It's a small world!

Eddie

Eddie

Senior Member
Nassau County, NY
USA - English
This is the theme of a recent thread in the French-English forum. I thought it would interesting to expand on this theme in this forum.

To start things off, here are some equivalents in French, Italian, Spanish, and German:

French: Le monde est petit.
Italian: E un mondo piccolo.
Spanish: Muy pequeño el mundo es.
German: Diese Welt ist ja so klein.

How would it be said in some other languages?
 
    • Arabic:

    العالم صغير (Pronunciation: "Al'aalam sagheer")

    Palestinian Arabic (colloquial):

    Ma as'ghar id-dinya! (lit. How small the world is!)
     
    I would like to correct the Spanish, because the way it is stated abovevdoesn't sound natural to me. The normal expression used is :

    "¡Qué pequeño es el mundo!" or "¡El mundo es un pañuelo!" (literally the world is a handkerchief)

    Catalan: "Qué petit és el món!"

    Cheers, Be
     
    A correction for the German suggestion, Eddie:

    Die Welt ist ja so klein.
    The world is so small

    You suggested "This world is so small". :)

    Another way to say the same thing would be:

    Unsere Welt ist ja so klein
    Our world is so small
     
    its 'Qualati na nyng iatu' [in ancient spelling or in modern spelling, its 'Kalati na ning yatu'] in Pampango or Kapampangan as we call it, a dialect spoken in the north of the philippines.
     
    Mandarin: 世界很小 shìjiè hěn xiǎo.

    Oh okay, it doesn't like the upside down circumflex thingy, but that xiao's in the 3rd tone.
     
    meili said:
    I think what you want to say is Maliit ang Mundo. - Please check the spelling :)
    Another: (In case you have not noticed...) :)
    Click to expand...
    Yap! My mistake. It should be:

    Maliit ang Mundo.

    Thanks for the correction!
     
    or to be more emphatic,it could be:
    Kay liit ng mundo....

    actually, until now, i dont know how to use 'ng' and 'nang'.... :(
     
    Persian:
    دنياي کوچکي است
    (Donyaye kuchaki ast.)

    Kurdish: دونياييکي بچوکه
    (Donyayeeki bechuka)

    Finnish: Maailma on niin pieni.

    Regards
    Tisia
     
    In Italian there's also that common sentence: Tutto il mondo è paese (The whole world/Everybody is [our] village).

    Jazyk
     
    liv3000 said:
    In italian we use to say also:
    "Com'è piccolo il mondo!" beside of "Il mondo è piccolo"
    Click to expand...
    jazyk said:
    In Italian there's also that common sentence: Tutto il mondo è paese (The whole world/Everybody is [our] village).

    Jazyk
    Click to expand...

    Interestingly, both versions are also very common in German: :)

    Wie klein die Welt doch ist!
    Die ganze Welt ist ein Dorf.
     
    panjabigator said:
    Hindi: /sa.nsaar chhoTaa hotaa hai/
    Urdu: /duniyaa chhoTii hotii hai/
    Panjabi: /duniyaa chhoTii hu.ndii hai/
    Click to expand...
    In my mind, "hotii" (/hotaa/hotai) is used for when things "tend" to be something. For example, "bhaartiy bachey chhotay hotai hai" (Indian children are (OR: "tend to be") small).

    To translate "It's a small world!", I would say: /sansaar kitnaa Chotaa hai!/ (lit. "the world is so small")

    Tell me if you disagree - it could just be me!

    Following my pattern, my translations would be:

    Hindi: संसार कितना छोटा है! [sansaar kitnaa Chotaa hai!]
    Urdu: دنيا كتنى چهوٹى ہے! [duniyaa kitnii Chotii hai!]
    Gujarati: સંસાર કેટલુ નાનું છે! [sansaar ketlu naanu Che!]
     
    Hungarian:

    • Ez egy kis/kicsi világ. ~ literally: It's a small world.
    • When you say it upon meeting, say, your next-door neighbour abroad, we usually say:
      Milyen kicsi a világ! :eek: ~ literally: How small the world is!
    • However, if it is only a simple statement, we say:
      A világ kicsi. ~ literally: The world is small.
    Cheerio! :)
     
    Neko said:
    Mandarin: 世界很小 shìjiè hěn xiǎo.

    Oh okay, it doesn't like the upside down circumflex thingy, but that xiao's in the 3rd tone.
    Click to expand...
    To make it more like an exclamation: 世界多lit, much/好lit. good. You can refer to the usage of the German word "gut" for emphasis /真really小啊!:)
    P.S. What do you mean by "it doesn't like the upside down circumflex thingy"? And you use "but" in giving the tone of xiao. I can't quite get your idea. Thank you:)
     
    In Tagalog:

    Mundong maliit - World that is small
    Daigdig na maliit - the world that's small
    maliit na daigdig - " "
    ang kaliitan ng mundo - the smalness of the world
    maliit ang daigdig - the world is small
     
    Hungarian: Kicsi a világ.
    Estonian: Maailm on väike.
    Finnish: Maailma on pieni.

    You should have checked them by native speakers, though.
     
    Vietnamese:

    "Thế giới thật nhỏ bé !" - How small the world is !

    When we've met someone we thought we've never met again, we said:

    "Ồ, trái đất hình cầu !" - Oh, the Earth is a ball.
     
    Tisia said:
    Persian:
    دنياي کوچکي است
    (Donyaye kuchaki ast.)

    Kurdish: دونياييکي بچوکه
    (Donyayeeki bechuka)

    Finnish: Maailma on niin pieni.

    Regards
    Tisia
    Click to expand...

    The Persian translation sounds far too formal! I think that, colloquially, it would sound better to say "What a small world!" In transliterated, colloquial Persian that would be: "Che donyâye kuchiki!"
     
    "aldunia sghaireh " en arabe
    "el mundo es un panuelo" la forma correcta en castellano.
     
    well, well, I wish I knew if everybody just translated the sentence literally or idiomatically.:rolleyes:
    It's a small world = used to express surprise at meeting an acquaintance or discovering a personal connection in a distant place or an unexpected context
    So the correct Hungarian translation is ONLY: Milyen kicsi a világ!
     
    dn88 said:
    I would rather say "Jaki ten świat mały!" (to express my surprise).
    Click to expand...
    Encolpius said:
    Milyen kicsi a világ!
    Click to expand...
    In German, we can use a similar construction to express surprise: Wie klein die Welt doch ist!
    - wie = 'how'
    - klein = 'small'
    - die Welt = 'the world'
    - doch ~ 'though'
    - ist = 'is'

    ... but very often you can hear this version: Die Welt ist klein! [surprised intonation](as in English: 'The world is small!')
     
    I have a whole bunch of languages here.

    Esperanto: Ĝi estas malgranda mondo
    Icelandic: Það er lítill heimur
    Romanian: E o lume mică
    Thai: มันเป็นโลก ที่มีขนาดเล็ก (Man pen lok thi mi khnad lek)
    Sundanese: Leu dunya leutik
    Irish: Tá sé ar domhan beag
    Kazakh: Бұл шағын әлем (Bul şağın älem)
    Belarusian: Гэта маленькі свет (Heta malieńki sviet)
    Ukrainian: Це маленький світ (Tse malen'kyy svit)
    Igbo: Ọ bụ obere ụwa
    Somali: Waa duni yar
     
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