Hokudai/Cast 83: Body Parts Part One

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Hokudai/Cast 83 brings you a Trilingual Lesson that includes the Chinese and Japanese words for 'arm, wrist, hand, finger' and 'leg, ankle, foot, toe' as well as 'eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.' This is part one of our Body Parts series. In English we often use parts of the body in phrases that have little to do with the body. For example:

Long arm of the law - This means the police will catch you eventually and you can't escape forever.

Point a finger at - This means to accuse someone of something. For example: "She thought someone stole her iPod and pointed the finger at me even though I was in a different prefecture."

Finger - This means you point someone out, especially to the police. For example: "I stole her iPod but her friend fingered me and I was arrested."

There are several phrases that deal with hands.
For example: hand in, hand over, hand out, and hands down.

'Hand in' means to give something to someone, usually an assignment to a teacher. "Please hand in your report by November first."

'Hand over' means to give something to someone even if you don't want to. "England handed over Hong Kong to China in 1997." You often see hand over' in movies when the criminal or policeman says, 'Okay, hand it over.'

'Hand out' is phrase that means 'gift' but is meant in a mean way; some people think the person who gets the hand out doesn't need it or deserve it. "He doesn't work. He just waits for some hand outs."

And "hands down" means easily. "Hands down, he is the best musician in school." Or "The iPod is hands down the best mp3 player on the market."
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