Eternal Sunshine of the Italian Mind

Continue or start your personal language log here, including logs for challenge participants
StringerBell
Brown Belt
Posts: 1035
Joined: Mon Jul 23, 2018 3:30 am
Languages: English (n)
Italian
x 3289

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby StringerBell » Sun Jan 30, 2022 6:37 pm

DaveAgain wrote:I'm really surprised by this!


Me too!

Btw, I'm sure there are lots of ridiculous American words/slang that English speakers from other countries think sound hilarious/confusing so I hope no one thinks I'm trashtalking British English.

Some words I'm familiar with from watching shows like British Top Gear (like boffins), some I can figure out either from context or the Italian version but one of the ones I can't quite figure out is Aga. It seems like it's either something related to a drying rack for clothes or a stove, but I don't remember the Italian version translating it with stendino (drying rack) or fornello. It came up a few times and now I'm wondering if the Italian version ignored it all together or possibly translated it differently each time.

There was also a sentence where a character took a shower then got a "kip". I don't know what kip means and my very helpful dictionary tells me that it's the hide of a small animal. :lol: I'm assuming that's slang for something but I can't figure out what.

The other confusing one I remember is the phrase "the media haven't cottoned on". I'm assuming cottoned on = caught on, but that just sounds like such a funny thing to say that I'm wondering if it's a typo in the book.
1 x
Season 4 Lucifer Italian transcripts I created: https://learnanylanguage.fandom.com/wik ... ranscripts

DaveAgain
Black Belt - 1st Dan
Posts: 1968
Joined: Mon Aug 27, 2018 11:26 am
Languages: English (native), French & German (learning).
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... &start=200
x 4050

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby DaveAgain » Sun Jan 30, 2022 6:43 pm

StringerBell wrote:
DaveAgain wrote:I'm really surprised by this!


Me too!

Btw, I'm sure there are lots of ridiculous American words/slang that English speakers from other countries think sound hilarious/confusing so I hope no one thinks I'm trashtalking British English.

Some words I'm familiar with from watching shows like British Top Gear (like boffins), some I can figure out either from context or the Italian version but one of the ones I can't quite figure out is Aga. It seems like it's either something related to a drying rack for clothes or a stove, but I don't remember the Italian version translating it with stendino (drying rack) or stufa / fornello. It came up a few times and now I'm wondering if the Italian version ignored it all together or possibly translated it differently each time.
Aga is brand of stove, oil or wood fired I think.
There was also a sentence where a character took a shower then got a "kip". I don't know what kip means and my very helpful dictionary tells me that it's the hide of a small animal. :lol: I'm assuming that's slang for something but I can't figure out what.
A kip is a nap, a sleep.
The other confusing one I remember is the phrase "the media haven't cottoned on". I'm assuming cottoned on = caught on, but that just sounds like such a funny thing to say that I'm wondering if it's a typo in the book.
No, you're right.

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dicti ... /cotton-on
3 x

StringerBell
Brown Belt
Posts: 1035
Joined: Mon Jul 23, 2018 3:30 am
Languages: English (n)
Italian
x 3289

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby StringerBell » Sun Jan 30, 2022 7:04 pm

Thanks!

I wish I made a list of all the stuff I needed the Italian version to understand the English version. I only remember these:

1) a character "tut-tutted". As soon as I heard in Italian that it was translated with "he shook his head" I then understood the meaning of the English sentence even though I don't think that was translated literally.

2) a character offered to make some "bacon butties". The Italian translated that as sandwiches (panini) so I'm assuming it's 2 slices of bread with bacon inside. Are butties a particular kind of sandwich or is "sandwich" an American word and butty is the British way to call it? There was also a scene where they made "chip butties" which I understand to be a sandwich with only french fries inside... I think. That sounds like a really bizarre thing to eat but maybe it's actually a common thing in England?

