小天的週記

你們是否有這種情況 - 飛機上或大眾運輸工具(如高鐵上)，

隔壁的人把手跨到你的手把上，導致你空間備受壓迫感?

可是，要怎麼用英文描述對方把手或腳跨到你的空間呢?

這英文動詞很簡單，就是spill over。

我記得第一次學到spill，老師是教我們倒牛奶時不小心倒出來，就可以用spill這個字。

而如果是牛奶溢滿，就要用spill over。

但是老師沒教的是其實spill over也可以用來描述他人把手或腳跨到我們的座位上。

英文範例: spill over into someone else's seat.

Spill over這片語動詞也可以用來形容某房間擠了太多人，把部份的人擠到另一個房間。

所以這片語動詞可以用在此情境。

以下是更詳細的英文解說:

In the literal sense, "spill over" might mean we have overfilled something,

like a bucket, so that the water spills over. On the other hand,

if you knock the mug with your tea over, I would just say you have spilled your tea, not "spilled over".

Spill over means specifically that something has overflowed and needs to go somewhere else,

not that it was accidentally tipped over.

So in a more figurative sense, we may use "spilled over" when talking about something else being full,

often a room of people. A room at a party might be full, so people have spilled over into the next room.

It might be considered a bit rude to say that someone has spilled over into another seat.

It means they are quite fat, and could be seen both in the figurative and literal sense,

as their fat may literally overhang the next person's seat.

下次你們要描述類似的情況，就知道要用哪個片語動詞了!