hoăm hoắm
Definitions
- Adjective:
- Very hungry, famished, ravenous: Describes an intense, urgent feeling of hunger, often to the point of weakness or desperation.
- Eager, greedy, voracious (for something): Can describe a strong, sometimes excessive, desire or craving for something beyond just food, such as knowledge or an opportunity.
Usage Examples
- Adjective:
- Tôi chưa ăn gì cả ngày, giờ thấy hoăm hoắm quá. (I haven't eaten anything all day, now I feel absolutely famished.)
- Đám trẻ chạy chơi cả buổi chiều, tối về ăn cơm hoăm hoắm. (The kids played all afternoon, they came home for dinner ravenously hungry.)
- Anh ấy hoăm hoắm tìm kiếm cơ hội mới trong công việc. (He is voraciously seeking new opportunities at work.)
Advanced Usage
- "hoăm hoắm" as an adverb: While primarily an adjective, it can function adverbially to modify verbs of eating or desiring, intensifying the action.
- Nó ăn hoăm hoắm như thể sắp chết đói. (He ate ravenously as if he were starving.)
- Used for emphasis: The word itself is emphatic and informal, often used in spoken language for dramatic effect to describe extreme hunger or eagerness.
Variants and Related Words
- Hoắm (adj): A shorter, less common variant with a similar meaning of being very hungry. "Hoăm hoắm" is considered a more vivid, intensified form.
- Đói cồn cào (idiom): Literally "hunger scratching the stomach," a common idiom for intense, gnawing hunger. It is a close synonym in meaning but differs in imagery.
- Thèm thuồng (adj): Means to crave or long for something, but lacks the intense, urgent physical connotation of "hoăm hoắm" related to hunger.
Synonyms
- Đói meo (adj): Very hungry, famished (informal).
- Đói lả (adj): Weak from hunger, faint with hunger.
- Thèm muốn chết (idiom): To crave something to death (very informal, hyperbolic).
Related Idioms
- Đói hoăm hoắm: This is a common collocation where "hoăm hoắm" intensifies "đói" (hungry). It directly translates to "famishedly hungry."
- Sau chuyến leo núi, cả đoàn đói hoăm hoắm. (After the hiking trip, the whole group was famished.)
- Ăn ngấu nghiến: To gobble, to wolf down food. This describes the of eating that results from being "hoăm hoắm."