26 Mar

down the rabbit hole

Who taught: Sangeetha and Alex

I feel like I have gone a long series about “animals in phrases.” In fact, there are so many phrases where you can find animals in it in American English. You know what the most popular animal is. I think it is “horse.” I mentioned about this to Jake and he told me he thinks it is because of American history of being with horses long time.

Let me summarize the expressions that have horse in it I learned!

1. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink

2. from the horse’s mouth

3. Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth

4. Trojan horse

5. hung like a ho…. (This is still very embarrassing to say even I mentioned it in my previous post! So,I am adding dots instead of the full one here.)

I learned another useful one with animal in it today. It is “down the rabbit hole” This expression can be used when you are about to do something hard or something you do not know how it will end or progress. So, let’s say you are going to get married! Then, I would say, “Well, my friend, you are about to go down the rabbit hole! Good luck with that!” Don’t get me wrong, though! I am saying you should take marriage very seriously and be prepared for so many different aspects of it. Don’t you agree?

The other thing I learned the other day is “make a mountain out of molehill” This is one of the expressions I actually get the meaning as I hear it for the first time. What do you think? Can you get it? It means basically “exaggerate.” For example, you have some bad experiences with your customer at your work today and, because of it, you are worried about you might be getting into a big trouble. Then, I would say “Come on, don’t make a mountain out of the molehill! It is not that important. Just, get over it! It could happen to anybody.” One thing I like about this expression is that this one has got rhyme when you speak. Try it now! Come on, say it to you! Can you feel it? I think that is another fun part of learning English or maybe different languages.

So, don’t be afraid of getting into a new thing. It is all yours. My friend Andrew says “You cannot get it with that attitude! Hey, Believe it and achieve it!” So, my friend out there, “Believe it and Achieve it!” Learning English is fun!! Yay!!

Good night and have a great weekend! ….. and see you soon!

25 Mar

animals in phrases 2

Who taught: Carol, Jean and Andrew

Today! The day after I wrote about “animals in phrase” post, my friends, Carol, Jean and Andrew all came to me, “We have one that has animal in it. Do you know what does hung like a horse mean?” Of course, I did not know. You know, I am very innocent. (If you have read previous posts, you would have figured it out already. If you did not, now is a good time for you to go through all of my previous posts, especially green t-shirts one.) My first interpretation was…hmm…. I forgot. Oh! I think I said “Does it mean like totally stuck in a situation? For example, a web browser got stuck and hung!” Well, I was totally wrong. No surprise at all! And, there was Santosh right beside me. Andrew said, “I can say it to him like Santosh is hung like a horse.” And he also asked to Santosh, “If I say it, would you like it?” Santosh responded, “Yes!” I was so confused. I asked more context and they told me, “You can use this expression only to men” At that moment, I realized this is something related with sexual stuff. “Guys, what is it? Something dirty, right?” They all nodded. Sigh! I should have known that. Hopefully, you would get the meaning of the expression by looking at the translation of the Korean equivalent below. If not, search for it by yourself!

By the way, are you guys sure I cannot use this for women? What is the counter expression for women? And also, shouldn’t the expression be used like “Santosh’s is hung like a horse” instead of “Santosh is hung like a horse” because the object is not the person but the one that the person has?

Korean equivalent : 왕자지 (Wang Ja Ji) (In English, “king penis”)  -> I cannot believe I am writing down this here. But since there is one that exists in Korean and fun to learn different languages…. Anyways, let’s talk about more phrases which have animals in it! What else do you have?