3) the terrain is dangerous if the weather goes suddenly pear-shaped. The Italian version made way more sense to me! (se le condizioni climatiche si mettono male il terreno diventa pericoloso)
3 x
Season 4 Lucifer Italian transcripts I created: https://learnanylanguage.fandom.com/wik ... ranscripts

Caromarlyse
Green Belt
Posts: 387
Joined: Fri Dec 06, 2019 2:31 pm
Languages: English (N), French (C1-ish), German (B2/C1-ish), Russian (B1-ish), Portuguese (B1-ish), Welsh (complete beginner), Spanish (in hibernation)
(All levels estimates and given as a guide only)
x 1611

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby Caromarlyse » Sun Jan 30, 2022 7:20 pm

StringerBell wrote: a character offered to make some "bacon butties". The Italian translated that as sandwiches (panini) so I'm assuming it's 2 slices of bread with bacon inside. Are butties a particular kind of sandwich or is "sandwich" an American word and butty is the British way to call it? There was also a scene where they made "chip butties" which I understand to be a sandwich with only french fries inside... I think. That sounds like a really bizarre thing to eat but maybe it's actually a common thing in England?


Sliced bread with butter (or margarine etc) on it, with then either bacon or chips (fries) inside. The heat of the filling makes the butter melt and you're left with fatty goodness ;). Better than they sound! Bacon butties would be eaten on their own (as a brunch kind of thing, and usually with added tomato ketchup or brown sauce), chip butties are more what you'd make if you were eating a meal that happened to have chips with it - you'd take a piece of bread and make a chip butty with some chips.
4 x

DaveAgain
Black Belt - 1st Dan
Posts: 1968
Joined: Mon Aug 27, 2018 11:26 am
Languages: English (native), French & German (learning).
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... &start=200
x 4050

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby DaveAgain » Sun Jan 30, 2022 8:56 pm

StringerBell wrote:3) the terrain is dangerous if the weather goes suddenly pear-shaped. The Italian version made way more sense to me! (se le condizioni climatiche si mettono male il terreno diventa pericoloso)
Pear shaped is a general purpose disaster.

"It all went pear shaped" >"It all went wrong"

"the terrain is dangerous if the weather suddenly goes ... pear shaped" > if the weather changes for the worse.
4 x

StringerBell
Brown Belt
Posts: 1035
Joined: Mon Jul 23, 2018 3:30 am
Languages: English (n)
Italian
x 3289

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby StringerBell » Mon Jan 31, 2022 7:26 pm

Just for fun, I took note of the British English terms in the last quarter of the book that I didn't know and was subsequently helped by the Italian version:

British English > “shambolic” / Italian > poco professionale

British English > “did a bunk” / Italian > sono spariti

British English > “complete pig’s ear” / Italian > fiasco totale

British English > “The Met team” / Italian > gli investigatori londinese


The idea of saying that something went totally pear-shaped is such an intriguing expression. I wonder where that one came from.
3 x
Season 4 Lucifer Italian transcripts I created: https://learnanylanguage.fandom.com/wik ... ranscripts

User avatar
rdearman
Site Admin
Posts: 7231
Joined: Thu May 14, 2015 4:18 pm
Location: United Kingdom
Languages: English (N)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=1836
x 23123
Contact:

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby rdearman » Mon Jan 31, 2022 7:50 pm

To go pear-shaped means to go wrong, to fail miserably, to go awry in a terrible fashion. To go pear-shaped may describe a situation in which finances suffer a sudden and catastrophic reversal, or a personal relationship takes a sudden and calamitous turn. The origin of the expression to go pear-shaped is in dispute. Some believe that the idiomatic phrase came into use in the 1980s, but others trace the phrase to the 1940s. They believe that the term originated with the Royal Air Force to describe pilots’ poor executions of loops in the air, ending up with pear shapes rather than a round shapes. Primarily a British phrase for many years, the idiom to go pear-shaped is being used more and more in North America, especially when describing economic or business downturns. Related phrases are goes pear-shaped, gone pear-shaped, going pear-shaped. Note that pear-shaped is properly rendered with a hyphen.
4 x
: 0 / 150 Read 150 books in 2024

My YouTube Channel
The Autodidactic Podcast
My Author's Newsletter

I post on this forum with mobile devices, so excuse short msgs and typos.

