Translating Figurative Language

Lately, in an effort to improve my Indonesian, I've resorted to the use of a notebook again. I decided to start with tools because I've been using them a fair bit lately. Here is what I came up with:

The more modalities that are used for vocabulary the better of course. Listening to the language using electronic devices, writing down vocabulary in a physical notebook, typing words and phrases into a computer, face-to-face interaction with a native speaker ... it all helps. The list of words above are very concrete but also very useful as most of my interactions are not of a philosophical nature!

Concrete words like "spanner" can be used figuratively in English but phrases like "throw a spanner in the works" need to be translated into Indonesian with caution. Consider the sentence: We were ready to start the project when the bank threw a spanner in the works by denying the loan. Google Translate renders this literally as: Kami siap untuk memulai proyek ketika bank melemparkan kunci pas dalam pekerjaan dengan menolak pinjaman. 

This translation really doesn't make any sense to a native speaker with little knowledge of English. A phrase in Indonesian that comes far closer is karena air setitik gula sebelanga rusak. This means literally that "a drop of water can ruin the sugar in a pan" when cooking but figuratively it means a little, seemingly inconsequential thing, can ruin a consequential undertaking. This was proposed to me by a native Indonesian speaker. It does not carry the exact same meaning as the English expression involving the spanner.

This is the problem when translating figurative language and clearly AI, as exemplified by Google Translate, struggles with it. Let's use the service to translate another phrase containing a word from the above list: thick as a brick. The translation is again literal: setebal batu bata whereas it really means "stupid".  An Indonesian would be baffled by such a phrase and so another fail. A similar phrase in Indonesian might be kepala udang that should translate as "a stupid person" and not "a shrimp head".

I imagine AI will rise to the challenge. It can't be too difficult to include stock phrases like "thick as a brick" in a database and to use their meanings as a first choice in preference to the meanings obtained by breaking such phrases down into individual words and then translating them. We await improvements but in the meantime it's best to avoid figurative language when trying to communicate across language barriers. 

If someone is stupid then simply say so and don't say to a non-native speaker that "he's thick as a brick". If someone or something has thrown a spanner in the works then simply say so more directly as the language in the following graphic illustrates.

Thus "he did something that prevented the plan from succeeding" could be rendered dia melakukan sesuatu yang mencegah rencananya untuk berhasil.