Reminds me of something I stumbled across on Wikipedia the other day: There's an article on equivalents to the phrase "when pigs fly" in other languages. The Russian version translates as "when the crawfish whistles on the mountain".
@17 - That is great as well, certainly more exotic than ours—but I can't help but wonder if Russian readers stumbling on the equivalent American phrase aren't awestruck by how wonderfully simple ours is. Unless of course the words for mountain and crawfish just have a better ring to them in Russian.
Technically speaking, "malpy" (ortographically 'małpy', but some browsers may have problems with crossed 'l') is the plural of "malpa". The translation should be "Not my circus, not my monkeys".
@21, 22: If pasted into Google Translate and the "speak" icon clicked, the rendering seems pretty good--but in 21's phrase, the modified/accented characters have to be replaced with English equivalents or the voice skips the whole word (maybe a character-encoding problem).
Malpy
But Sloggers! Go read www.schlockmercenary.com!
"How do I make this copy machine work?"
"Not my circus. Not my monkey."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDS5Qilqe…
With your position and your place
Don't you understand
It's not my problem
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyZ7V_ota…
nyeh moy tsirk, nye moy-eh mow-pih.
Roll your "R", put the stress on the first syllable, and you'll be fine.
I don't have a band in that festival.
I don't have a shirt in that catalog.
I don't have a topping on that pizza.
I don't have a dick in that porno.