English
In the context of our integration project “Tamam”, we got the idea, in a joint creative brainstorming, to investigate which phrases other countries and cultures have.
Just as for many of the fugitives our phrases certainly sound strange and incomprehensible – such as “The apple falls not far from the trunk” or “to have a heart”, of course, phrases from their homeland sound also funny to us when translated literally. We wanted to get closer to this. And first of all, of course, what do they have for proverbs and sayings and above all what do they mean? Because this is not immediately clear …
Thus we assembled, thought, and collected, and there came to us funny and thoughtful sentences:
“Someone is learning from his bag.”
“The donkey does not fall twice into a hole.”
“The dream of the devil is paradise.”
“You took a face.”
“You are like a mountain in a storm.”
“A woman fights with her mouth”.
In some phrases, you can guess the meaning, some are very similar to ours. “The donkey does not fall twice into a hole”, which was equal to each of us, means “Do not make the same mistake twice”. But what does “somebody learn from his bag” mean?
We wanted to know this from the citizens of Landsberg, have selected three phrases from Syria and Eritrea and went, equipped with microphone and recording device, into the city, in order to interview them. It quickly became clear: for the passers it was not so easy to come to a meaning and some had to think first.
For the young fugitives the interviews were great fun. It was interesting and funny for them to hear people interpret the phrases that were so clear to them. It was also nice for them to bring a part of their own culture to the Landsberg population and to share it with them.