open sesame
- idiom
- /ˈoʊpən ˈsɛseɪmi/
- Literature
:
palabra mágica
- Just like Open Sesame is the secret code for Alibaba.
And it was open sesame from there on.
- And it was open sesame from there on.
- You give them your name or the name and they say, OK, go over to this bookshelf and say open sesame to the little owl.
Examples
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And it was open sesame from there on.
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You give them your name or the name and they say, OK, go over to this bookshelf and say open sesame to the little owl.
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"Open sesame," said Aladdin
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He believed that a prestigious degree would be the open sesame to a successful career.
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For many aspiring actors, getting a role in that film is the open sesame to fame.
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She viewed the scholarship as an open sesame to further education opportunities.
Synonyms
4
4.1
A special chance that gives a person an easy way to succeed
Surface Forms
Morphology
open + sesame
Although 'open' is transparent, the word 'sesame' (a seed) gives no clue to the idea of a magic formula that grants access; the expression is a fixed folkloric incantation from the Ali Baba story rather than a compositional command. A B1 learner who knows the constituents but lacks cultural exposure would not reliably infer the idiomatic meaning, so the MWE is not derivable from its parts.
Etymology
Open sesame comes from the story of Ali Baba, where saying a few magic words made a heavy stone door swing open to a secret cave. That strong image of words that open a locked place explains why open sesame now means 'an easy way to get access or success'.