Worldly Words (part 1)

       Within the English language there are countless ways of describing feelings, physical things, moments, concepts, and various situations from real or imaginary – and all usually take quite a collection of words to paint that metaphoric picture. Not so with other languages, in fact the following list of international words will prove that unlike English, highly colorful situations, rich emotional journeys, and oddly humorous “metaphoric pictures” are easily painted by single words. May i present to you a most bodacious and bombastic grouping of weird words that Adam Jacot de Boinod terms “Tojours Tingo”.

        I just consider them the “Jolly Jello” of international alphabet soup; or delightful nonsense. Enjoy!

Sitzpinkler 

(German)

    Slang for “wimp,” literally translated as “a man who sits to pee”.

Koi No Yokan 

(Japanese)

   The sense upon first meeting a person that the two of you are going to fall in love.

Voorpret 

(Dutch)

    The feeling you have just before you are about to do something fun

Backpfeifengesicht

(German)

    A face badly in need of a fist.

Gokotta

(Swedish) 

 “a dawn picnic to hear the first birdsong”

Mokita 

(Papua New Guinea) 

"the truth we all know but agree to not talk about."

    Eomchina 

 As the webstite Lingholic says, “(엄친아) is a hilarious Korean word that is a contraction of the phrase “Mom’s friend’s son” (엄마친구아들). Korean mothers are often very competitive and compare their children against the offspring of their friends. This word is used to describe a person who is more successful or skilled than you – the kind of person your mother would compare you to in a negative light so as to motivate you to study harder.”

    

Apeiron 

(Greek)

 The "limitless, endless, infinite" or, the creation of the cosmos.

 Boketto 

(Japanese) 

“the act of gazing vacantly into the distance.”

    Kummerspeck

(German)

 Excess weight gained from emotional overeating. Literally, “grief bacon.”

Gattara

(Italian) 

 "An old and lonely woman, dedicated to her cats."

Forelsket

 (Norwegian)

"The euphoria you experience when you are first falling in love."

To be Continued. . . .next week with twelve more resplendently weird worldy words.