Recent newsletters have been a tad on the businesslike side, so this month we thought we'd take a break, with something purely for fun. Specifically, a wee selection of definitions from 'The meaning of Tingo', a delightful book Nick gave me for Christmas, which trawls 'the collective wisdom of over 154 languages' for words and expressions which for the most part have no direct English counterpart - though on reading them, you often itch to create one. Such as:
Plimpplamppletteren (Dutch) - skimming stones across water
Areodjarekput (Inuit) - to swap wives just for a few days
Anaranjear (Spanish) - to throw oranges at someone
And at the risk of causing offense, may we caution all our valued readers against 'neko-neko' - an Indonesian word for 'one who has a creative idea that only makes things worse'...
Find more at http://www.themeaningoftingo.com/. Or do yourself a favour and buy a copy.
Kind regards
Alan Paterson
PS Oh, and the meaning of 'tingo'? It is apparently an expression from Easter
Island, meaning 'to take all the objects one desires from the house of a
friend, one at a time, by asking to borrow them'.