I learned something interesting from my Russian student the other day. In English, hypochondriacs are people who are extremely worried about their health. Frequently these people are coming up with some horrible new disease that they are most assuredly dying from. However, the equivalent word in Russian means someone who always pretends to be sick, but is not really sick at all. That way the person can stay home from work with a valid excuse.
How is the word hypochondriac or its equivalent used in your culture?
@tempus.edax.rerum, I'm afraid your Russian student doesn't quite understand what the word ипохондрик means because it is not a synonym of the word симулянт (a malingerer?), it has exactly the same meaning as in English. It doesn't necessarily have to be someone who is not sick at all, it's just someone who is extremely, excessively worried about their health. I'm not surprised someone could confuse these two words, but these are different things even in Russian, really.
IMHO, I with my foreign teacher have so much misunderstanding. Sometimes I can see it.
But we talk about everything. So, I'm afraid my teacher got the wrong knowledge about my country.
Get just a half from the conversation!
-)
