Definition

1. Verb:
   • To be spilled or scattered: Refers to small, often granular or numerous items (like rice, seeds, sand, or crumbs) falling out of a container and becoming dispersed over an area.
   • To be lost or forgotten piece by piece: Describes knowledge, memories, or skills gradually fading or being forgotten over time.

Usage Examples

• Verb:
  • Hạt gạo rơi vãi trên sàn nhà. (Rice grains were scattered on the floor.)
  • Trẻ con làm rơi vãi đồ chơi khắp phòng. (The children spilled their toys all over the room.)
  • Tiếng Anh tôi học hồi đại học giờ đã rơi vãi gần hết. (The English I learned in university has now almost all been forgotten.)

Advanced Usage

• The term often implies a state of messiness or wastefulness resulting from the spilling or the incomplete, fragmented nature of what remains after being lost.

Variants and Related Words

• Làm rơi vãi (v): to spill, to scatter (something).
  • Đừng làm rơi vãi hạt cườm. (Don't spill the beads.)
• Thu nhặt những thứ rơi vãi (v): to gather or pick up scattered things.
  • Cô ấy cúi xuống thu nhặt những đồng xu rơi vãi. (She bent down to pick up the scattered coins.)

Synonyms

• To spill: (of liquids or granular solids) to flow or fall out.
• To scatter: to throw or drop things so they spread over an area.
• To lose gradually: to diminish bit by bit over time.

Related Idioms

• Rơi vãi như mưa: (to fall) like rain; used to describe something falling or being scattered in great abundance.
  • Pháo hoa rơi vãi như mưa trên bầu trời. (Fireworks fell like rain in the sky.)

1. Be spilled, scatter