Have you ever had that frustrating feeling of being at a loss for words? You know what you want to say - the perfect idiom exists in your own language - but you're speaking English, and English sadly lacks the very turn of phrase you love so much! In this column, we present some of the "missing idioms" which we think ought to be introduced into European English. This time, Aleksandar Savić brings us the brighter side of death...

Image: Jengod (CC-SA)

Radish to radish, dust to dust...

Just the other day I happened to overhear my father talking to an acquaintance of his, who was constantly complaining to a nasty pain he felt in one of his legs. Deeply sympathising with his misery, my father assured him that it would all go away as soon as he mended it with some loam (kad privije ilovaču). The man's first thought was that my father was recommending him a mud-based treatment, and was delighted by the idea of going to a spa for some time. What he didn't realise was that by "mending his pain with loam", my father meant that his suffering would end when he was six feet under.

This Serbian idiom is just one example of a European habit - we often use phrases related to soil when we're talking about death. A widely spread expression is smelling the flowers from below, as the Poles would say (wąchać kwiatki od spodu). What usually differs is the type of flowers – in Serbian they are mostly violets, whilst English has daisies. The German version is somewhat different, since they say to see the radish from below (das Radießchen von unten sehen), but the point is more or less the same. Now, these idioms may be legacy of a centuries-old tradition of pleasing the chthonic deities, or just some cheesy gardening jokes, but their meaning is not really obscure. Soil has a clear association with the end of our earthly life, or as we might say - radish to radish, dust to dust.

Just to make things perfectly clear, there are also idioms related to larger plants than flowers. In Ukraine, to cut down an oak (vyrizaty duba) means to die, which is, while we're on the subject, rather plausible should you stand on the wrong side of the tree. This situation even gives the German phrase of the same sense putting on the wooden pyjamas (den Holzpyjama anziehen), a whole new absurd, yet literal context.

While some of these phrases are quite obvious in their meaning, there are idioms which don't really indicate what they're about. A common, rather colloquial expression in Serbia is to stretch one's cloven hooves (otegnuti papke), similar to the Polish idiom to turn up hooves (wyciągnąć kopyta). If you're wondering what's with all the hooves – beats me, but I believe it has something to do with that bucket everyone has to kick sooner or later.

If you're in Romania and decide to give your last nickel to the priest (A da ortu' popii) that means you're settling your scores for good. Now, since E&M is all about finding a wider European perspective, I couldn't help relating this idiom to another tradition from the continent. The cradle of civilisation had to attend to its graves as well, so the Greeks imagined a ghastly ferryman called Charon who transported the dead across the river Styx, with a long, uncombed beard and obscene attire, as Virgil wrote. The ride had to be paid for, naturally, so the last coins of deceased Greeks were reserved for him alone. Well, at least he did do the rowing...