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Thursday, December 15, 2011

They are trying to nickel-and-dime me right out of business.

recovered...

nickel-and-dime?

Annonymous said:
Webster's: "involving or offering only a small amount of money". In this context, per me: "To extract money a little bit at a time with great frequency".

Mandaly said:
I see. The Haitian Creole word "Koutay" means to embezzle, to skim, to defraud. I am not sure I'd use it in your specific sentence.

They're trying to nickel-and-dimed me out of business.
They're trying to take (steal) the business from me for peanuts.
Y'ap eseye pran biznis la nan men'm pou yon ti kras kòb.

or
Rephrasing:
They're trying to con me right out of business.
Y'ap fè m pèdi biznis la tank yo fè koutay.

2 comments:

  1. He was guilty of koutay (noun) because he te fè koutay (verb)?

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  2. It is interesting how you mixed the English and Creole together in the two sentences above :)

    yes, "Fè koutay" → is a verb

    and yes, "koutay" → is a noun

    Specifically, koutay is about corruption and contraband.
    You may give someone about $10,000.00 to buy you a car. But he buys you a $5000.00 car, tells you that the car actually cost $10,000 and pockets the rest of the money. That's "koutay".

    To emmbezzle is more popularly known as "detounen lajan".

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