Glossary entry

Polish term or phrase:

na kogo wypadnie, na tego bęc

English translation:

Eeny, meeny, miny, mo... // One potato, two potato, three potato, four...

Added to glossary by Rafal Piotrowski
Dec 26, 2010 15:12
13 yrs ago
1 viewer *
Polish term

na kogo wypadnie, na tego bęc

Polish to English Art/Literary Idioms / Maxims / Sayings wyliczanka
... czyli wszystkim znana wyliczanka dziecięca.

Jest rysunek Mleczki z królewną w ciąży, która wylicza krasnoludków :D

Tylko jak to powiedzieć anglofonowi? W moich słownikach nie ma :-/

Z góry dzięki,

Rafał
Change log

Dec 26, 2010 16:42: Crannmer changed "Language pair" from "English to Polish" to "Polish to English"

Proposed translations

+3
3 hrs
Selected

Eeny, meeny, miny, mo... // One potato, two potato, three potato, four...

"Eeeny, meeny..." http://tinyurl.com/pzf56

"One potato, two potato..."
http://tinyurl.com/32hpm8a; http://tinyurl.com/35rubnk


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Note added at 6 hrs (2010-12-26 22:06:20 GMT)
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Hi, Rafał,

Well, without seeing the cartoon, it's rather difficult. Perhaps I've misunderstood what the caption's saying?

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Note added at 17 hrs (2010-12-27 08:58:50 GMT)
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Great! I didn't misunderstand! That's exactly what I thought!

So - to me, if I saw that cartoon, captioned "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe..." I think I'd understand it exactly as you've said.

The whole thing - as I knew it - goes:

"Eeny meeny miny moe
Catch a spider by his toe
If he hollers let him go
Eeeny, meeny, miny mo.
You're it!"

When we used it in the playground, the "You're it" child would be the one counted on the last 'moe' - and thus, the one selected - singled out - for whatever purpose it was that we had in mind - being the one who had to catch us all in a game of chase, or being 'Grandma' in 'Grandma's footsteps'(http://tinyurl.com/36o5hma), or being 'Mr Wolf' in 'What's the time, Mr Wolf' (http://tinyurl.com/c67csj), and so on.

My brother and I also used to use it when we were told, e.g., "You can have ONE biscuit each" - but which one to choose? "Eeny, meeny....". We'd use it with our friends to decide who'd get to use the swing first. Or who was going to be James Bond this time. My best friend and I would use it to decide who got which bit if dressing-up finery...

So - it's a way known to that famous 'postać' of 'Every Child' for (sort-of) arbitarily selecting one thing from a group of things or one person from a group who are all involved on the same activity...

And because 'Every Child' knows it - well, so do the grown-ups. Which is why I suggested it - because we all know it and because it's a kid's thing - and that's part of Mleczko's irony, isn't it? Juxtaposing a children's fairy tale and a children's selecting game with the outcome of somewhat less childlike games...?
(And given the teenage pregnancy rate in the UK, the whole thing takes on another layer of ironic social comment...)

The link I posted tells us that 'Eeny meeny..." has also been around in the US for a long time.

Australia?
http://tinyurl.com/3227qmp; http://tinyurl.com/35t4ymn

Canada?
http://tinyurl.com/3a54gvz; http://tinyurl.com/35bo2y9

New Zealand?
http://tinyurl.com/34srp9n

South Africa:
http://tinyurl.com/3yfksrp; http://tinyurl.com/335992o

So, IMHO, a caption reading "Eenie, meenie, miney, moe..." would absolutely do the trick...

(BTW, my apologies for misspelling 'mo' in the <Answer> box)

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Note added at 17 hrs (2010-12-27 09:10:35 GMT)
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P.S.
The same thing applies to the potatoes, of course. However, I've just had a look and it seems that several hundred authors and TV producers have had the brilliant idea of using it for the title of cookery books/blogs/recipes/programmes - so I think "Eeny meeny..." might, perhaps, be a more clear-cut association for your purposes.


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Note added at 4 days (2010-12-31 10:09:05 GMT) Post-grading
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My pleasure :-)
Note from asker:
Hi, Caryl :) Could you find me a rhyme that would BEST reflect the original? Or, one that could be inserted in the cartoon caption to convey the meaning to an English-speaking recipient? Alas, Google won't display the drawing :-/
OK; In the picture, there's a princess, Snow White like, discernibly pregnant, and some (I'm not really sure if there're actually 7!) dwarves. and she does that counting-out rhyme. The scene obviously implies that she's slept with EACH of them - and now it's up to the fate (or up to the rhyme) who's gonna be recognised as the father & maintain the baby :-)
Peer comment(s):

agree Malina9
1 day 7 hrs
Thank you :-)
agree legato
2 days 20 mins
Thank you :-)
agree Darius Saczuk
3 days 19 hrs
Thank you :-)
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4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "Thx A LOT! :-)"
9 hrs

one, two, three, out goes he

:)
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Reference comments

44 mins
Reference:

Ip dip

Może któraś z tych wersji:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ip_dip
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