"It went through one ear and the other," I said flippantly.
My Chinese Language Partner stared at me with surprise. "What does that mean?" He wondered.
"Oh." I wondered if this was a new expression or phrase for him. "If someone isn't listening properly or paying attention, then what you said to them has gone through one ear and out the other...I guess because their mind isn't present and so there's an empty space in between their ears..."
My language partner nodded enthusiastically. "It's the same as in China."
"Ehh, really?!" What a surprise!
The word 'walk' doesn't exist in all languages, but a strange expression like 'Through one ear and out the other' does. What a funny world we live in...
Later, when I went on a date with my potential boyfriend, we discussed it over two steaming cups of delicious butterscotch hot chocolate, and he said that the same expression exists in Arabic too. He is a citizen of a country in Africa and the Middle East called Libya.
It amazes me that an expression like this can exist in three different languages and in three different areas of the world.
