There is a new book coming out in March from Penguin entitled, "The meaning of Tingo"
by Jacot de Boinod. It is a collection of interesting, and funny expressions from many other languages - some of which would be good to adopt to save time.

Tingo is Pascuense (Easter Island) for "to borrow things from a friend's house one by one, until nothing is left." Justly followed by Hakamaru, which means "to keep borrowed objects until the owner has to ask for them back."

I particularly appreciate a modern Italian colloquialism: Biodegradabile - To fall in love easily and often, in the sense of turning to putty at every flutter of the eye.
Obviously, biodegradable - but once in love and dancing closely the central Americans say pulir hebillas - "rubbng belt buckles"

drf

calonlan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> >
> There is a new book coming out in March from
> Penguin entitled, "The meaning of Tingo"
> by Jacot de Boinod. It is a collection of
> interesting, and funny expressions from many other
> languages - some of which would be good to adopt
> to save time.
>
> Tingo is Pascuense (Easter Island) for "to borrow
> things from a friend's house one by one, until
> nothing is left." Justly followed by Hakamaru,
> which means "to keep borrowed objects until the
> owner has to ask for them back."
>
> I particularly appreciate a modern Italian
> colloquialism: Biodegradabile - To fall in love
> easily and often, in the sense of turning to putty
> at every flutter of the eye.
> Obviously, biodegradable - but once in love and
> dancing closely the central Americans say pulir
> hebillas - "rubbng belt buckles"
>
> drf

Sounds fun -- I'll look it up!

This reminds me of that hilarious little dictionary by Douglas Adams & John Lloyd, THE MEANING OF LIFF. It can be found online (probably illegal, though, so I won't link to it).

Yrs
Martin