The Spanish idiom, arrimar el ascua a su sardina, literally means “to bring an ember to one’s own sardine.” It means “to look out for number one,” the idea being that if a group is cooking sardines over a fire, and each person pulls out a coal to cook his own fish, then the whole fire will go out. So the idiom carries the sense not only of being selfish, but the effects of that selfishness on the larger community. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Looking Out for Number One”
I came across a fantastic Spanish idiom the other day,
Arrima el asco a su sardina,
which means to bring an ember to one’s own sardine, literally.
It’s an idiom that has to do with somebody who’s looking out for himself,
looking out for number one.
And the reference here is to when laborers used to get together and cook their sardines on a common fire.
And if you pulled an ember to yourself and you heated the sardine over that ember, then you would be doing this selfish act that would eventually get rid of the fire.
If everyone does that, then there’s no fire and the embers aren’t all making heat together.
Exactly.
Looking out for number one.
What I love about it is that it’s stronger than looking out for number one because it sort of tells you what happens to the larger community if everybody is bringing in ember to his own sardine.
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