A World of Wisdom: Fun and Unusual Phrases from Around the Globe
The world is your oyster English The world is your canvas Spain Colombia The world is at your feet Germany The world is at your service Russia The world is your hotel Pakistan The world is a pot man a spoon in it Armenia The world stands open before you Poland The world is the world for the world Japan WHAT IS THE WORLD TO YOU hey take care of yourself
Introduction is an When thinking about different cultures and places we usually focus on the food the people and the landscape Language important part of any culture too Expressions like proverbs and idioms passed down through generations can tell us so much about life in a specific place Proverbs are little nuggets of wisdom that impart a moral or message and idioms are figurative turns of phrase that have a meaning beyond their literal one For example in English-speaking countries we might say it’s raining cats and dogs and it means that it’s raining very hard not that house pets are falling from the sky But when there’s a heavy rainstorm in Slovakia they say it rains tractors and in Colombia it rains husbands
This book is a collection of these kinds of marvelous phrases from all over the globe shining a light on the subtle differences found in our lives and the cultures we come from Take apples for example they’re common in so many countries Apple juice apple pie apples are everywhere They’re common in English expressions too such as in phrases like the apple of your eye and an apple a day keeps the doctor away Living in such an apple-loving culture it makes sense that they show up so frequently right But what if apples aren’t so common though Venezuela is one of the biggest pineapple producers in the world So in that country an annoying person isn’t called a bad apple or a pain in the neck but instead they’re eres una piña bajo el brazo a pineapple under the arm It’s a perfect fruit-based description for an uncomfortable annoyance
The phrases in this book illustrate these kinds of ideas in wonderfully unexpected ways as well as unique concepts you may not already know After all the world is a diverse place full of knowledge everywhere you turn There’s a world of wisdom out there
