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Καλό φυντάνι is used in the latest transcript and video of EASY GREEK and is translated as ‘a fine piece of work’ i.e, ‘an unpleasant, difficult and in this context, a nasty person’. The note explains the word as meaning ‘a seedling’ but metaphorically as someone young and unexperienced. Also...

Karl Reinhardt in a memorable phrase about the Greek gods in Homer’s Iliad talks of them as displaying—in a wonderful oxymoron--‘a sublime frivolity—ein erhabener Unernst”.The gods are a paradox of great beauty and excellence whilst also being light-hearted and spontaneous, not caring about...

I have heard this epithet usually used by certain women, who have posted, say, pictures of their children or grandchildren on web sites like instagram and snap chatq which the children or grandchildren, when they have grown up, find highly embarrassing. This compound is a recent variation of an...

My brothrt-in-law and his wife are in the Cyclades and at present ‘exploring’ Santorini. They met a man who, with typical Greek generosity, gave them a book of poetry which his father had written. They sent my wife one of his poems for me to ‘decipher’ for them: neither of them knows a word of...

In this article at https://ensia.com/features/solar-water-heaters-israel-renewable-energy-thermal-photovoltaic/ these are the opening words:- “October 28, 2020 — For Gershon Grossman and Ed Murray, 1978 was a big year. Grossman, then a solar energy pioneer at the Technion, Israel’s premier...

Defined in wikipedia thus:- ‘A nuclear bunker buster also known as an earth-penetrating weapon (EPW), is the nuclear equivalent of the conventional bunker buster’. ’Bunker‘ in Greek, as in English, has several meanings, as, e.g. οχυρό καταφύγιο, πολεμικό όχυρο, όχυρο, παγίδα άμμου, whether a...

This is the text: Ἀπὸ νερὸ κι' ἀπὸ χῶμα εἶν' οἱ λέξεις μου, ζυμωμένες μὲ μπόλικον ἥλιο, μὲ μπόλικη ἀγάπη. Ὅλες μου οἱ δύσες μὲ βρίσκουν νὰ κοιτάζω τόν οὐρανό μέ λάσπες στά δάχτυλα. Χτίζω τὴν πολιτεία μὲ τὸ χαμόγελο. Χτίζω τὴν πολιτεία μὲ τὴν καρδιά. Χτίζω τὴν πολιτεία μὲ τὰ παιδιά ποὺ θὰ ’ναι...

The AI overview describes a blended winglet thus:- Blended winglets are wingtip devices that seamlessly integrate with the main wing, reducing aerodynamic drag and improving fuel efficiency They are characterised by a smooth, outward curve that blends into the wing. This design helps to minimize...

My grandchildren (two of whom are very curious!) asked me what the various parts of an aircraft are in Greek. I had no answer. Apart from άτρακτος for the fuselage and πτερύγια I was stumped. The ‘sharklet‘ and ‘winglets’ and nearly every other part was beyond my knowledge. I have searched...

We went for a sea trip on a catamaran from Athens on our holiday in late May and there was a fair breeze. I asked the skipper if the wind was the meltemi and he said it was the wrong time of year for the meltemi but that this wind was the afternoon wind. I asked him for the Greek name of it and...

This is a very common idiom in English. It is defined by the AI overview as:- “The idiom "what makes someone tick" means understanding their motivations, beliefs, and the factors that drive their behaviour. It's about working out what influences someone's personality and actions. The phrase can...

In Alexandra Tourloumi’s latest post at she is showing the difficulties involved in filming her videos with her husband Dimitri. She has an uncharacteristic outburst of swearing in the above video at about 4:00 minutes into the video. I cannot make out what she says. The words sound like όχι...

Is this a common idiom or is it common to Crete? From the context it seems to mean ‘and you are doing your own thing’. This is the context:- ΓΙΑΓΙΑ:- ΠΟΥ ΗΣΟΥΝΑ, μωρέ και κρύωσε το φάι!.Ο κύρης σου ανήμενει για να φάει και εσύ βαράς τη βιόλα σου; Εεεε γαιδουρογάιδαρε! The subtitle is ‘and you...

At 9:51, the English subtitle reads:- ‘Get your hands off my butt, before you raise the devil in me!’ The actual Greek I hear is as above, viz. get your paws off me, wretch, before all hell is let loose’. Is the woman implying only that she is angry or is there an implication in the English...

This should be a simple, even trivial, question as the phrase is very common but seems usually to be personal as in δεν μας χέζεις; meaning roughly ‘piss off!’ But in ΠΙΛΑΛΑΛ this dialogue occurs:- Ο χασάπης λέει: -Αντύπα! Πιάσε μωρέ την όρ’θα. Ο Αντύπα απαντάει: -Δεν μας χέζει. The subtitle...

All who read this post will realise that I am working through the script of ΠΙΛΑΛΑ. But obviously the words of the script won’t exactly match English idiom. I have come across ξιά μου as a term of endearment, like the English ‘darling/ love/ lovie’ but that seems somehow in this context of...

What is the interpretation of this Cretan proverb which seems to mean ‘tell me how/that they flayed you and I know how many strokes you received’?

A Cretan grandmother to her grandson, Adipas:- Α δε γαύρης επιτόπου θα σε πάρει και θα σε σηκώσει. Adipas replies:- Δεν έρχομαι. The clip is from that evocative short film ΠΙΛΑΛΑ. I cannot find the word γαύρης anywhere and presume it is a Cretan dialectical word meaning ‘come’. I also presume...

A dialogue with a teeny-bopper (κοπελίτσα) and her mother on a short Greek instagram:- Μαμά, βρήκα κάποιον που το φυσάει. Όχι μόνο το φυσάει, φυσάει κιόλας. The first idiom is common slang but is the second? Or is it only ‘girly’-speak?

I have been unfortunately detained (obsessive as I tend to be) by this passage with many slang words in it:-Although I get the general drift of the passage. The first sentence has no verb, so rightly of wrongly, I understand είναι. Κολασμένο I presume is complimentary and means ‘wicked’ in...