mal trago
Meaning: a difficult or unpleasant experience; a bitter pill to swallow.
Language: Spanish
Literally: bad swallow
Category: Body & Senses
Origin: The phrase pictures something physically unpleasant to swallow, metaphorically extending to emotional or circumstantial hardship.
More idioms — Body & Senses
- en dos patadas — very easily or effortlessly.
- con pies de plomo — To proceed with extreme caution or wariness; to tread carefully in a delicate situation.
- con lo puesto — With nothing but the clothes on one's back; in a state of complete destitution.
- die Nase voll haben — To be fed up or exhausted by something.
- Salz in die Wunde streuen — To deliberately make someone's pain or humiliation worse.
- vor den Kopf stoßen — To offend or affront someone.
More Spanish idioms
- ni a tiros — absolutely not; under no circumstances.
- a la buena de Dios — To proceed carelessly or without proper planning, leaving the outcome to chance or fate.
- no sé qué y no sé cuánto — An undefined or vague something; an indescribable quality or collection of things.
- cuéntame una de vaqueros — A challenge to someone to stop lying or exaggerating; an equivalent of "pull the other on…
- tomar el toro por los cuernos — To face a difficult problem directly and courageously rather than avoiding it.
- cortar por lo sano — To sever a problem decisively rather than manage it halfway, making a clean break or radi…
From our false friends
- Vaso — Actually means 'a drinking glass'. A vase (for flowers) is un jarrón or florero.
- Embarazada — Actually means 'pregnant'. For embarrassed, say avergonzado/a.
- Constipado — Actually means 'having a head cold'. Estoy constipado = I have a cold.