In Aekyom, years are counted as “turtles” (ambum).
Norm Mundhenk tells this story:
“Recently I was checking some New Testament material in the Aekyom language of western Papua New Guinea. It seemed relatively clear until suddenly we came to a passage that started, ‘When Jesus had 12 turtles, …’ Surely I had misunderstood what they said.
“‘Did you say that Jesus had 12 turtles?’
“‘Let us explain! Around here there is a certain time every year when river turtles come up on the banks and lay their eggs. Because this is so regular, it can be used as a way of counting years. Someone’s age is said to be how many turtles that person has. So when we say that Jesus had 12 turtles, we mean that Jesus was 12 years old.’
“It was of course the familiar story of Jesus’ trip with his parents to Jerusalem. And certainly, as we all know, Jesus did indeed have 12 turtles at that time!”
In Tok Pisin, krismas (derived from “christmas”) is taken as the fixed annual marker, so Jesus had 12 “christmases” (Jisas i gat 12-pela krismas pinis) or Abram (in Gen. 12:4) had 75 (Abram i gat 75 krismas) (source: Norm Mundhenk). In Noongar it is biroka kadak or “summers had” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang).
In the Bawm Chin culture there are no horses, but one kind of buffalo is guided by a rope in its mouth, so that was used in James 3:3 in the translation into Bawm Chin.
In Kuy culture, snakes are eaten, so here the Kuy translation says the equivalent of “a yellow snake” as these are taboo (source: David Clark). For the same reason, the term used in Barasana-Eduria is “eel” since eels are detested among the speakers (source: Larry Clark in Holzhausen 1991, p. 45).
The phrase that is rendered in English versions as “land flowing with milk and honey” (“milk and syrup” in Goldingay [2018]) is translated into Afar as niqmatak tan baaxoy buqre kee lacah meqehiyya: “a blessed land good for fields and cattle.” (Source: Loren Bliese)
In the interconfessional Chichewa translation (publ. 1999) it is translated with the existing proverb dziko lamwanaalirenji or “a land of what (type of food) can the child cry for?” (i.e. there is more than enough to eat). (Source: Ernst Wendland in The Bible Translator 1981, p. 107 )
In Kwere it is “good/fertile land.” (Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
The Hebrew word for “honey”, devash, is also used for syrup extracted from figs, dates, and grapes, or from certain types of palm tree. The phrase “a land flowing with milk and honey” refers to a land that is fertile and thus rich in pasture, fruit, and the grain and flowers from which bees make honey. (Source: All Creatures Great and Small: Living things in the Bible (UBS Helps for Translators) )
In Russian, the phrase молоко и мед (moloko i med) or “milk and honey” is widely used as an idiom in every-day life. (Source: Reznikov 2020, p. 67)
In Afar “you frisk about like a heifer on the grass, and neigh like stallions” is translated as Qaysok cayya iyyeh xobbaaqa gaalih innah xobbaqten. Canak cayye mooyuh innah kaqitten.: “You frisk like camels satisfied with grass, and jump like goat kids satisfied with milk.” (Horses don’t survive in the Afar desert, but camels thrive.)
