So my native language is Hungarian, so it is sort of natural to look words up like yonder, or secondhand, because let’s be honest, these words are indeed uncommon, and quite unnecessary to express yourself most of the time.
However…
I’ve encountered 見送る, which should mean something like to see off
Dear English speaking People, I’m begging for someone to explain me what should this expression mean. I tried many different kinds of translators, looked at several example sentences, but I seriously just can’t wrap my head around the exact meaning.
Lots and lots of love, for everyone, regardless of the language they speak!
Ahh thank you so much! I think now I understand it, like you accompany someone to a designated location to say goodbye.
Now what confuses me, that to put off and to pass on are remarked as alternative meanings. And in my head to put off means something like you have something to do, but you just place it aside, sort of procrastinating. Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I imagine to see off and to put off are two completely different things.
Yes, to see off and to put off are two different things. Your understanding of to put off is fine. It’s just that sometimes a single word can be used for multiple things, and it seems like this is the case for 見送る. It would then be up to context which meaning is the one being used.
Also to note, I think here to pass on is meant as in to pass along, such as information.
Alternative meanings of the japanese word, right? The meanings of Japanse and English terms with multiple meanings don’t match up one to one. In British English “to see off” also means to “defeat someone” or “chase someone away”, but those meanings of “see off” don’t apply to 見送る either:p (well, as far as I know anyway, my Japanse honestly isn’t very advanced, so who knows)
Thank you so so much guys, now I completely understand the case!
What really confused me that the alternative meanings aren’t related, and I just couldn’t connect them, but now it makes a lot more sense!
If one goes by one of WK’s context sentences, it can also mean “to pass on (an opportunity)”. So to pass on fits. (Although they translated it slightly different. “To pass up” was the way that sentence was translated.)
Uh, very interesting thread indeed, but I’m slowly reaching my (English-language) limits, it seems…
So you mean this in the sense of “reject”, right? Like if you invite me for coffee and I say “no”, then I pass on the opportunity to taste your excellent brew?
Yup. Although I will have to point out that I would never be able to make an excellent coffee brew, but tea on the other hand. In fact, I’ve passed on the opportunity to drink coffee my whole life. (In my head, I have to intonate the sentence a certain way to not make it sound like “passed on” as in dead…)
By the way in German there is a similar phrase and now I wonder if they are related? We can say „ich passe“ to mean „no thanks“ or „please skip me“, e.g. when somebody offers me something (food or drink or participation in something), or in card games when it’s my turn but I can’t play a card and I want the game to move to the next person. I think it’s striking that the words are so similar.
Although the two have many words that are similar, English is a melting pot of Germanic, Latin, Celtic and probably some more, so it’s not guaranteed that there are matching words or expressions in German, or that they mean the same thing.
English ‘to pass’ is from Anglo-Norman passer which in turn is from Old and Middle French passer and thus Latin (source: OED). The “skip your turn in a game of cards” sense dates back to at least 1599; my guess is that “passing on/up opportunities” might be a metaphorical extension from the cardplay usage.
Wiktionary thinks German passen is a borrowing from Dutch which in turn gets it from French.
Once you get more advanced, it’s best to just refer to monolingual resources (though I translated them here so you get some idea of how much more detail you get from them)
Hungarian, so it is sort of natural to look words up like yonder, or secondhand, because let’s be honest, these words are indeed uncommon, and quite unnecessary to express yourself most of the time.
