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> Like kaldos, putting medicine on a well place, rather than the injury. Kaldos is a medical treatment, said by some to have been learned from the Germans, in which medicine is applied to a parallel member of an injured part in a way that is supposed to transfer pain to an uninjured place. The idiom is applied to a decision or action that completely misses the point or problem. |
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> Like one who has eaten the thorny puffer fish, full of many things. The thorny puffer fish is sometimes gulped by the wide-mouthed grouper fish. The puffer, expanding and extending its thorns in the grouper's mouth, renders the latter rather "full of things" and completely helpless. Groupers in this predicament are occasionally caught by fishermen. The idiom is applied to anyone who faces more problems, more work, or more sweethearts than he can cope with. |
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> Like the ilaot [coconut juice] of Ngetkib, mixing itself. Probably of folk-tale derivation, the idiom may be applied to a man who has married too close to his own clan, thus not gaining the assistance of the wife's clan in food and services, since this would amount to the clan giving to itself. Also applied to a situation where a person expects to have some service performed for him but ends up doing it himself. |
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> Like eating a forked taro corm. Taro (Colocasia esculenta) generally grows like a single fat carrot. Some corms, however, develop one or more points or forks. The image conveyed by this idiom is that of a man beset by many tasks, trying to decide among them. |
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> You're like a stinkbug that burns itself in the fire. i.e., you get involved in things that may hurt you. |
