ngôn tinh ngữ túy
Star-words and gem-speech — language distilled until it belongs in the anthologies.
Browse Tiếng Việt 2960
All languages English Tiếng Việt
Where will you be? Anywhere Hà Nội & the NorthHuế / Đà Nẵng & the CenterSài Gòn & the SouthOnline slang Bắc ↔ Nam words
ngôn tất hữu trúng
Speak so it lands — one sentence discloses the gentleman or the knave; aim every word.
ngông có kiểu
Eccentric with style — flamboyance carried off on personality alone.
ngăn hành lý phía trên
overhead locker
ngăn sông cấm chợ
Barring the rivers and banning the markets — cutting off the flow of goods between regions.
ngũ tử cướp cái
Five pips seize the deal — the tam cúc hand that wins the right to lead; grabbing first call.
ngư mục hổn châu
Fish-eyes mixed among pearls — fakes shelved with the genuine, daring the eye to sort them.
ngư thủy nhứt đoàn
Fish and water in one band — a fellowship as close as the element to what swims in it.
ngưu tầm ngưu, mã tầm mã
Close to the English saying: “Birds of a feather flock together.”.
người có tiền dể đứa tay không
The moneyed scorn the empty-handed — respect priced strictly in cash.
người dưng có ngãi, thì đãi người dưng, anh em không ngãi, thì đừng anh em
A stranger with decency, treat as kin; kin without decency, let them go — conduct, not blood, draws the family line.
người hai mặt
A two-faced person — sweet to your face, different behind your back; the standard label for double-dealing.
người khôn chóng già
The wise age quickly — thought is expensive tissue.
người không vì mình, trời tru đất diệt
every man for himself
người là vàng, của là ngãi
People are the gold; goods are the debt of kindness — value the maker over the made.
người làm nên của
People make the wealth — hands, not vaults, are the mint.
người mò rận
The louse-picker — someone withdrawn from worldly affairs, absorbed in their own small business.
người nhiều chuyện
The busybody — "many-story person": collects, retells, and embroiders everyone's business; every neighborhood has one.
người năm bảy đấng, của ba bảy loài
People come in five and seven ranks, goods in three and seven kinds — variety is the census of the world.
người sống đống vàng
A living person is a pile of gold — no asset compares with being alive.
người ta là hoa đất
People are the flowers of the earth — humanity as the soil's finest bloom.
người ta đi cấy lấy công, tôi nay đi cấy còn trông nhiều bề. Trông trời, trông đất, trông mây, trông mưa, trông nắng, trông ngày, trông đêm. Trông cho chân cứng đá mềm, trời yên biển lặng mới yên tấm lòng
Others transplant rice for wages; I transplant watching every quarter — sky, earth, cloud, rain, sun, day, night — praying for firm feet and soft stone, calm heaven and quiet sea — the farmer's whole anxiety in one verse.
người ta đi đôi về đôi, thân em đi lẻ về côi một mình
Others travel in pairs and return in pairs; I go single and come back alone — solitude in one couplet.
người tốt về lụa
People look their best in silk — presentation flatters whoever wears it.
người đâu gặp gỡ làm chi, trăm năm biết có duyên đường hay không
Why did we ever have to meet — a hundred years on, who knows if the path held fate or not.
người đầu bạc tiễn kẻ đầu xanh
"the young perish and the old linger"; an elderly person has/had to suffer the anguish of watching their young loved one die, because they think it should be the other way around
người đến sau
The one who came after — loving someone who loved before you; second in the door, whole in the heart.
người đời của tạm
People endure, goods are on loan — property is the guest, we are the household.
người đời khác thể là hoa, sớm còn tối mất nở ra lại tàn
A person is a flower — open at morning, gone by dark, blooming only to fade — mortality in one blossom.
ngại giùm
secondhand embarrassment
ngậm bồ hòn làm ngọt
Holding the soap-nut and calling it sweet — swallowing bitterness with a straight face.
ngậm máu phun người, trước dơ miệng mình
Curses are like young chickens, they always come home to roost.
ngậm đắng nuốt cay
Holding the bitter, swallowing the acrid — grievance eaten daily and in silence.
ngật ngà ngật ngừ
Nodding and drifting — sluggish, decision never quite arriving.
ngậu tôm canh
Empty as a pagoda — silence with room to echo.
ngắm gà khỏa thân
Gazing at the naked chicken — joking euphemism for having died: the boiled offering hen stares back from the altar.
ngọc bất trác bất thành khí, nhơn bất học bất tri lý
Uncut jade is no vessel; untaught people know no principle — polish makes the gem and the person.
ngọc lành ai dễ bán rao
Fine jade is never hawked about — true worth, like true virtue, needs no street-crier.
ngọc thạch cu phần
Stone and jade burn together — war's fire checks no credentials; the good perish mixed with the bad.
ngọn rau tất đất
A sprig of greens, an inch of soil — even the smallest sustenance obliges the eater to its giver.
ngọt mật chết ruồi
You can catch more flies with honey than you can with vinegar.
ngọt như đường
Sweet as sugar — sweetness beyond argument.
ngồi buồn nhớ mẹ ta xưa Miệng nhai cơm búng, lưỡi lừa cá xương
Idle and sad, I remember my mother of old — chewing rice soft for me, her tongue sorting out the fish bones — tenderness recalled in its smallest act.
ngồi gốc sung há miệng chực rơi
Sitting under the fig with mouth open, waiting for the drop — providence expected to do the chewing too.
ngồi mát ăn bát vàng
Sitting in the shade, eating from a gold bowl — reward without a bead of sweat.
ngồi thúng cất cạp
Borrow by the đấu-measure, repay by the basket — interest at folk-tale rates.
ngồi thúng khôn bề cất thúng
Sitting in the basket, how to lift the basket — the insider's dilemma; you can't carry what you're part of.
ngủ ngon nha
"Sleep well" — the goodnight of choice, softer than the textbook "chúc ngủ ngon"; last message of a million chats.
ngứa ghẻ đòn ghen
Scabies itch and jealousy's beating — two torments that only worsen with scratching.
ngựa chạy đàng dài
A horse running the long road — instruction galloping past the ears; heard and instantly lost.
ngựa non háu đá
A young horse eager to kick — hot-blooded youth, all spirit and no judgment.
ngựa qua cữa sổ
A horse glimpsed past the window — time at a gallop; the white colt crossing the crack.
ngựa quen đường cũ
to lapse back into one's old ways; to relapse into vice
nhanh như chớp
Quick as lightning — done in a flash.
nhanh như cái cắt
Quick as a shrike's snatch — gone between blink and blink.
nhanh-nhẩu đoảng, thật-thà hư
Brisk but botching, honest but hapless — two virtues, each shipped with its defect.
nhi tôn tự hữu nhi tôn phước
Grandchildren carry their own luck — save yourself the frenzy of enriching descendants; their portion is theirs.
nhiều sãi, không ai đóng cữa chùa
Many monks, and no one shuts the temple gate — everyone's duty is no one's.
nhiều tay vỗ nên bột
Many hands clap the flour into dough — enough people make any task knead itself.
nhiều thóc nhọc xay
More paddy, more milling — every abundance bills you its labor.
Advertisement
Ad space — ads help keep Idiomer free. Premium will remove them.