Le mot du jour : “passer un savon”
“Passer un savon” (to brush
with soap) is an expression that means to scold someone and not at all,
as you would expect, to give a soap to someone.
So now that soap
has become rare and precious, if a French person says “Je vais te passer
un savon !”, don’t expect them to kindly share their soap with you but
rather to give you an earful!
I am not sure where this expression comes from, but it always brings to my mind the image of a mum energetically washing her reluctant child 😀