Is There Any English-Chinese Word Equivalence At All?

[gougou]

So word order is important, too? I thought it might be more interesting to look at it apart from grammatical (or syntactical) differences the languages have. Look at the examples zozzen provided, even "blood is thicker than water / 血濃於水" would not qualify if you look at it that rigidly, as there is no "is" in the Chinese version. Yet I think this is one of the most interesting examples in this thread so far.

[Lu]

我爱你, for example, would need to be expressed like that in the majority of languages, no?

You'd think so, but in Dutch it's expressed differently, we say 'ik hou van jou', grammatically very different. The closest in grammar you can get to 'I love you/我愛你' is 'ik bemin je', but that is not only very old-fashioned, but also with slightly different connotations. The closest you can get to 'I love you' in meaning is 'ik heb je lief', as 'liefde' means 'love'. But this one, too, is very different grammatically.

[character]

There isn't much surprise that we'd find word-for-word equivalence here, and in my OP I was indeed talking more about proverbs, expressions and colloqualisms.

This is what your OP still says (emphasis added):

Consider when you translate proverbs, expressions, or even just simple nouns or verbs, the meaning-based translation is often in an entirely different form.

To find equivalence here, in idiomatic language, is much more interesting, especially when we consider the two nations have never had any direct connection with each other.

The British were in China since before the 1800's. Certainly 星期日 wasn't independently arrived at, for ex.

[Alhazred]

Yesterday, I came accross this one in T.K. Ann's "Cracking the Chinese Puzzles:"

燕 (swallow, the bird) and the same character with 口 on the left (for some reason, I cannot type with Windows IME, any idea why?) meaning to swallow, the verb.

Also, slightly off topic as this relates to French and not as direct, but the phrase 吹牛 makes me think of Jean de la Fontaine's "La Grenouille et le Boeuf:"

Une Grenouille vit un bœuf

Qui lui sembla de belle taille.

Elle qui n’était pas grosse en tout comme un œuf

Envieuse s’étend, et s’enfle, et se travaille

Pour égaler l’animal en grosseur,

Disant : Regardez bien, ma sœur ;

Est-ce assez ? dites-moi ; n’y suis-je point encore ?

- Nenni. - M’y voici donc ? - Point du tout. - M’y voilà ?

- Vous n’en approchez point. La chétive pécore

S’enfla si bien qu’elle creva.

Le monde est plein de gens qui ne sont pas plus sages :

Tout Bourgeois veut bâtir comme les grands Seigneurs,

Tout petit Prince a des Ambassadeurs,

Tout Marquis veut avoir des Pages.

Of which here is a translation:

A Frog espied an Ox that seemed to her of a noble size.

She, no bigger than an egg,

Envious, stretches, puffs up and labours

To match the animal in size,

Saying: 'Hey watch me sister;

Is this enough? tell me; am I there yet?

-No way! -How about now? -Not at all. - Is that it ?

You aren't even close.' The puny, pretentious creature

Swelled up so much that she croaked.

The world is full of people who aren't too wise:

People with some money wish to build like royalty,

Every minor prince has ambassadors,

Every marquis wants servants.

(From http://www.francaisfacile.com/exercices/exercice-francais-2/exercice-francais-4123.php

[imron]

and the same character with 口 on the left (for some reason, I cannot type with Windows IME, any idea why?)

It's probably there, just after pages of other choices. Alternatively, you could use Wubi, and wouldn't have this problem 嚥 is KAUO

[renzhe]

好久不见 = long time no see

but I heard that this one was actually imported into English from China.