"rocambolesque" expressions

[Osias]

This is a thread for expressions that are quite straightforward in most languages but a little complex in some others, like "Go raibh maith agat" for "thank you" in Irish.

A rocambole is this:



If you don't like my coinage of "rocambolesque" suggest me a better term in English and I'll edit the title.

[Osias]

Another example: the two first words of the preface of the novel Dom Quixote are "desocupado lector" in Spanish, something like "dear idle reader", but one Italian edition once used like 10 words to say the same.

[IpseDixit]

"Go raibh maith agat"

Do you realize that it has just one more syllable than obrigado? Or, according to Wikitionary, if we take Cois Fharraige dialect, it has exactly the same number of syllables as obrigado.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/go_raibh ... nunciation

[Osias]

It's even less if we consider people say "muito obrigado".

[IpseDixit]

It's even less if we consider people say "muito obrigado".

So what's "rocambolesque" about it?

[kevin]

Do you realize that it has just one more syllable than obrigado? Or, according to Wikitionary, if we take Cois Fharraige dialect, it has exactly the same number of syllables as obrigado.

Will you count it as long enough if I answer his "go raibh maith agat" with "go ndeánaidh a mhaith duit"?

I do think that Irish likes set phrases instead of single words much more than most popular languages. Even if in pronunciation it doesn't end up much longer, you can still see the literal meaning behind the phrases, which is kind of nice.

It's even less if we consider people say "muito obrigado".

Well, I can do the same: "go raibh míle maith agat"

[Osias]

So what's "rocambolesque" about it?

It seemed convoluted, unnecessarily winding for me at first.

It's all about first impressions. Once one gets used to a language, everything seems smooth.

This isn't a thread to prove Irish is complex, but to give interesting/funny examples you met in any language.

[IpseDixit]

Do you realize that it has just one more syllable than obrigado? Or, according to Wikitionary, if we take Cois Fharraige dialect, it has exactly the same number of syllables as obrigado.

Will you count it as long enough if I answer his "go raibh maith agat" with "go ndeánaidh a mhaith duit"?

No, because I have no idea how it's pronounced.

[vijayjohn]

Even if in pronunciation it doesn't end up much longer, you can still see the literal meaning behind the phrases, which is kind of nice.

But isn't that true of most languages that have an equivalent of "thank you"? Where can't you see that? French? (Well, and of course languages that borrowed it from French).

[kevin]

But isn't that true of most languages that have a word for "thank you"? Where can't you see that? French? (Well, and of course languages that borrowed it from French).

What I mean is that the meaning of a simple word like "thanks" is kind of boring compared to a whole phrase that you probably wouldn't intuitively understand as anything related to thanking someone if you just looked it up word by word.

[IpseDixit]

Anyways, something that has always struck me is that English has never felt the need to shorten the phrases "the day after tomorrow" and "the day before yesterday". I propose the coinage of the words "twice-tomorrow" and "twice-yesterday".

[kevin]

I'll also nominate "s'il vous plaît", "alstublieft", "más é do thoil é" and similar things for "please".

No, because I have no idea how it's pronounced.

Like it's written, of course.

Anyways, something that has always struck me is that English has never felt the need to shorten the phrases "the day after tomorrow" and "the day before yesterday". I propose the coinage of the words "twice-tomorrow" and "twice-yesterday".

"overmorrow" and "ereyesterday"? Apparently they felt a need to lengthen the short words rather than never feeling a need to shorten.

[vijayjohn]

Why not just "ereday"?

Also, how about "qu'est-ce que (c'est)" and other examples of enchaînement in French?

[Dormouse559]

Also, how about "qu'est-ce que (c'est)" and other examples of enchaînement in French?

Go big or go home! "Qu'est-ce que c'est que ça ?" for "What's that?"

In the Harry Potter books, Voldemort is occasionally referred to as He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. In French, that became Celui-Dont-On-Ne-Doit-Pas-Prononcer-Le-Nom, which means basically the same thing but has twice as many syllables.

