Tag Archives: cool words

Foreign Words That Should be Part of English

microondas – Spanish for “microwave.”  This one needs little explanation, really.  Don’t you just wish you could tell your friend you’re about to go warm up your burrito in the microondas?  Props also go to the Spanish paloma, “dove.”  They know how to make their language poetical-sounding.

deinos – Ancient Greek.  As in dinosaur.  It’s a slippery thing to pin down what this word means, though.  The meanings shade from “terrible” to “great” to something that’s roughly equivalent to the modern English “awesome.”  When something is so cool it scares the crap out of you, it’s deinos.

quamquam – Latin.  Actually I have no clue what this means, but it sounds great.

arigato – Japanese for “thank you.”  English’s “thank you” is adequate for its purpose, but it just doesn’t convey the same depth of gratitude that the Japanese does.  Try watching an anime sometime and you’ll see what I mean.  When somebody looks another person in the eye and says arigato, you can tell they mean it.