| 小洞不补大洞吃苦 |
xiǎo dòng bù bǔ dà dòng chī kǔ |
A small hole not plugged will make you suffer a big hole (idiom); a stitch in time saves nine |
| 小 |
xiǎo |
small / tiny / few / young |
| 洞 |
dòng |
cave / hole / zero (unambiguous spoken form when spelling out numbers) / CL:个 |
| 洞 |
tóng |
used in 洪洞, a county in Shanxi |
| 不 |
bù |
no; not so / (bound form) not; un- |
| 补 |
bǔ |
to repair / to patch / to mend / to make up for / to fill (a vacancy) / to supplement |
| 大 |
dà |
big; large; great / older (than another person) / eldest (as in 大姐) / greatly; freely; fully / (dialect) father / (dialect) uncle (father's brother) |
| 大 |
dài |
see 大夫 |
| 洞 |
dòng |
cave / hole / zero (unambiguous spoken form when spelling out numbers) / CL:个 |
| 洞 |
tóng |
used in 洪洞, a county in Shanxi |
| 吃 |
chī |
to eat; to consume / to eat at (a cafeteria etc) / to eradicate; to destroy / to absorb / to suffer (shock, injury, defeat etc) |
| 吃 |
chī |
variant of 吃 |
| 吃苦 |
chī kǔ |
to bear hardships |
| 苦 |
kǔ |
bitter / hardship / pain / to suffer / to bring suffering to / painstakingly |