Quote:
Originally Posted by talycap
in japan the word "baka" means "idiot" or "fool" right?
but in the philippine the word "baka" means "cow"
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I used to know someone studying arabic; she used to swear that 'baka' also meant 'young camel', though I'm not sure I believe her.
There's lots of cross-cultural homophones like this, even in english. In the UK, 'natty' means something looks fashionable and smart, according to my Coloradan friends, 'natty' means something tangled and dirty.
I also used to live in the same building as a Greek guy in Japan. In Greece they have a tradition of smashing plates, and you shout 'opa!' when you do so, which means something like hello/cheers. We went through a session where a lot of people broke a number of plates by accident and he, of course, jokingly shouted 'opa!' each time, other people joining in too. Too bad though, when we were in a restaurant in Kobe and someone knocked the waitress and she dropped a plate. 5 or 6 ryuugakusei shouted 'opa!', leaving all the Japanese people stunned, thinking we'd just randomly yelled out 'breasts!' at the poor woman.