Words that don't translate
You may be aware of some words that we have borrowed from other languages, because we don't have a word for them in English. One well known example is schadenfreude, or the enjoyment people have in hearing of the troubles of others. Here's a cross cultural list of 20 such words from various languages, including jayus, an Indonesian word for a joke so poorly told or written that it's funny. However, my favorite such word, mokita, does not appear on this list. A mokita is a truth that a group agrees not to talk about. The phrase elephant in the room describes a similar concept, but it's not exactly the same thing.
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