thắng như chẻ tre
to get wins after wins; to rake victories
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
to get wins after wins; to rake victories
The paternal family (father's side) is credited with good things while the maternal family (mother's side) is blamed for bad things.
Diving head-first into the thicket — refuge chosen entirely by panic.
synonym of anh chột làm vua xứ mù (“in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king”)
The bent man labors, the straight man eats — toil and takings, distributed by posture.
Riffraff of the market corners — the despised drifters at society's bottom rung.
A sick man in a wrestling bout — straining far past one's strength with little hope of winning.
The straight ink-line pains the timber — honest measure always hurts what's crooked.
Completely frank and direct — saying exactly what one thinks, without scheming.
The straight and honest usually lose out — candor pays the bill for others' cunning.
debit or credit card
yellow card or red card
Isolated in position, thin in strength — no allies, no reserves.
Northern "oh, is that so?" — the particle "cơ" loads the surprise, anywhere from genuine amazement to raised-eyebrow disbelief.
The world is still foolish, not yet wise — alive in torn shirts, buried in fine ones — spending on the dead what the living needed.
Power tilting court and country — influence heavy enough to lean the whole state.
A peach-blossom spring beyond the world — the hidden paradise every escape dreams of.
Momentum like splitting bamboo — once the blade bites, every joint after gives way.
A reflective Northern "huh, true enough" — soft agreement that dawns on you mid-conversation rather than being declared.
to enforce the (moral) Way on behalf of Heaven, to take the law into one's own hands
Positioned where winning is obligatory — committed past the option of losing.
empty promise; vain promise; false promise
Oaths tangle the false — swear enough and the perjury knots itself.
water aerobics
Used to emphasize the irresistible result of an event regardless: no matter what
Biting your own navel, too late — remorse gnawing at what no tooth can reach.
First and last as one — constancy without a single alteration.
Please don't laugh at me — the scholar's modest preface to any offering.
Kindly bear with me — the formal plea for indulgence.
Praising the ancients to damn the present — nostalgia weaponized.
If this can be borne, what cannot — cruelty so far past bearing it defines the limit.
Right, then act; wrong, then stop — decision is the hinge; hesitation does neither.
Facing death as a homecoming — courage that reads the grave as a return address.
Meat and fish and suchlike — the protein end of the market, spoken of loosely.
red meat and white meat
The debtor resents the creditor — gratitude curdles fastest in the borrowed hand.
Receiving wealth is receiving an arrow — every gift arrives fletched with obligation.
Fed on favor and perquisite — thriving on others' help until working feels optional.
to put a spoke in someone's wheel; to throw a spanner in the works
Lisping like a three-year-old — grown, and still babbling in milk-teeth.
A crock of fish-paste hung at the shelf's edge — arrangements one bump from disaster.
Hands too slow for the moment — caught before a single move was ready.
The fox mourns the rabbit — grief among kindred kinds; when your like falls, your own cold comes closer.
Step back one pace and the world widens — yielding buys room the stubborn never see.
The top millstone wears, and so does the bottom — in every grinding lawsuit, both stones lose face.
Honor your teacher to become one — mastery is inherited through respect.
the time creates the hero
How’s the weather?
What awful weather!
The blacksmith without a betel knife — supplying every house but his own.
Bearing bitterness and shouldering hardship — endurance as a full-time occupation.
Guarding the stump, awaiting the rabbit — one accident enshrined as a strategy.
Guard the mouth like a stoppered jar — sealed speech, walled intentions.
Guarding one's own body is the great charge — self-preservation as first duty.
The mouse at the burrow's lip, in and out — commitment that pokes its head and pulls it back.
Head and tail answering each other — the two-headed snake's defense; touch either end, the other strikes.
Water too clear keeps no fish; a person too exacting keeps no friends — every bond needs a little silt.
Water carries the boat and water capsizes it — the people bear the throne, and can turn it over.
Water flows to the lowest place — and so does every loss; the underling's share is obedience and the bill.
Trawling the moon from the water — labor spent on a reflection.