[Korean idiom] "Belly button is bigger than Belly." (배보다 배꼽이 더 크다)

[Korean idiom] "Belly button is bigger than Belly." (배보다 배꼽이 더 크다)

A: "Actually, I need brand-new mouse pad for my mouse. But these days, it's a little bit hard to go to buy that because I am working here in Paju."

B: "Well, in that case, maybe you can buy that online. It's cheap enough, isn't it?"

A: "Yes, I know that's really cheap. But the problem is... delivery charge, I don't want to spend too much money for that buying very cheap product like mouse pad, it's just about 1,000 won. But the delivery charge is more than 2,500 won."

B: "Yeah... then, that's the problem."

A: "Oh, do you know how can we say when we have this kind of situation in Korean?"

B: "I don't know."

A: "We can say that belly button is bigger than belly."

B: "What?"

▲ Orange Belly button? (Image from Google Search)

"Today's expression is something to do with BELLY and BELLY BUTTON"

Here, I would like to introduce a very strange Korean idiom for the people who came from diverse countries. Today's expression is this, 'Belly button is bigger than belly.' Maybe many people would not be able to guess what does that mean. Well, so in order to help you understand the meaning of the expression, I have written down dialogue above.

Like the dialogue, when we have some kind of strange situation, we can use the idiom. Especially, when the main thing is far smaller or far cheaper than the minor thing, we normally say that expression. In this case, the main item, mouse pad, is far cheaper than delivery charge. So we can say that "Belly button is far bigger than belly."

"Belly button is bigger than belly." (배보다 배꼽이 더 크다.)

Imagine the situation, normally our belly button is far smaller than belly. But what if belly button is far bigger than belly? Can you imagine that? That would be looked very strange. And I don't want to think about that kind of situation either.

Somehow, as I hope that the readers do not have this kind of situation, "Belly button is far bigger than belly.", I would like finish this very short column.

More Samples,

A: "I bought brand-new phone, it was really cheap!"

B: "Oh, really? How much is it?"

A: "It's just about 1 dollar. But I just spend more than 50 dollars for the case and covers."

B: "Oh, In that case, your belly button is far bigger than belly."

More Samples in Korean,

A: "마우스 패드를 온라인으로 주문하려고 하는데, 패드 가격은 1,000원인데 배송비가 2,500원이야."

B: "그것 참, 배보다 배꼽이 더 큰 상황이네."