12 Colombian Sayings and What They Actually Mean
Colombians do not explain things. They quote things. Ask a difficult question in Bogotá, Medellín or Barranquilla and you will very often get a saying back instead of an answer — and, annoyingly, the saying will be more accurate.
Here are twelve Colombian sayings that carry the whole worldview: fatalism with a smile, suspicion of anything too easy, and the firm belief that you are responsible for not being robbed. With the original, the literal translation, and what people actually mean.
1. No dar papaya
Literally: Don’t give papaya.
Means: Don’t make yourself an easy target.
The first commandment of Colombian street life, and probably the most used phrase in the country. Phone face-up on the restaurant table, laptop bag slung on the back of the chair, gold chain out on the wrong bus — all of it is dar papaya. The follow-up is merciless: papaya puesta, papaya partida. Papaya offered is papaya taken. Nobody will feel sorry for you.
It sounds like a warning about crime. It is really a philosophy about attention: stay awake, read the room, do not hand anybody an opportunity you did not mean to give.
See the No Dar Papaya design →
2. Vamos a ver, dijo un ciego
Literally: “Let’s see,” said a blind man.
Means: Sure. We’ll see. (We will not see.)
The most deadpan sentence in Colombian Spanish. It is what you say when someone promises something you have no intention of believing — a raise, a call back, a payment on Friday. Nobody says the promise is false. The blind man does that for you.
3. El que nace pa’ tamal, del cielo le caen las hojas
Literally: He who is born to be a tamal will have the leaves fall on him from the sky.
Means: What you are meant to be will find you — for better or worse.
Colombian fatalism at its most beautiful. Destiny does not just call you; it delivers the packaging. Said with warmth about someone who was clearly born for what they do, and with a sigh about someone heading exactly where everybody expected.
4. El vivo vive del bobo
Literally: The clever one lives off the fool.
Means: The sharp make their living from the naive — that is simply how it works.
Not advice. A description. And it explains half of Colombian humour: the admiration for the vivo, the pity for the bobo, and the constant private question of which one you are being today.
5. Cría cuervos y te sacarán los ojos
Literally: Raise ravens and they will pluck out your eyes.
Means: Give too much to the wrong people and they will use it against you.
Inherited from Spain, kept alive across Latin America, and still deployed at family gatherings with devastating precision. Usually about an ungrateful child, a business partner, or the friend you got the job for.
6. Amanecerá y veremos
Literally: It will dawn and we shall see.
Means: Nothing gets solved tonight. Go to sleep.
The most generous sentence on this list. It does not promise the problem will disappear — only that it will look different in daylight, and that worrying at 2am has never once helped anybody.
7. Hacer una vaca
Literally: To make a cow.
Means: To pool money together.
Beer, a birthday present, a taxi, a funeral. Somebody says hagamos una vaca and everybody puts in. It is the purest expression of how Colombians handle money: collectively, immediately, and without a spreadsheet.
8. ¡Qué pena con usted!
Literally: What embarrassment with you!
Means: I’m so sorry / excuse me / this is awkward for me.
Colombians apologise through shame rather than guilt, and they do it constantly. It covers arriving late, interrupting, asking a favour, and having to tell you the kitchen is closed. Foreigners take years to deploy it at the right volume.
9. Paila
Literally: Frying pan.
Means: Too bad. It’s over. Nothing to be done.
One syllable, total finality. Missed the flight? Paila. Ex is at the party? Paila. It is the sound of a door closing, said with a shrug that somehow makes it easier.
10. No comer cuento
Literally: To not eat the story.
Means: To not fall for it.
A close relative of no dar papaya. In a country where everyone has heard a very good explanation for a very bad thing, no como cuento is a form of self-defence — and a compliment when said about somebody else.
11. Más perdido que el hijo de Lindbergh
Literally: More lost than Lindbergh’s son.
Means: Completely, hopelessly lost.
A 1932 American kidnapping case, still doing comedy work in Colombian Spanish ninety years later. Nobody remembers the details. Everybody understands the phrase. That is how idioms survive.
12. A la orden
Literally: At your order.
Means: Can I help you? / You’re welcome / Come in / Goodbye.
Said by shopkeepers, taxi drivers, waiters and street vendors roughly four hundred times a day. It has no exact translation because it is not really a phrase, it is a national posture: available, polite, ready.
Why Colombians abroad hold on to these
Ask any Colombian living in Madrid, Miami, Toronto or Berlin what they miss and, after the food, they will tell you about the way people talk. Not the accent — the sayings. The compressed, funny, fatalistic little sentences that make a situation legible in five words.
That is exactly why we draw them. Every design in our Colombian collection starts with a phrase somebody grew up hearing, turned into artwork that works whether or not you speak Spanish. Each one comes in an artwork-only version and a version with the saying in its original wording.
Looking further afield? Start with our guide to 15 sayings from around the world that don’t survive translation.
Frequently asked questions
What does “no dar papaya” mean in English?
Literally “don’t give papaya”. It means don’t make yourself an easy target — don’t leave your phone, bag or valuables exposed, and more broadly don’t hand anyone an opening they can take advantage of.
What is the most Colombian saying of all?
“No dar papaya” is the strongest candidate: it is used daily, it has a matching reply (papaya puesta, papaya partida), and it explains an entire attitude to risk and personal responsibility.
Are these sayings used all over Colombia?
These twelve are national. Beyond them, each region has its own vocabulary — Paisa Medellín, Costeño Barranquilla and Rolo Bogotá can sound like three different countries in the same sentence.
