Some expressions/proverbs are present in many langagues. But others are very specific, and sometimes these expressions seem funny, weird or poetic. I think it will be cool to share our discoveries. So to start, a russian expression which make me laught the first time I heard it. The Russians use it to say that something is very clean and shinny. "блестит как у кота яйца" Shinny like the cat's balls
For Cebuano if something bad happens to you can someone else thinks its not that big a deal, they might say: "layo sa tinae" "(it's) far from the intestine" I seem to recall a Russian equivalent for "I'll take the edge off my hunger" which was something like "I'm going to feed the little worm."
@Big_Dog : we don't use "egg" in french for testicules (or it is not commun). One of the more "fancy" expression is "les bijoux de famille", "the family jewels". Do english speakers use it often ?
I've never heard the worm thing in English. I saw the Russian phrase in a book called "So Say the Russians"
I can't think of any expressions that are weird, but there are a lot of weird (from my perspective) ways of phrasing things. One thing that does sort of make me smile is how the word "lepo" which means "nicely" or "beautifully" (when used as an adverb) and it is used in so many phrases where it wouldn't make sense so much if translated literally - e.g. hvala lepo = thank you nicely (hmm, maybe like "thank you kindly"?) but means "thanks a lot"; "molim lepo" literally means "I beg nicely" but means "you're welcome" (molim is a bit hard to translate as well since it has a bit of a versatile meaning). Anyways, what's funny about it is when my mum speaks English you see how her English is Serbianized through the use of "nicely": pensulo, take this outside how is it going to fit through the door? nicely! pensulo, put this on the table; hey, put it nicely!
