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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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> You're just like a cat washing yourself. i.e., you have to do everything yourself because your relatives are neglecting their obligations to you. |
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> You're like the old man of Ngerechelong who uses a cloud to mark the location of his fishtrap. i.e. you depend too much on people who are unreliable. |
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> He's like the rabbit fish in Ngetmeduch, which jumps into the net (seemingly) of its own will. i.e. He always drops by without having been invited. At one point in their life cycle the meas, a tasty, black reef fish, school close to the surface in the shallow lagoon near Ngetmeduch (Koror) and may be easily caught with the derau, a two-part net consisting of two scoop nets, one held in each hand (hence sometimes "butterfly net"). The idiom is applied to a person who habitually appears without invitation at parties or feasts. |
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> Those of high family are like the seed pod of the bngaol tree, which falls with its leafy cap upright. The bngaol, a mangrove tree, bears a long pod which is sharply pointed on one end and has a leafy "cap" on the other. When it falls from the tree it generally lands standing in the mud with "cap" end up. Hence, the quality of being socially elite (meteet) is gained naturally at birth. One is born in good standing with a cap or insignia of high rank. It follows, then, that the elite need not display their high standing, everyone knows they are elite when they are born (and there is no other way to become elite). Going a step further, the elite may display proper humility and refer to a group including themselves as kid a remechebuul (we commoners). |
