At my public library I found an interesting book from 2014 by Ella Frances Sanders titled Lost In Translation: An illustrated compendium of untranslatable words from around the world.
One is the Swedish noun Resfeber defined as:
“The restless beat of a traveler’s heart before the journey begins, a mixture of anxiety and anticipation.”
If a speech is like a journey, then that word expresses very well what a speaker feels, and hopefully what the audience does as a story is told.
That book covers the following 52 words (listed in alphabetical order):
Ákihi (Hawaiian)
Boketto (Japanese)
Cafuné (Brazilian Portuguese)
Commuovere (Italian)
Cotisuelto (Caribbean Spanish)
Drachenfutter (German)
Feuillemort (French)
Fika (Swedish)
Forelsket (Norwegian)
Gezellig (Dutch)
Glas wen (Welsh)
Goya (Urdu)
Gurfa (German)
Hiraeth (Welsh)
Iktsuarpok (Inuit)
Jayus (Indonesian)
Jugaad (Hindi)
Kabelsalat (German)
Kalpa (Sanskrit)
Karelu (Tulu)
Kilig (Tagalog)
Komorebi (Japanese)
Kummerspeck (German)
Luftmensch (Yiddish)
Mamihlapinatapai (Yaghan)
Mångata (Swedish)
Meraki (Greek)
Murr-ma (Wagiman)
Naz (Urdu)
Nunchi (Korean)
Pålegg (Norwegian)
Pisan zapra (Malay)
Poronkusema (Finnish)
Razliubit (Russian)
Resfeber (Swedish)
Samar (Arabic)
Saudade (Portuguese)
Sgriob (Gaelic)
Shlimazel (Yiddish)
Struisvogelpolitiek (Dutch)
Szimpatikus (Hungarian)
Tíam (Farsi)
Tíma (Icelandic)
Trepverter (Yiddish)
Tretår (Swedish)
Tsundoku (Japanese)
Ubuntu (Nguni Bantu)
Vacilando (Spanish)
Wabi-sabi (Japanese)
Waldeinsamkeit (German)
Warmduscher (German)
Ya’aburnee (Arabic)
On March 3rd I blogged about seven Concepts and words from far away, which included both jugaad and wabi-sabi.
The EKG image came from Wikimedia Commons.
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