Calis Beach and Fethiye Turkey Discussion Forum
Calis Beach Forum => Calis Beach Questions and Information => Topic started by: Scunner on February 07, 2008, 21:22:53 PM
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From personal experience, don't do this in Calis, or indeed Turkey.
You know the little joke with kids, where you put your hand to their nose, move your hand away and show your thumb between your next two fingers, with the witty line "I stole your nose"?
Well, what you are showing the child is one of the most offensive hand gestures in Turkey.
Worse still, I did it at a Fethiyespor footie match, surrounded by many Turkish men ;)
I think they saw the funny side; I can't be sure because I ran faster than them.
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i know what you mean i do it to my grandson,what does it mean then from the turkish interpretation
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I really don't want to know
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you have a little one
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Ahh yes, my daughter said she had done exactly the same thing with her Turkish cousin, much to the shock of everyone in the room.
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It's a conversation stopper, that's for sure.
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I think most adults and older children do this, good job you told us it was offensive, but cant think why.
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If you ran faster then them, how do you know it upset :D or did you see their faces as you legged it ;) So why would it upset them [?] it is something we have all done at some time here in uk. So good to know if it is offensive. I can not run as fast as you :D:D:D
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it is the same as the V sign but worse or so my husband tells me
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There is so much we need to learn ( maybe not you lot on this forum, but us Saunders as a family ) i just hope we can do it. Would hate to offend anyone because of ignorance :-\
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You just be sure that if you do it Ken, you are at the top of a hill ;)
It's funny how something so innocent to us can have such a different meaning. Actually, Yetkin thought it was funny, he worked out that (at least) it must mean something different in the UK :)
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Trust me on this Keith, Carole can run ( and push ) pretty fast if needed [^]:D
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LOL good girl
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so what does it mean? or have I missed something as usual
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Fig sign
The "fig sign" is a gesture made with the hand
and fingers curled and the thumb thrust between
the middle and index fingers,
or, rarely, the middle and ring fingers,
forming the fist so that the thumb partly pokes out.
In some areas of the world,
the gesture is considered a good luck charm,
in others it's considered an obscene gesture,
and in still others it's used in the
"I've got your nose" child's game.
This gesture is also the letter "T" in the
American Sign Language alphabet.
In International Sign,
which otherwise uses the same manual alphabet,
"T" has been modified to avoid possible offence.
In ancient Rome, this gesture was called the mano fico,
and was a fertility and good luck charm designed
to ward off evil. Although this usage has survived
in Latin America, where carved images of hands in
this gesture are used in good luck talismans,
in many other cultures, such as Indonesia,
Turkey and Russia, the sign has come to
have an insulting meaning roughly equivalent
to "screw you", based on the thumb being
seen as representing a clitoris or sexual intercourse;
this usage goes back at least 600 years,
being attested in The Divine Comedy
(Inferno, Canto XXV). In modern Russia this gesture
is used mostly by kids with the meaning
"screw you/no way". The same meaning is
expressed by adults either with the bent elbow
(rude, very emphatic, non-classy),
or with the "finger" (used mostly by city dwellers).
The "finger" made it to Russian gesture
language from Western movies. In modern Italian,
the gesture is called the mano fica,
taken to mean "fig hand",
as the Italian word for "fig" is fico (ficus in Latin).
The obscene connotations of the gesture
may partly originate from the fact that a
similar Italian word, fica,
is a slang term referring to the vulva.
This sexual connotation may date back
to ancient Roman times; some Roman amulets
combine a phallus and a mano fico gesture.
In the Indian sub-continent, this gesture
is taken as threatening symbol.
Many neopagans use this gesture as a
symbol of the mother goddess to help adherents
identify one another. In this context,
it's referred to as the "Sign of the Goddess".
Its counterpart is the corna sign.
In Turkey, this gesture is considered highly offensive.
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:)
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Thanks for that Tinx....should not have happened :-\ but how did you reset the layout? :)
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Gosh Tribal where did you find that- what did you Google for that to come up. Its excellent!
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I used a site www.totallyexplained.com It can be very useful for all sorts of things. If you search for hand gestures you will find a mine of information. :)
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Keith That's really helpful information to pass onto those who don't know. the last thing you want to do is offend anyone.
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thanks
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thanks tribalelder saved that it's a handy site to have
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Thanks Tribal at least now we know why we should'nt be doing it. ;)