Vietnamese

Vietnamese proverbs, at a glance

• Care for those unlike you; difference of origin is nothing beside a shared frame.

  Bầu ơi thương lấy bí cùng, tuy rằng khác giống nhưng chung một giàn

  Literally: O gourd, love the squash too — though of different kinds, you share one trellis.

  Vietnamese · Vietnam

  Set beside

  • Latin (Terence) — I am human; nothing human is foreign to me. Kinship by shared humanity
  • Indonesian — the heavy borne together, the light carried together; kinship by shared labour
  • Igbo — let the kite perch and the eagle perch; mutual accommodation across difference

• Enjoy what you are given, and never forget whose labor gave it.

  Ăn quả nhớ kẻ trồng cây.

  an kwah nyuh keh chong kay

  Literally: Eating the fruit, remember the one who planted the tree.

  Vietnamese · Vietnam

  Set beside

  • Mandarin (饮水思源) — drink water, think of the source; the same gratitude, traced upstream
  • Latin (Caecilius via Cicero) — the planter's side: setting trees for an age he will never see
  • English — the negative cast: ingratitude named as a vice rather than gratitude as a virtue

• Persistent effort, however small, will one day produce its result.

  Có công mài sắt, có ngày nên kim.

  Literally: With effort sharpening iron, one day it becomes a needle.

  Vietnamese · Vietnam

  Set beside

  • Latin (Ovid) — the drop that wears the stone; patient repetition defeats hardness
  • Japanese — three years of sitting on a cold stone warms it; endurance transforms even the most resistant surface
  • Persian (Saadi) — drop by drop they gather and become a sea; accumulation from patience

• A straight tree does not fear dying upright

  Cây ngay không sợ chết đứng

  Literally: Tree straight not fear die standing

  Vietnamese · Vietnam

  Set beside

  • Mandarin — the same claim, with the body and its shadow as the testing pair
  • Spanish — the test moves indoors, to the bed and the night
  • Latin (Quintilian) — the protection named: conscience itself, in a courtroom of one