This week I've found myself learning idiomatic expressions in French to do with body parts, so I figured I'd make an entry of it and share some of them. I think it's interesting how some expressions' equivalents in English also involve body parts, but different ones than in French.
tête à claque, literally 'head to slap' = a person who is so irritating you feel like slapping them everytime you see them
faire la tête, literally 'to do the head' = to sulk
casse-pieds, literally 'foot breaker' = a pain in the neck
faire un pied de nez à quelqu'un, literally 'make a foot of nose at someone' = to thumb one's nose at someone
avoir bon pied bon oeil, literally 'to have good foot, good eye' = to be fit as a fiddle
mener quelqu'un par le bout du nez, literally 'lead someone by the end of the nose' = to have someone under one's thumb
avoir du nez, literally 'to have some nose' = to be shrewd
faire quelque chose les doigts dans le nez, literally 'to do something with your fingers in your nose' = to do something easily (à la 'I could do that with my hands behind my back')
faire la fine bouche devant quelque chose, literally 'to make the delicate mouth in front of something' = to turn one's nose up at something
la gueule de bois, literally 'mouth of wood' = a hangover
tirer les oreilles de quelqu'un, literally 'to pull someone's ears' = to tell someone off (like when a parent grabs a child's ear?)
Alright, maybe more later. A bientôt!
Maggie B.
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3 comments:
hmm, interessant. nice to know that someone is at least learning something new at the institute! post more things like this so i can learn too! i miss you maggie!
haha yay!
comments:
the ear-grabbing thing exists in portuguese too... except people are for real threatening to pull your ear when they say that. not really an idiom.
i love the nose ones!!!!!!! all of them!!! and the shrewdness--i always think of a nose when i think of that word, like a crinkled nose and eyes of someone thinking. and the leading someone by the nose--soooo comes from leading cows around. i bet.
now, portuguese (i only know ones about elbows):
falar pelos cotovelos: "talk through your elbows," meaning like you talk so much that it's coming out of more places than just your mouth.
estar com dor de cotovelos: "have elbow pain," meaning like either your boyfriend leaves you for someone else/you have unreciprocated feelings for someone, or you are envious of someone, hence you do that gesture where you put your elbow on the table and you put your head on your hand and sigh. actually now i just read a thing about that and it suggested that the envy one comes from standing at the window, elbows on the balcony, looking over at the neighbor's property, and the failed love one comes from standing at the bar leaning elbows on the balcony, drinking and crying over the person. anywayyyy something like that. i love that expression.
And (I am told) there is a near-equivalent hangover phrase, not "mouth of wood" but "cotton-mouth" to describe the lovely mouth-feel associated with excessive drinking. Ah, idioms, how we love thee!
On an entirely different note, I highly recommend you view Jon Stewart's evisceration of Jim Cramer last night.
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