Chó ỉa bờ giếng không sao, chó ỉa bờ ao thì bị người ta tóm cổ

🎙 Say it

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Meaning · English

Minor mistakes are tolerated, but serious ones are punished

Literally: Dog defecates by well no problem, dog defecates by pond then gets caught

Examples

Anh ấy làm lỗi nhỏ nên được bỏ qua, nhưng lỗi lớn thì bị sa thải, chính là chó ỉa bờ giếng không sao, chó ỉa bờ ao thì bị người ta tóm cổHe made a small mistake so was forgiven, but a big mistake got him fired, it's like the saying goes

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

Sources & notes

Headword listed in the vdict.com proverb dictionary index (discovery source; headword only — no source content copied). Entered as candidate 2026-08-05; definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-08-05; pending editor spot-check.

Common questions

What does “Chó ỉa bờ giếng không sao, chó ỉa bờ ao thì bị người ta tóm cổ” mean?

Minor mistakes are tolerated, but serious ones are punished Literally: Dog defecates by well no problem, dog defecates by pond then gets caught

Is “Chó ỉa bờ giếng không sao, chó ỉa bờ ao thì bị người ta tóm cổ” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.

👁 Views 0 today 0 past 7 days 0 this month 0 all time