[księżycowy]

No, because I have no idea how it's pronounced.

Like it's written, of course.

Let's see how close I come:
go ndeánaidh a mhaith duit
/gə n`ɑːni(g?) ə vɑː dɪt`/

Because of my keyboard, I can't mark the slender consonants like I normally would. I'm also not sure if the <dh> in <ndeánaidh> would be pronounced in this case.
I believe that <duit> has a bit of an offglide with the <u>.

[Karavinka]

English: I think that ...
Japanese: ...という風な考え方もあろうかと思いますが toiu fuu-na kangaekata-mo arou-ka-to omoimasuga
(lit: although I think there might be a way of thinking in such a way that...)

English: We apologize for your inconvenience. (to a customer)
Japanese: この度はお客様に大変ご不便ご迷惑をおかけし、大変申し訳ありません。kono tabi-wa okyakusama-ni taihen gofuben gomeiwaku-wo okakesi, taihen mousiwake arimasen
(lit. we have caused such terrible inconvenience and trouble to the esteemed customer this time, we truly have no excuse to utter.)

English: Hello/Good afternoon. (welcoming a visitor to your office)
Japanese: お忙しい中おいでいただきありがとうございます。oisogasiinaka oideitadaki arigatougozaimasu
(lit. we consider it hard to happen that we receive your honorable visit in the midst of your busi-ness.)

As for the last one, こんにちは(konnichiwa) is not a proper greeting to use in business because you cannot add -ございます(gozaimasu) to make it formal Keigo. The visiting one may say something like this as a "hello":

いつもお世話になっております。itsumo osewani natte orimasu
(lit. we are always under your favor/assistance)

[kevin]

Let's see how close I come:
go ndeánaidh a mhaith duit
/gə n`ɑːni(g?) ə vɑː dɪt`/

Oh, sorry, didn't mean to confuse you.

So, well, yes and no. What you have looks like a proper Munster pronunciation of what I wrote. It just doesn't make a whole lot of sense because what I wrote is dialectal Ulster Irish. I did this both because that's what I would say myself, and also because I think that in the South other responses such as "tá fáilte romhat" are preferred (which sounds awfully like Béarlachas to me, but it's probably just a question of what you're used to).

So my actual pronunciation would be like:
/gə 'n´ɑːniː (ə) wɑɪ dɪt´/

The standard form is "go ndéana a mhaith duit". I think, Munster is the same as the standard in this case, though I'm not completely sure whether the subjunctive form of "déan" would really be "go ndéana" there. But I couldn't find anything else that might be used there, so probably it is.

[księżycowy]

You tricked me with Ulster!

And here I thought you were learning CO.

[vijayjohn]

From a post I wrote over two years ago:

The word for an (electric) switch in Malayalam (e.g. a light switch) is simply "switch," but apparently, there used to be a joke that if there was to be a "pure Malayalam" word for 'switch' (which effectively means a compound of Classical Sanskrit words/morphemes without any English ones), it would be:

വൈദ്യുതഗമനാഗമനനിയന്ത്രണയന്ത്രം [ʋəjd̪jʊd̪əgəməˈnaːgəmənən̪ijən̪d̪rəɳejən̪d̪rəm]

Literally 'device (/jant̪ram/) for controlling (/n̪ijant̪raɳa/) the coming (/aːgamanam/) and going (/gamanam/) of electricity (/ʋajd̪jut̪a/)'

Also, a Balinese colleague of mine in grad school used to joke with me about the Malay word for 'maternity ward': rumah sakit korban lelaki, literally 'hospital (rumah sakit, or even more literally 'sick (sakit) house (rumah)') for victims (korban) of man (lelaki)'.

[OldBoring]

Aujourd'hui. Like seriously? Why not simply hui?
And of course, if you want to stress the concept of today, you can say au jour d'aujourd'hui.