your other left

9.9

A joking phrase people say when they mix up left and right

idiom

Informal

: tu otro izquierdo

He looked confused when told to go left, so his friend quipped, "It's your other left!"

Examples

She started to turn right, so I laughed and said, "No, your other left."
Whenever someone mixes up directions, I jokingly tell them, "Try your other left."
Turn to your other left!
She pointed to your other left when he went the wrong way.
He looked confused when told to go left, so his friend quipped, "It's your other left!"
She started to turn right, so I laughed and said, "No, your other left."
Whenever someone mixes up directions, I jokingly tell them, "Try your other left."

Surface Forms

your other left main

Morphology

your + other + left

The words 'your', 'other' and 'left' transparently indicate an alternate left-hand direction, so a learner can infer it means 'the other left' or 'turn the other way' in a directional sense. However, the specific humorous/pragmatic use (pointing out a left/right mistake by saying someone use their 'other left') is somewhat idiomatic and relies on contextual/pragmatic inference rather than strict compositional meaning, so it is not fully predictable.

Etymology

Your other left is a joking way to fix a directions mistake: it treats left like a thing you can choose and tells someone to use the other one when they turn the wrong way. So people say it when someone 'mixes up left and right'.