In Finnish we have “kissanristiäiset” (literally means a cat’s christening), which means some trivial and meaningless celebration/event.

  • Lvxferre@lemmy.ml
    47·
    1 year ago

    There’s a bunch of weird ones in Portuguese.

    • “Caroço de manga não é sabonete” Do you think that mango seed is soap? = “this is an absurd proposal/situation/etc.”
    • “Pobre só sobe na vida quando o barraco explode” Poor people only ascend on life when the [shit]shack explodes. = “don’t expect social ascension”
    • “Enquanto vem com o milho, já comi a polenta.” While you’re bringing the corn, I already ate the polenta. = “I’ve already handled this, you’re too late.”
    • “um polaco de cada colônia” a Pole from each settlement = a bunch of randomly picked people or items. I don’t think that people use this too much outside Paraná.
    • “farinha do mesmo saco” flour from the same bag = extremely similar in some aspects that matter (and usually negative ones)
    • “comer o pão que o diabo amassou” to eat the bread kneaded by the devil = to go through rough times
    • “Vai chupar prego até virar tachinha!” Go suck an [iron] nail until it becomes a thumbtack! = somewhat polite way to tell someone to fuck off
    • “Vai ver se estou na esquina.” *Go check if I’m around the corner." = also a way to tell people to fuck off
    • “anta quadrada” squared tapir = “anta” tapir is used to call someone stupid, so anta quadrada is stupid to the power of two.
    • “anta cúbica” cubed tapir = because some people do some really, really stupid shit.
    • “mais louco que o Requião de pedalinho” crazier than Requião on a paddle boat = Requião is a politician here in Paraná known for his crazy antics. The phrase highlights that something is completely fucking crazy. Clearly local.
    • “teu cu” your arse[hole] = definitively, clearly, and blatantly “no”.
    • Aceticon@lemmy.world
      3·
      1 year ago

      Only a few of these - “comer o pão que o diabo amassou”, “vai ver se estou na esquina” - are used in Portugal, so they’re mostly used in Brasil.

      The language hasn’t drifted all that much in between both countries during the last couple of hundred years but expressions seem to tend to be the first to drift away.

      • Lvxferre@lemmy.ml
        1·
        1 year ago

        It also seems to me that expressions drift away faster than other aspects of the language. Perhaps due to their casual nature, or due to context. And they’re often extremely local, too - for example, I’ve heard nordestinos using “sacrifício de mundo” (lit. world sacrifice) to refer to difficult things, while folks here in Paraná practically never do it. While saying that something is “uma vaca no milharal” (a cow in the corn farm - wrecking everything with no regards or reason) usually outs the person as from a rural background.

        For speakers from Portugal there’s an additional weird expression: pila is used here in Paraná as a completely innocent word for money, e.g. “dois pila” two bucks. (In PT I believe that it’s used as a slang for dick.)

    • xinayder@infosec.pub
      2·
      1 year ago

      Haven’t seen some of these before. Ones I particularly like are:

      • Tirar o cavalo da chuva: take your horse away from the rain = give up on something
      • Lavar as mãos: wash (the) hands = do not involve yourself in something