When I first arrived in the USA, I had a terrible time getting used to the English language as spoken by Americans. I found that many of the sayings, idioms and colloquialisms I'd been accustomed to in South Africa (and England, for that matter) didn't mean at all the same thing over here. For example, in 1996 I was having breakfast with a family in Baltimore, MD. The father and mother, their teenage daughter, and myself (at the time, a visiting pastor) were seated around a table. The young lady was busily picking cherries out of her fruit salad and laying them on the side of her plate. In all innocence, I asked her, "May I have your cherry?" - meaning that fruit, right there! She blushed scarlet, and her parents hooted with laughter. She fled as they explained to me (to my great embarrassment) what I'd just asked for in colloquial American terms, rather than what I'd meant in English.
The gestures used by Americans also confused me a little, but they weren't as different from those to which I was accustomed as was the language. However, it seems that in many parts of the world, physical signs can have profoundly different meanings. Mandatory.com has just published an article titled 'The Comprehensive Guide to International Insults', listing 20 gestures and their meanings in different areas. Here's one example.
The article informs us:
Japan and Korea aren’t terribly fond of each other. Tuck in your thumb and thrust the other four fingers out at them, and you are letting your adversary know that he is a dumb animal. Which is something you don't want to be in either Japan or Korea.
There are many more examples at the link. Warning: they're not always safe for work, but they are interesting, entertaining and enlightening!
Peter
I've been told that in italy, the horns has the meaning of "your wife sleeps with other men because you're not a real man."
ReplyDeleteOf course if you turn it around, it means the sign of the devil, a common sight at metal concerts. (Because the index, pinkie and thumb combined with middle and ring fingers each form the shape of the number 6, thus 666).
Advice to all those English visitors to America.
ReplyDeleteNever tell an American woman, who house you visit, that: "It's so homely".
Homely = ugly in the U.S.