Dutch word "Gezellig" not translatable or explainable.

Researchers from the Leiden University Faculty of Linguistics recently confirmed their suspicions that the word gezellig is not translatable or understandable by non-dutch speakers in a milestone work published last week. For some this was no surprise, but for others, still holding on to the hope of understanding the term, this was devastating news.

We approached a third year in the study area who sat awkwardly surrounded by first years while he charged his laptop battery at the only working plug. “Everyone told me the term was complicated and didn’t have a direct translation. I tried to wrap my head around it but actually I’m still recovering from writing a reflection on my final paper for this class.”

“Its cozy or something like that apparently.” claimed another confused student.

“I knew it, I tried telling them that there was no translation.” exclaimed a triumphant ‘dutchie’ who promptly threw her arms up and shouted, “Doei!”

Because of this new study, in recent weeks Leiden University has been flooded with requests from hundreds of people all claiming that their own terms are also unique and completely untranslatable. Words like “Toska” (Russian), “Litost” (Czech), “Kyoikumama” (Japanese), “Cafuné” (Brazilian Portuguese), “Torschlusspanik” (German), “Dépaysement” (French), as well as others.

However initial reports from these proponents show that they have not managed to achieve the extreme exclusiveness that Gezellig has. One second year told us that:

“I tried making people feel that they could never understand my term, even if I used more than one word to do it. I tried communicating that they were missing out ‘big time,’ and that they would never be privy to my unique cultural experience, but unfortunately since I am the only one at LUC who speaks my language (Ilunga), it sort of ended up isolating me rather than putting me into this exclusive elite club I was hoping for.”

In adjacent news, Gezellig is to become a new Dutch national trademark, some calling for it to be emblazoned on the national flag. Stick to LUC News to find out more about this strange phenomenon which we can’t quite describe.