (_Tarab_): the unique sense of pleasure derived from listening to music (or, less commonly, poetry).


 
Yes, this is another word that I can not find a translation for; I even find it extremely hard to explain what it is to non-Arabic speakers.


----------



## Pedro y La Torre

Molka said:


> Hungarian: Halali vagy!
> Literally: you are deadly
> Actually this is an appreciative exclamation, something like: you are so cool that the pleasure of talking to you / being with you is killing me, which is exceptionally good feeling.
> Don't take my remark as black humour, but the suicidal rate is quite high in Hungary. A great Hungarian novelist (1st half of 20th century), Antal SZERB, talks about dying as an erotic act.



That is often said in Ireland.

You're deadly =  you're very good (at something)

That's deadly = that's really good (cool).


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## Miguel Antonio

For the sake of brevity I will refrain from quoting all the posts that I would like to comment on.

Portuguese _saudade_ is close to *feeling the blues*, it is a longing that goes beyond mere *nostalgia* or love lost, and it is best expressed in the Portuguese song, *Fado*, from the Latin _fatum_ yet something more than just destiny or fate, and with a musical sentiment that lies very, very close to *Blues* as in music.
The Galician word _morriña_ as I learned it from my childhood refers to a sort of dirtiness that builds up in places that are difficult to reach with normal cleaning procedures. My grandmother was always telling me to wash off the _morriña_ from behind my ears. All over Spain it is interpreted as being a synonym of _saudade_, and apparently in Brazil too. 

Then in Galician also we have the expressions _a eito _vs_ a feito. _The first refers to something that is done in a disorderly, random, haphazard fashion as opposed to the second, from Latin _factum_, which is the opposite.

A day in Galicia starts with _fusco-lusco _(morning twilight) and ends at _lusco-fusco _(evening twilight). 
_Mencer: _Dawn
*Mañanciña: Early morning*
_Mañán: _morning
_Mediodía: _midday
_Tarde: _afternoon
*tardiña: late afternoon*
_Noitiña: _evening
_Noite: _night

Enough for now


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## Molka

Sorry for giving "deadly" as the literal meaning of "haláli". It is not correct. The literal meaning would be something like: "from death" or "concerning death"... That is why I thought it cannot really be translated, but it was a rather hair-splitting idea... As to the suicidal rate coming into the scene: pure exageration, pardon me... it just served as an excuse to have a word about SZERB Antal... All the best for Everyone!


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## waterbuf

Someone said, I forget who:

_Well, try to translate the names of the (allegedly 365) French cheeses. Or Italian pasta. Or the varieties of Bulgarian yoghurt. Not that they are untranslatable - you can translate the recipe or you can explain, use footnotes etc. But of course you do not expect these words to have any exact equivalent.

_Point well taken.  I'd like to add the names of German cold cuts -- 
 Austrian too but to a lesser degree and Swiss.  In Spanish you'd have
expressions like longanesa or chorizo, not much more.  In English
you'd have to work with "salami" as a sort of generic term or with
cold cuts.  Go into a German butcher shop and view the great variety
of "wurst" (generic German term for all the cold cuts) there:  Lyoner,
Zungenwurst, Speckwurst, Leberwurst, Teewurst, Fleischwurst, 
Goettinger, Schinkenwurst, Gelbwurst, Pressack, Blutwurst and  of
course SALAMI.  I know the list is not complete.  I know too that 
the list would vary from one one part of Germany to another.  But
I also know that these are true intranslatables.


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