ăn vỏ dưa, thấy vỏ dừa mà sợ
Slipped on a melon rind, now afraid of coconut husks — one fall, and every peel looks lethal.
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All languages English Tiếng Việt
ăn xôi chùa ngọng miệng
Temple sticky-rice ties the tongue — accept a benefactor's food and your honest opinions choke.
ăn xổi
to eat food (usually vegetables) that has been pickled or prepared for immediate consumption
ăn xổi ở thì
short-sighted, lacking foresight; temporary, makeshift
ăn ốc nói mò
To eat snails and talk by groping — to make baseless guesses; to speak without knowing the facts.
ăn ở xởi lởi ông trời gởi cho
Live open-handed and heaven keeps you stocked — generosity is a supply line, not a leak.
ăn ở đây
"For here" — the dine-in half of the counter question; answer it before they ask and you sound local.
Đen tình, đỏ bạc
Lucky at cards, unlucky in love.
Đi một ngày đàng, học một sàng khôn
Travelling forms a young man.
Đi với bụt mặc áo cà sa, đi với ma mặc áo giấy
Pay a man back in the same coin.
Điếc không sợ súng
He that knows nothing doubts nothing.
Đoàn kết thì sống, chia rẽ thì chết
English equivalentː United we stand, divided we fall.
Đánh chết cái nết cũng không chừa
Close to the English saying: “Old habits die hard.”.
Đây là ... của tôi
This is my ...
Đây là những ... của tôi
These are my ...
Đã trót thì phải trét
If you sell the cow, you will sell her milk too.
Đèn nhà ai nấy sáng
Half the world not know how the other half lives.
Đông Lào
A tongue-in-cheek internet name for Việt Nam itself — literally "East Laos" — used to discuss domestic affairs with plausible deniability, or simply as satire.
Đầu xuôi đuôi lọt
"Starting properly ensures the speedy completion of a process. A – beginning is often blocked by one or more obstacles (potential barriers) the removal of which may ensure the smooth course of the process.".
Đồng thanh tương ứng, đồng khí tương cầu. Ngưu tầm ngưu, mã tầm mã
Similar people often become friends.
Đồng ý!
I agree! / Okay!
Đời cha ăn mặn, đời con khát nước
When the father's generation eats salt, the child's generation thirsts for water.
Đừng chế nhạo người
Laugh and the world will laugh with you.
Đừng xét đoán người qua bề ngoài
Do not judge the book by its cover.
đa hư bất như thiểu thiệt
Much hollow is less than a little solid — one true handful beats a cartload of froth.
đa sự đa lự
Many affairs, many anxieties — every undertaking enlists its own worry.
đa tài lụy thân
Much wealth wearies its owner — property is luggage; the rich travel heaviest.
đa đa ích thiện
The more, the better — abundance as its own argument; said of what improves by quantity.
đanh đá cá cầy
Sharp-tongued as a trapped dog — shrewish, snapping, giving no quarter.
đao kiếm tuy lợi bất sát vô tội chi nhơn
The blade, however sharp, spares the innocent — even weapons are held to law.
đao to búa lớn
exaggerative; braggy
đau chóng đã chày
Quick to hurt, slow to heal — damage keeps a sprinter's pace, recovery a pilgrim's.
đau chơn há miệng
An aching leg opens the mouth — press hard enough and confession comes, true or not.
đau lâu tốn thuốc
Long illness, deep pharmacy bills — sickness billed by the calendar.
đau lòng súng súng nổ, đau lòng gỗ gỗ kêu
A pained gun fires, pained timber creaks — pressure finds a voice; the aggrieved cannot stay silent.
đau như Hề Hoạn
Aching like Hề Hoạn — carrying a grief no one will hear out, like the jester in the old chèo play.
đau tiếc thân lành tiếc của
Sick, cherish the body; well, cherish the wallet — the patient promises anything, the recovered renegotiates.
đau đầu vì tiền
Headaches over money — the first half of the rhyme that ends 'and madness over love.'
đem chuông đi đấm nước người, chẳng kêu cũng đấm ba hồi lấy danh
Carrying your bell to strike in another's land — if it won't ring, strike it three times anyway for the name — persistence abroad, dignity kept.
đem con bỏ chợ
to help others and abandon them halfway; to help irresponsibly
đem quỉ về phá nhà chay
Fetching demons to wreck the fast-hall — peace on the premises, and someone imports the wrecker.
đem voi về giày nhà mả
Bringing the elephant home to trample the ancestors' graves — importing the very ruin, and showing it the family's soft ground.
đen đầu gọi là người
Every black-haired head counts as a person — humanity by the simplest census; all alike beneath the hair.
đen đầu thì bỏ, đỏ đầu thì nuôi
Black-haired, abandoned; red-haired, raised — the foundling's fate decided by a glance at the crown.
đeo mặt nạ
Wearing a mask — the public face kept over the private one.
đi bụi
To run away from home and live rough; to drift on the streets (from "bụi đời", street life).
đi cho biết đó biết đây, ở nhà với mẹ biết ngày nào khôn
Travel and you'll learn the there and here; stay home with mother and when will you wisen — the road as the only school.
đi guốc trong bụng
To know exactly what someone is thinking or planning — to read them completely.
đi gánh đau vai
Day-sleep schools the eyes — idle habits practice themselves into place.
đi khôn đứt, bứt khôn rời
Leaving can't cut it, pulling can't part it — attachment past all severing.
đi mây về gió
Traveling by cloud, returning by wind — presence with no fixed itinerary; the drifting life, or the spirit's commute.
đi mô
Central Vietnamese for "where are you going?" — "mô" is the region's word for "đâu" (where), one of the signature Central function words.
đi nhậu không
The after-work summons: "coming out drinking?" — "nhậu" is the Southern institution of beer, grilled snacks, and long tables that solve nothing and everything.
đi qua nghiêng nón, cúi lưng, anh không chào, em không hỏi, vì chưng đông người
Passing by, I tip my nón and bow — no greeting from me, no word from you, only because the crowd was watching — decorum over a beating heart.
đi thẳng
"Go straight" — direction-giving 101; Vietnamese directions chain these: "đi thẳng, tới ngã tư rẽ trái…".
đi tắt đón đầu
Cutting across to meet the head of the column — leapfrogging the long road to seize the opportunity first.
đi vào lòng đất
Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see đi, vào, lòng, đất.
đi xem đất, về cất mặt xem trời
Eyes down when walking out, face up only to check the sky — the old school of composed deportment.
đi đâu mà bỏ mẹ già, gối nghiêng ai sửa, tách trà ai dâng
Where are you off to, leaving your old mother — who straightens her pillow, who serves her tea — the guilt-verse of the wandering child.
đi đêm lắm có ngày gặp ma
keep wandering at night and you'll see a ghost eventually
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