by Elliot Sinclair, Web Editor in the Content and Community Team

With the latest phenomenon of baked beans on Weetabix triggering heated debates all over the internet, we thought we’d take a look at combinations of things which definitely do not belong together, or are completely different from one another, in idiomatic expressions from across the globe.

And where better to find such a rich mix of languages than among our own staff? So just ahead of International Mother Language Day, we put the question to them…

A few of our favourites...

Language	Idiom	Translation
Amharic (Ethiopian)	ሆድና ጀርባ "hodena Ǧäreba"	stomach and back
Arabic (Iraqi)	مثل الحية والبطنج  "mathal al-ḥayah w'al-baṭnaj"	like a snake and betony [a plant]
British English	like chalk and cheese	like chalk and cheese
Chinese (Mandarin)	风马牛不相及  "fēng mǎ niú bù xiāng jí"	horses and cattle won't mate with each other
Czech	jako nebe a dudy	like heaven and bagpipes
Danish	Hvad er højest, Rundetårn eller et tordenskrald?	What is highest, the Round Tower or a thunderclap?
Estonian	nagu päkapikk ja maja	like an elf and house
Farsi	مثل فیل و فنجان  "misle feel va fenjan"	like an elephant and a teacup
German	Äpfel mit Birnen vergleichen	comparing apples and pears
Hebrew	כרחוק מזרח ממערב  "ki-rehok mizrah mi-ma'arav"	as far as the east from the west
Japanese	月と鼈　 "tsuki to suppon"	moon and a soft-shelled turtle
Polish	piernik do wiatraka	gingerbread for the windmill
Portuguese	comparar alhos com bugalhos	comparing garlic with oak apples
Romanian	ca baba si mitraliera	like a grandmother and a machine gun
Russian	Путать Божий дар с яичницей  "putat’ Bozhii dar s iaichnitsei"	confusing God's gift with scrambled eggs
Serbian	поредити бабе и жабе  "porediti babe i žabe"	like grandmothers and toads
Spanish	como un huevo a una castaña	like an egg to a chestnut
Turkish	dağlar kadar farklı	as different as the mountains
Ukrainian	як свиня на коня  "yak svynya na konya"	like a pig on a horse
Welsh	mor wahanol â mêl a menyn	as different as honey and butter
Yiddish	ווי בוידעם און ציבעלעס  "vi boydem un tsibeles"	like a loft and onions

Poles apart

How many of you are familiar with the phrase like chalk and cheese? It’s used primarily in British English to imply that two things are an odd match (e.g. ‘that married couple are like chalk and cheese’). Probably soon to be overtaken by Weetabix and beans.

Variants include like an elephant and teacup (Farsi), an elf and a house (Estonian) (both of which contrast the size of one against the other), and the rather dramatic grandmother and a machine gun (Romanian) or grandmother and a toad (Serbian).

Meanwhile the Marmite reputation of bagpipes is unfortunately confirmed by the Czech expression contrasting heaven and bagpipes.

Speaking of Marmite, food, unsurprisingly features a lot in these idioms. For example the fairly ubiquitous apples and oranges (known in various other forms such as apples and pears), the Welsh honey and butter, the Polish gingerbread for the windmill and the Yiddish loft and onions, where the inference is that the items cannot be compared.

Never the twain shall meet

Other variants point to the fact that the two items will never cross paths with one another, such as oil and water, night and day and heaven and earth, which are widespread across many languages.

An equivalent in Iraqi Arabic is like a snake and betony [the plant]. In folklore snakes are repelled by the plant and it is also said to be a remedy for their bite (however nowadays it is more commonly used to flavour Iraqi dishes).

Meanwhile, it has been suggested that the origin of the Mandarin expression horses and cattle won't mate with each other lies in the traditional belief that cattle normally follow the direction of the wind, while horses go against it, so even if they get lost, they would never meet. It was originally used in Zuo zhuan (The Commentary of Zuo) to describe two States in the Spring and Autumn period (771 to 476/403 BC) that were so far apart geographically that they would never have anything to do with each other.

Perhaps you can compare this to the more surreal pig on a horse in Ukrainian, or earrings on a pig in Yiddish?

Other variants include stomach and back (Amharic) (where the connotation is that despite the two being connected, they will always be facing different directions) and as far as the east from the west (Hebrew).

Same same but different

Many variants have an implication that although the items being compared are completely different from one another, it may be possible to mistake them.

In Portuguese we have comparing garlic with oak apples (similar in texture and size), while a Spanish equivalent is eggs and chestnuts (similar in size and shape).

We can also see this in the Japanese expression moon and soft-shelled turtle: both are round, although if you really are guilty of confusing them, you should probably book yourself an eye test.

With the alliteration in chalk and cheese, you might say that even the British idiom draws our attention to their similarities (even only in pronunciation).

The outliers

Of course there are also exceptions to these three neat categories by other languages which take slightly different approaches. In Turkish for example as different as the mountains speculates that the difference between two items is so great that there might as well be a mountain range between them, while the Danish rhetorical question What is highest, the Round Tower or a thunderclap? contrasts the size of the former against the sound of the latter.

What is the equivalent in your language?