Nancy Matos

Reader Question:

“How are you holding up?” “Fine. Just eating humble pie and doing my job.”

Could you explain “eat humble pie”?

My comments: To “eat humble pie” is to admit guilt and apologize for an error and face humiliation. Another expression meaning the same thing is to “eat crow”.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the English phrase is derived from umbles offal (the entrails and innards of an animal), a food from medieval times considered inferior, therefore served to lower-ranking individuals and the poor. The phrase “eat crow” comes from America.

British celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay had to eat a large slice of humble pie recently. Ramsay, who is known as much for his popular reality television shows such as “Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares” as for his foul mouth, made headlines for insulting an Australian female television reporter. His harsh comments regarding the reporter’s appearance and sexuality caused a fury and even sparked outrage in Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. Ramsay eventually apologized, saying: "Humble pie is something that from this day on in, is something that I will be eating for breakfast for the rest of my life."

本文僅代表作者本人觀點，與本網(wǎng)立場無關(guān)。歡迎大家討論學(xué)術(shù)問題，尊重他人，禁止人身攻擊和發(fā)布一切違反國家現(xiàn)行法律法規(guī)的內(nèi)容。

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Nancy Matos is a foreign expert at China Daily Website. Born and raised in Vancouver, Canada, Nancy is a graduate of the Broadcast Journalism and Media program at the British Columbia Institute of Technology. Her journalism career in broadcast and print has taken her around the world from New York to Portugal and now Beijing. Nancy is happy to make the move to China and join the China Daily team.