12 Czech Sayings That Make No Sense in English

Translation: To rub yourself in somewhere.
Meaning: To crash a party—to go somewhere where you’re not invited and try to find your way in.

Translation: He needs it like a dead man needs a winter coat.
Meaning: This is used to mean “as useful as” for things that are obviously not useful at all.

Translation: Throwing your rifle in the rye.
Meaning: To throw in the towel or to give up, especially after a long fight that seems to be going nowhere.

Translation: Once in a Hungarian moon.
Meaning: Close equivalent to “once in a blue moon” or very rarely. Nobody seems to know what Hungary has to do with it.

Translation: White sex.
Meaning: Midnight snack. The white being a reference to the traditional color of fridges.

Translation: Baked pigeons don’t fly into your mouth.
Meaning: If you want to make money or achieve something, you have to work for it.

Translation: A fish rots from its head.
Meaning: If something is wrong, chances are it started with the government or leaders.

Translation: He has butter on his head.
Meaning: He carries a lot of secrets that everybody knows about, or, he has skeletons in his closet—except that they’re not actually skeletons anymore but very obvious things.

Translation: He who runs away, wins.
Meaning: It is wiser to give up and walk away from a situation if you think you can’t win.

Translation: A man once thought he would fart but he pooped himself instead.
Meaning: It doesn’t matter what you thought would be the consequences of your actions—it only matter what the real consequences are, or if you make a mistake, it’s pointless to say, “Well, I thought…”.

Translation: After the battle, everybody is a general.
Meaning: It’s easier to know the right answer after everything’s said and done; this is similar to the phrase, “hindsight is 20-20”.

Translation: Patience brings roses.
Meaning: Be patient and you’ll be rewarded greatly and beautifully.