谈虎色变(談虎色變)

Aussprache: tán hǔ sè biàn Wörtliche Bedeutung: Speak of the tiger, face changes

Ursprung & Verwendung

The Cheng brothers' recorded conversations distinguish knowing about a thing from having met it. Everyone knows tigers are dangerous, they observed, but the man whose face changes (色变) when a tiger (虎) is merely mentioned (谈) is the farmer who was mauled by one. The point is epistemological: his knowledge and yours use the same words and are not the same knowledge. The phrase is used of a fear that is disproportionate on paper and entirely earned in fact.

Beispiele

Deutsch: "Anyone who lived through that crash still changes colour at the word"

Chinesisch: 经历过那场崩盘的人，至今一提起就变了脸色