Re: Cool (was Re: T-Shirt)

Carlos Thompson wrote:

>Jörg Rhiemeier wrote:
>
>> > 4. Isn't this shirt cool?
>>
>> Hardly works, because the idiom "cool" is almost impossible
>> to translate other than by borrowing.
>
>Not quite.  Proably speakers have a way to express something close to
>cool, without borrowing.  I can think in Spanish a lot of expressions:
>"una onda" (mexican), "de pelos" (also mexican), "chévere" (colombian
>and I guess actually latinamerican... at least caribean), "la
>verraquera" (colombian and caribean), "del putas" (colombian, mostly
>bogotan)... none of them are borrowings from English yet they express
>the same concept as "cool".
In Denmark, people say "fedt" with exactly the same effect. Literally,
it means "fat". I have no idea how this came about. In Tagalog, the
word "hanep" is used. The best translation of which is "cool" IMO.

-----<snip>-----
>Well.  How would you say "cool" in a sentence like "Isn't this shirt
>cool?" in your conlangs?  What does it means ethimologically.
In Boreanesian, the root used is "psa,q" (where <a,> is an <a with ogenek
-- a nasalized <a>). Literally, it means "blood". Hence: "Isn't this a
bloody shirt?" It probably stems from the time when warriors who have
slained enemies in battle and were all covered in blood were considered
"cool". The funny thing is, when the neighbouring white Australians met a
Boreanesian he didn't like, he'd curse "Bloody Boreanesian" in vain.

-kristian- 8)