DaveAgain
Black Belt - 1st Dan
Posts: 1968
Joined: Mon Aug 27, 2018 11:26 am
Languages: English (native), French & German (learning).
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... &start=200
x 4050

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby DaveAgain » Tue Feb 01, 2022 8:50 am

rdearman wrote:
To go pear-shaped means to go wrong, to fail miserably, to go awry in a terrible fashion. To go pear-shaped may describe a situation in which finances suffer a sudden and catastrophic reversal, or a personal relationship takes a sudden and calamitous turn. The origin of the expression to go pear-shaped is in dispute. Some believe that the idiomatic phrase came into use in the 1980s, but others trace the phrase to the 1940s. They believe that the term originated with the Royal Air Force to describe pilots’ poor executions of loops in the air, ending up with pear shapes rather than a round shapes. Primarily a British phrase for many years, the idiom to go pear-shaped is being used more and more in North America, especially when describing economic or business downturns. Related phrases are goes pear-shaped, gone pear-shaped, going pear-shaped. Note that pear-shaped is properly rendered with a hyphen.

I'm a bit disappointed by this. I had convinced myself it emerged from Bruce Forsyth's Generation Game. :-(
2 x

DaveAgain
Black Belt - 1st Dan
Posts: 1968
Joined: Mon Aug 27, 2018 11:26 am
Languages: English (native), French & German (learning).
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... &start=200
x 4050

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby DaveAgain » Tue Feb 01, 2022 12:36 pm

StringerBell wrote:Just for fun, I took note of the British English terms in the last quarter of the book that I didn't know and was subsequently helped by the Italian version:

British English > “shambolic” / Italian > poco professionale
The source of this is apparantly an old word for a butcher's slaughterhouse, there was an interview with a politician where he applied the original meaning to a journalist's question, which was entertaining.
British English > “did a bunk” / Italian > sono spariti
Leave without telling anyone, and hopefully without being noticed. If John Wayne walks in the front door of a saloon, the cowardly villain does a bunk out of the back door.

British children bunk off from school while I think american children play hookey.
British English > “complete pig’s ear” / Italian > fiasco totale
A mess. I wonder if this is related to the expression "you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear"?

If an untrained apprentice were put in charge of the lighting sytem at a pop concert, you'd expect him to make a pig's ear of it.
British English > “The Met team” / Italian > gli investigatori londinese
London metropolitan police AKA Scotland Yard.

OR
The meteorological office > met office > government weather forcast people.
1 x

User avatar
zjones
Green Belt
Posts: 483
Joined: Mon Apr 16, 2018 6:22 pm
Location: USA
Languages: English (N), French (B1-certified), Spanish and Greek (abandoned)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=9860
x 1404

Re: è un po che non ci vediamo

Postby zjones » Wed Feb 02, 2022 2:49 am

StringerBell wrote:Reading Challenge Week 6: Jan 24 - Jan 30

While I was reading, instead of looking up unknown words I just highlighted them in my kindle. It turns out that I hightlighted 500+ words. Some are duplicates or variations of the same word, but in looking over the list of the highlighted words I don't know what most of them are. That feels like an overwhelming amount, but it averages to about 1 word per page, which I guess isn't so bad. I was planning to leisurely add them to a deck for this book but I'm realizing that doing it this way (instead of while I'm reading) is proving to be even more tedious than adding them while I'm reading (largely due to how unbearably slow my kindle is) so I will not be using this strategy with future books.


I can absolutely believe that this would be tedious. I've thought about doing this before but I got the strong feeling that I would never look at the list of the words that I highlighted (based on my track record of never looking at any of my highlights ever again). Do you usually add your reading vocab to a specific deck to practice later? Can you tell me more about that?
2 x


Return to “Language logs”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests