There are always words that you can't seem to translate, and it tells you something about a culture to see which ones. You can eventually explain the meaning of these words, but not always their feeling. Here are a few examples.
FRENCH doesn't have a word for:
kind The French say "gentil," which is not at all the same; "nice" can be false, but "kind" means with a good heart.
home "Foyer" or "maison" is somehow not homelike.
squeamish "délicat" is not the same thing at all.
rude "mal poli" does not translate the American sense: aggressively, deliberately impolite.
gentleman in French seems to be more of a fashion statement than a personal quality.
tailgating -- as in a car. This is curious because almost all French drivers tailgate. Maybe it's like our not noticing gravity until Isaac Newton pointed it out.
friend Of course, the French have friends too. But a French ami/amie always has to have a sex, whereas we find it's often so convenient not to have to say.
neighborly Did you ever read Guy de Maupassant?
ENGLISH doesn't have a word for:
sortable This refers to someone you are not embarrassed to take places. "Presentable" is somehow less flattering.
doux which means so many things in one word: gentle, sweet, soft.... La douce France....
encadrer means to surround children, guests, tourists, etc. with care, education, a certain environment.
dépaysement is a wonderful word meaning that you are taken out of your own familiar world into a different one.
patronat means collectively the Big Bosses. It's used a lot in French newspapers. I don't think we have an equivalent in English, and that tells you something.
incontournable It means something that you can't get around, no matter how much you might want to.
attentat French has a useful word that means any kind of terrorist attack.
My favorite expression in French, just because of how it sounds, is tentative d'attentat (an attempted terrorist attack).
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