Here are my top ten words, compiled from online collections, to
describe love, desire and relationships that have no real English
translation, but that capture subtle realities that even we English
speakers have felt once or twice. As I came across these words I’d have
the occasional epiphany: “Oh yeah! That’s what I was feeling...”
Mamihlapinatapei (Yagan, an indigenous
language of Tierra del Fuego): The wordless yet meaningful look shared
by two people who desire to initiate something, but are both reluctant
to start.
Oh yes, this is an exquisite word, compressing a thrilling and scary
relationship moment. It’s that delicious, cusp-y moment of imminent
seduction. Neither of you has mustered the courage to make a move, yet.
Hands haven’t been placed on knees; you’ve not kissed. But you’ve both
conveyed enough to know that it will happen soon… very soon.
Yuanfen (Chinese): A relationship
by fate or destiny. This is a complex concept. It draws on principles of
predetermination in Chinese culture, which dictate relationships,
encounters and affinities, mostly among lovers and friends.
From what I glean, in common usage yuanfen means the "binding force" that links two people together in any relationship.
But interestingly, “fate” isn’t the same thing as “destiny.” Even if
lovers are fated to find each other they may not end up together. The
proverb, “have fate without destiny,” describes couples who meet, but
who don’t stay together, for whatever reason. It’s interesting, to
distinguish in love between the fated and the destined. Romantic
comedies, of course, confound the two.
Cafuné (Brazilian Portuguese): The act of tenderly running your fingers through someone's hair.
Retrouvailles (French): The happiness of meeting again after a long time.
This is such a basic concept, and so familiar to the growing ranks of
commuter relationships, or to a relationship of lovers, who see each
other only periodically for intense bursts of pleasure. I’m surprised we
don’t have any equivalent word for this subset of relationship bliss.
It’s a handy one for modern life.
Ilunga (Bantu): A person who is willing to forgive abuse the first time; tolerate it the second time, but never a third time.
Apparently, in 2004, this word won the award as the world’s most
difficult to translate. Although at first, I thought it did have a clear
phrase equivalent in English: It’s the “three strikes and you’re out”
policy. But ilunga conveys a subtler concept, because the feelings are different with each “strike.” The word elegantly conveys the progression toward intolerance, and the different shades of emotion that we feel at each stop along the way.
Ilunga captures what I’ve described as the shade of gray
complexity in marriages—Not abusive marriages, but marriages that
involve infidelity, for example. We’ve got tolerance, within reason,
and we’ve got gradations of tolerance, and for different
reasons. And then, we have our limit. The English language to describe
this state of limits and tolerance flattens out the complexity into
black and white, or binary code. You put up with it, or you don’t. You
“stick it out,” or not.
Ilunga restores the gray scale, where many of us at least
occasionally find ourselves in relationships, trying to love imperfect
people who’ve failed us and whom we ourselves have failed.
La Douleur Exquise (French): The heart-wrenching pain of wanting someone you can’t have.
When I came across this word I thought of “unrequited” love. It’s not
quite the same, though. “Unrequited love” describes a relationship
state, but not a state of mind. Unrequited love encompasses the lover
who isn’t reciprocating, as well as the lover who desires. La douleur exquise gets at the emotional heartache, specifically, of being the one whose love is unreciprocated.
Koi No Yokan (Japanese): The sense upon first meeting a person that the two of you are going to fall into love.
This is different than “love at first sight,” since it implies that
you might have a sense of imminent love, somewhere down the road,
without yet feeling it. The term captures the intimation of
inevitable love in the future, rather than the instant attraction
implied by love at first sight.
Ya’aburnee (Arabic):
“You bury me.” It’s a declaration of one’s hope that they’ll die before
another person, because of how difficult it would be to live without
them.
The online dictionary that lists this word calls it “morbid and
beautiful.” It’s the “How Could I Live Without You?” slickly insincere
cliché of dating, polished into a more earnest, poetic term.
Forelsket: (Norwegian): The euphoria you experience when you’re first falling in love.
This is a wonderful term for that blissful state, when all your
senses are acute for the beloved, the pins and needles thrill of the
novelty. There’s a phrase in English for this, but it’s clunky. It’s
“New Relationship Energy,” or NRE.
Saudade (Portuguese): The feeling of
longing for someone that you love and is lost. Another linguist
describes it as a "vague and constant desire for something that does not
and probably cannot exist."
It’s interesting that saudade accommodates in one word the
haunting desire for a lost love, or for an imaginary, impossible,
never-to-be-experienced love. Whether the object has been lost or will
never exist, it feels the same to the seeker, and leaves her in the same
place: She has a desire with no future. Saudade doesn’t distinguish between a ghost, and a fantasy. Nor do our broken hearts, much of the time.
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