| Romanian | ||
| După război mulți viteji se arată! | ||
| Literal translation to English | ||
| After war many valiants(/brave people/heroes) show themselves up! | ||
| English | ||
| After the war (is over) many heroes show up! | ||
| The previous proverb with the mice showing up after the cat is
gone reminded me of this proverb. The mice show themselves up, talk smack
about the cat, dance and defy the cat only in her absence, after her leave.
They're often throwing out there some bold statements like: "where's
that cat now? if she was here I'd show her who the boss is! how dares she
frighten us, who does she think she is? let her come now, oh if only she was
here, I would tell her so many things and make her pay for everything! she
will run crying, oh, too bad she is not here now!" Hehe, and people are
like that too, often liking to show braveness not for what they have done but
for how they like to even fool themselves that they would have acted. I too
fall in this sad cateogry. "Oh I will tell my boss it's the last time I
stay overtime, no matter what!" and then go and talk like a mouse. Sure
this is not about a war that was, but it's similar. "Oh you didn't tell
your boss you dislike the working conditions? ha ha, I pity you, if I was
there I would have told him all my frustrations and make him change stuff
around here!" Ya, right. And then the time comes, no need to say how I
and others really act. In another way, more literally, this reminds me of the movie The Gladiator, which I only saw fully or >90% just recently. The bad, mischevious son showed up at the camp of the battle after it was won by his father, the Emperor, and his greatest general (which the son despised because his father loved that guy and not him). He tried to like take merits for the battle in front of the soldiers, he even said something to his father like "too bad I wasn't here to fight with you". Ha ha, why weren't you there if you were so brave? And why the need to praise yourself for something you didn't do, instead of waiting for the next chance to prove yourself? Waht better example than actions. Maybe words should follow actions, and not the other way around. Or better yet, you do the actions and let the other say the words about them, hopefully praising you. Yes, I think it is very low to not only praise yourself instead of letting others do it, if the case, while remaining humble. But at the same time actually praising yourself for something you didn't even do, and chances are you will not be able to actually do. And all is done at the cost of cutting the others merits, somehow berating them for not being as good as you would have been. Haha, really great. And now I realize that I would be probably very bad at inventing proverbs. I am not sure, sometimes I tried, maybe I suceeded, but I forget them lol. But It took me a lot of time and words to explain what this simple proverb succeeds to portray in just 6-7 words. |
||
| după= after | time adverb | |
| război = war | noun | neutral: sg. -
război -> masc.; pl. - războaie -> fem. |
| mulți = many, lots of | adjective | Ha, the first adjective so
far. Proverbs are really to the point. quantifier adjective?mult m.sg.,
mulți m.pl.; multă f.sg., multe f.pl. you might rememebr it from the "La mulți ani!" wish. Perhaps if you think of multi-touch devices you could rememebr it means many touches |
| viteaz = valiant, brave one, curageous, hero |
noun ……….. ……...adjective | sg., masc.; viteji = pl., masc; Here it's a standalone noun but usually it's an adjective. I bet you don't know but one of the greatest leaders of Romanians, who fought against the Ottomans at ~1600 C.E. was Mihai Viteazul = Michael the Brave |
| a (se) arăta = to show (up themselves) |
verb | 3rd person, sg. & pl., masc. & fem. With se it means it is in reflexive form - they show themselves up; without se, it just means to show something |
