onsdag 11. februar 2009

French expressions you won't learn at school

  • À boire ou je tue le chien!
    Bring me something to drink or I kill the dog!

  • Arriver comme un cheveu sur la soupe
    About a remark in a conversation, to be completely irrelevant (literally: "to arrive like a hair in the soup")

  • Attaquer bille en tête
    He didn't beat about the bush (literally: "to attack with a marble in head")

  • Avoir chaud aux plumes
    To escape a danger (literally: "to have one's feathers hot")

  • Avoir des atomes crochus avec quelqu'un
    To have a lot in common with someone (literally: "to have hooked atoms with someone")

  • Avoir le cul entre deux chaises
    To be caught between two stools (literally: "to have one's ass between two chairs")

  • Avoir les dents du fond qui baignent
    To be overfed (literally: "to have one's back teeth swimming")

  • Avoir les jetons
    To be scared (literally: "to have the tokens")

  • Avoir les chevilles qui enflent
    To be very full of oneself (literally: "to have one's ankles swell")

  • Avoir des casseroles au cul
    To be haunted by a scandal (literally: "to have saucepans hung on the ass")

  • Avec ma bite et mon couteau
    To do something with very few tools (literally: "with my dick and my knife")

  • Avoir le cul bordé de nouilles
    To be lucky (literally: "to have the ass full of noodles")

  • Avoir trois métros de retard
    To always be one step behind (literally: "to be three metros late")

  • Avoir un chat dans la gorge
    To have a frog in one's throat (literally: "to have a cat in one's throat")

  • Avoir un fil à la patte
    To be tied down (literally: "to have a thread at the leg")

  • Avoir un poil dans la main
    To be lazy (literally: "to have a hair in the hand")

  • Avoir une peur bleue
    To have a bad scare (literally: "to have a blue fear")

  • Ça me fait une belle jambe
    A fat lot of good that does me! (literally: "It makes me a nice leg")

  • Ça ne casse pas des briques
    It has nothing to write home about (literally: "It doesn't break bricks")

  • Ça ne casse pas trois pattes à un canard
    It has nothing to write home about (literally: "It doesn't break three legs to a duck")

  • Ça va chier des bulles
    There'll be one hell of a row (literally: "It will shit bubbles")

  • Ça va être pour ma pomme
    It's for yours truly (literally: "It will be for my apple")

  • Ça vaut son pesant de cacahuètes
    Ironical: That's priceless (literally: "It is worth its weight in peanuts")

  • C'est dans la poche
    It's in the bag (literally: "It's in the pocket")

  • C'est le pied
    That's great (literally: "It is the foot")

  • C'est une autre paire de manches
    That's another story (literally: "It's another pair of sleeves")

  • Chat échaudé craint l'eau froide
    Once bitten, twice shy (literally: "A warmed cat fears cold water")

  • Coincer la bulle
    To bum around (literally: "to wedge the bubble")

  • Courir sur le haricot
    Get one someone's nerves (literally: "to run on someone's bean")

  • Découvrir le pot aux roses
    To discover a secret (literally: "to discover the roses' pot")
    Note: This expression does not spell "découvrir le poteau rose" (i.e., "to discover the pink pole").

  • Démerden Zie sich
    German-like expression for "solve your problem yourself" (literally: "get out of the shit yourself")

  • Dire tout et son contraire
    To say contradictory things (literally: "to say everything and its contrary")

  • Donner du fil à retordre
    To make life difficult to someone (literally: "to give threads to twist")

  • Donner sa langue au chat
    To give up a riddle (literally: "to give one's tongue to the cat")

  • L'enfance de l'art
    Its child play (literally: "the childhood of art")

  • En voir de toutes les couleurs
    To be through the mill (literally: "to see some of all colors")

  • Enfoncer le clou
    To drive the point home (literally: "to drive the nail in")

  • Essuyer les plâtres
    To have all the initial problems to put up with (literally: "to wipe the plasters")

  • Être de mauvais poil
    To be in a bad mood (literally: "to be of bad hair")

  • Être fagoté comme l'as de pique
    To be dressed any old how (literally: "to be dressed like the ace of spades")

  • Être habillé à la six-quatre-deux
    To be dressed any old how (literally: "to be dressed like six-four-two")

  • Il en a bavé des ronds de chapeau
    His eyes nearly popped out of his head (literally: "he dribbled hat circles")

  • Enfoncer des portes ouvertes
    To state the obvious (literally: "To break down open doors")

