trung triêng
Definition
- Adjective:
- Sitting on the fence / being in two minds: Describes a person who is indecisive, who cannot choose between two sides, opinions, or courses of action, often to avoid commitment or risk.
- Swimming between two waters: Describes a situation or person that is ambiguously positioned between two opposing sides, trying to benefit from or avoid conflict with both.
Usage Examples
- Adjective: (He always has a fence-sitting attitude, never daring to give a clear opinion.) (During the debate, she kept sitting on the fence, not supporting either side.)
Advanced Usage
- The term is often used in a critical or negative sense to describe political neutrality, moral ambiguity, or a lack of principled stance. (That country's fence-sitting foreign policy pleases neither side.)
Variants and Related Words
- Lưỡng lự (adj): hesitant, indecisive. (His hesitation annoyed everyone.)
- Nước đôi (adj, idiom): ambiguous, double-meaning (often of speech). (His ambiguous words were of no help.)
Synonyms
- Indecisive: not able to make decisions quickly.
- Non-committal: not expressing a definite opinion or commitment.
- Ambivalent: having mixed feelings or contradictory ideas.
Related Idioms
- Ngồi giữa hai chiếc ghế: Literally "sitting between two chairs"; means the same as "sitting on the fence." (Don't sit between two chairs anymore, choose a side.)
- Nước đôi nước ba: An extended idiom implying even greater ambiguity and duplicity. (That highly ambiguous stance is very dangerous.)