Does Not Translate - Words That Don't Translate

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打鸡血 dǎ jī xuè (lit. to inject chicken blood)·Someone who is overly excited.

Mandarin

Folköl·A beer with an alcoholic content between 2.25% and 3.5%.

Swedish

Vaska·To buy expensive champagne and pour it into the sink just to show off how rich you are.

Verschlimmbesserung·An attempted improvement that makes things worse than they already were.

German

画龙点睛·Lit. to draw in eyes on a painted dragon.

Chinese

Eighth-grade sickness·The feeling being unable to be understood because of one's self-perceived, false sense of depth, ability, or complexity.

Chinese/Japanese

Benaltrismo·The strategy of dodging or ignoring a problem by pointing that there are others, more compelling problems to solve.

Italian

-eth·Eth - humorous suffix to imitate old words.

English

Tollkühn·Daring and brave in a foolish/unhealthy kind of way.

German

חופר (lit. Digger)·Someone who communicates (talks/writes) a lot, but doesn't add any new information. Repeats the same things with different words.

Hebrew

Kiasu·Fear of losing out, wanting to be ahead of the competition.

Hokkien, Singlish

Ajeno·Of, pertaining to, or belonging to other people; foreign to; alien.

Spanish

Schenkelklopfer·Literally Thigh-beater means a joke and is named after the reaction of hitting ones thigh with ones hand while laughing, often used ironically for a really bad joke.

German

Schnulze·A predominantly kitschy and sentimental song, play, show or movie. Often used in a derogative context.

German

Hoʻoponopono·An ancient Hawaiian practice of reconciliation and forgiveness.

Hawaiian

טרנטה·A shitty or very worn out piece of machinery, usually applied to cars.

Hebrew

Pucumã·The disgusting accumulation of dust and spiderwebs, sometimes with soot thrown in for good measure.

Dahergelaufen·Adjective, fromthenceran. Some fromthenceran guy came into my bakery and tried to tell me how to bake. Something like uninvited, unqualified, obnoxious, without renown, but also plain common. Not necessarily a person.

German

Aidzuchi (あいづち)·Sounds made during a conversation to indicate that you are listening.

Japanese

蚁居 yǐ jū·To live in crowded slum housing in expensive cities, because you can't afford the rent of a proper room.

Chinese

Legarbetz·To scratch one's balls; To be lazy, not do anything.

Hebrew

Just·I was just asked to define it by a non-native English speaker. I can think of no other English word that can take on so many different meanings.

English

Solochvårare (lit. sun-and-springtimer)·A con man who hooks up romantically with (usually multiple) partners to cheat them out of money.

Swedish

Tanavo (adj.)·To keep being surprised by something despite already knowing it.

Malagasy

Autoinfanticide·The act of going back in time and killing yourself as an infant and associated with the grandfather paradox of time travel.

English

Tocayo·Someone who shares your first name.

Spanish

Cafuné·The act of runnning your fingers through your lover's hair.

Portuguese

Gnagnarella·Rain enough light to make people annoyed to use an umbrella, but still heavy enough to make people annoyed to not use an umbrella.

Italian (Roman dialect)

痛車 (itasha)·A car painted with anime characters (lit: painful car, because it's painful to look at).

Japanese

不明觉厉 bùmíngjuélì·I do not understand what you're saying but it seems awesome.

Chinese