  • Être comme une poule qui a trouvé un couteau
    To be at a complete loss (literally: "To be like a chicken who has found a knife")

  • Être un peu long à la détente
    To react slowly to something (literally: "To have a slow trigger")

  • Faire d'une pierre deux coup
    To solve two problems with one solution (literally: "To do with one stone two hits")

  • Faux cul
    Hypocrite (literally: "fake ass")

  • Faux jeton
    Hypocrite (literally: "fake token")

  • Fumer comme un sapeur
    To smoke like a chimney (literally: "to smoke like a fireman")

  • Haut comme trois pommes
    About a person: small (literally: "tall as three apples")

  • Il n'y a pas de quoi fouetter un chat
    It is nothing to make a fuss about (literally: "It's no reason for whipping a cat")

  • Il y a de l'eau dans le gaz
    Things aren't running too smoothly (literally: "there is water in the gaz")

  • Il y une couille dans le potage
    There is a problem here (literally: "there is a ball (i.e., testicule) in the soup")

  • Jeter un froid
    To put a damper on things (literally: "to throw a cold)

  • Je ne vais pas faire long feu ici
    I will be leaving soon (literally: "I will not make long fire here")

  • Je te vois venir avec tes gros sabots
    Now we are finally getting to the point (literally: "I see you coming with your big clogs")

  • La vache!
    Expression of surprise (literally: "the cow!)

  • La cinquième roue du carosse
    To be like a spare part (literally: "the fifth wheel of the coach)

  • Laisser pisser le mérinos
    Don't react to a provocation (literally: "to let the merino piss")

  • Laisser tomber quelqu'un comme une vieille chaussette
    To jilt somebody (literally: "to drop somebody like an old sock")

  • Les bras m'en tombent
    I am stunned (literally: "my arms are falling")

  • Ne pas avoir inventé la poudre
    To be a little dumb (literally: "not to have invented gunpowder")

  • Ne pas savoir sur quel pied danser
    Not to know what to do (literally: "not to know on which foot to dance")

  • Ne pas y aller avec le dos de la cuillère
    There is no half-measures with him/her (literally: "not to go there with the back of the spoon")

  • Noyer le poisson
    To evade an issue (literally: "to drown the fish")

  • On n'est pas sorti de l'auberge
    We are not out of the woods yet (literally: "We are not out of the inn yet")

  • Parler à tort et à travers
    To blather (literally: "To speak wrongly and crosswise")

  • Pas piqué des hannetons
    Great (literally: "not bitten by cockchafers")

  • Peigner la girafe
    To do something useless (literally: "to comb the giraffe")

  • Poule mouillée
    Coward (literally: "wet chicken")

  • Prendre entre quatre z'yeux
    To have an argument with someone (literally: "To take someone between four eyes")

  • Quand les poules auront des dents
    Never (literally: "when chickens will have teeth")

  • Ronger son frein
    To champ at the bit (literally: "to gnaw one's break")

  • Sauter du coq à l'âne
    To jump from one subject to another (literally: "to jump from the rooster to the donkey")

  • Se faire chier comme un rat mort
    To be extremely bored (literally: "to make oneself shit like a dead rat")

  • S'en donner à coeur joie
    To have a tremendous time (literally: "to give oneself heart joy")

  • S'entendre comme larrons en foire
    To be thick as thieves (literally: "to get along like thieves in a fair")

  • Sortir de la gueule d'une vache
    This is said about a clothing item that looks cumpeled (literally: "to come from a cow's mouth")

  • Sucer les pissenlits par la racine
    Be dead (literally: "to suck the dandelions by the root")

  • Surveiller comme du lait sur le feu
    To keep an eye on (literally: "to keep an eye on like milk on a fire")

  • Tirer le diable par la queue
    To have money problems (literally: "to pull the devil's tail")

  • Tiré par les cheveux
    Far-fetched (literally: "pulled by the hair")

  • Tirer des plans sur la comète
    To build castles in the air (literally: "to draw plans on the comet")

  • Tomber à plat
    About a joke: not to trigger any reaction by the audience (literally: "to fall flat")

  • Tous les 36 du mois
    Never (literally: "each 36th day of the month")

  • Un peu mon neveu!
    Of course! (literally: "a little bit, my nephew!")

  • Vendre la peau de l'ours avant de l'avoir tué
    To count one's chickens before they are hatched (literally: "to sell the bear's skin before killing it")


    _______________
    Banzai Harakiri


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