East or west, home is best
Meaning: No matter where you go, home remains the best place.
Origin: The saying came into English from German. Walter Keating Kelly's Proverbs of All Nations (1859) gives it as "East and west, at home the best," and the preacher Charles Spurgeon printed "East and west, home is best" in 1869. However far you travel, home remains the best place to be.
Equivalents in French, Spanish, Japanese, and German
- French: Il n'y a rien de tel que son chez-soi (literally: There is nothing like home)
- Spanish: En todas partes cuecen habas, pero en mi casa a calderadas (literally: They cook beans everywhere, but at home by the cauldron)
- Japanese: 我が家に勝る所なし (Wagaya ni masaru tokoro nashi) (literally: No place surpasses one's own home)
- German: Ost und West, daheim das Best (literally: East and west, at home is the best)
More proverbs about Human Nature
- Variety is the spice of life — Diversity makes life interesting.
- Speak of the devil — Said when someone appears just as they're being discussed.
- You can't please everyone — It's impossible to satisfy every person all the time.
- A leopard can't change its spots — People can't fundamentally change their nature.
- When the cat's away, the mice will play — People behave freely when authority is absent.
- Lightning never strikes twice — Rare events are unlikely to happen to the same person twice.
From our idioms
- Faire d'une mouche un éléphant — To make a mountain out of a molehill; to exaggerate wildly.
- avoir des fourmis — Experiencing a tingling or prickling sensation in a limb losing circulation.
- être sur des charbons ardents — Being extremely anxious or impatient about something.