Book Review: "The Meaning of Tingo and Other Extraordinary Words From Around the World" by Adam Jacot de Boinod

The Meaning of Tingo and Other Extraordinary Words from around the World by Adam Jacot de Boinod
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Amazon Book Description

A divine gift for the word-obsessed—a deliciously eccentric world tour of words that have no English equivalent.

  The countless language freaks who’ve worn out their copies of Eats, Shoots and Leaves will find inexhaustible distraction in The Meaning of Tingo. Where else will they discover that Bolivians have a word that means "I was rather too drunk last night and it’s all their fault"? As for tingo, on Easter Island it means "to take all the objects one desires from the house of a friend, one at a time, by borrowing them." Organized by themes such as food, the human body, and sex and love, this irresistible book combs through more than 254 languages in search of those gorgeous oddities that have no direct English counterpart—words so strange and apt that if they didn’t exist, they would have to be invented.



Highlights from The Meaning of Tingo:
• mencomet (Indonesian): stealing things of small value such as food or drinks, partly for fun
• scheissbedauern (German): the disappointment one feels when something turns out not nearly as badly as one had hoped
• mono-no-aware (Japanese): appreciating the sadness of existence
• mahj (Persian): looking beautiful after disease
• plimpplamppletteren (Dutch): the skimming of a flat stone as many times as possible across the surface of the water
• koshatnik (Russian): a dealer in stolen cats
• ava (Tahitian): wife (but also means whisky)

Highlights from The Meaning of Tingo:
• mencomet (Indonesian): stealing things of small value such as food or drinks, partly for fun
• scheissbedauern (German): the disappointment one feels when something turns out not nearly as badly as one had hoped
• mono-no-aware (Japanese): appreciating the sadness of existence
• mahj (Persian): looking beautiful after disease
• plimpplamppletteren (Dutch): the skimming of a flat stone as many times as possible across the surface of the water
• koshatnik (Russian): a dealer in stolen cats
• ava (Tahitian): wife (but also means whisky)

This book had such potential to be at least a 4-star reference book but fell quite short by providing no guide to pronunciation. This is a collection of words from around the globe that have either no direct translation into English, or may mean one thing in English but something completely different in another language. The book is broken down nicely into categories and each chapter is full of words that have very bizarre translations. Too bad the author didn't take the time to provide the key to pronunciation so that this reference book could be a one-stop place to learn meanings and how to use them verbally. There is a very interesting chapter at the end that covers all the barnyard animals and the sounds they make as conveyed in different languages. There are also some great cultural lessons, such as why certain numbers are considered unlucky. My favorite and most useful aspect of the book was the section at the end of each chapter called "false friends" or words in English that mean something completely different in another language.