羊肠小道

Pronunciation: yáng cháng xiǎo dào Literal meaning: A path like a sheep's gut

Origin & Usage

Chinese has no gentler way of saying that a road is bad. The image is anatomical and exact — the winding, doubling coil of a sheep's intestine — and it was applied first to real mountain tracks in the north, where the passes turn back on themselves so often that distance stops meaning anything. Writers extended it early to any course that is technically passable and practically punishing, and it still carries that double sense: not blocked, merely narrow, slow, and shaped so that you cannot see far enough ahead to know how much of it is left.

Examples

English: "The route up the mountain narrowed until it was barely a track."

Chinese: 山间只有一条羊肠小道。