being at a loss what to do

being at a loss what to do

Face to face, a Chinese idiom, Pinyin is mi à NMI à ns à Q à, which means to look at each other speechless, describes the state of being helpless due to tension or fear. It comes from the popular novel Nianyu Guanyin in Beijing.

The origin of Idioms

"Nianyu Guanyin, a popular novel in Beijing:" when I ask my father-in-law and mother-in-law at home, they look at each other face to face

Idiom usage

They are used as predicates, attributives and Adverbials to describe the expressions of panic. Chapter 31 of the outlaws of the marsh by Shi Naian of Ming Dynasty: when two people enter the building, they see three corpses lying in a pool of blood. They look at each other in astonishment and can't speak. Chapter 71 of Shi Naian's outlaws of the Marsh: these 15 people, with heavy heads and light feet, look at each other face to face, and all of them are soft. Ming Shi Naian's "outlaws of the marsh" one hundred and four times: both of them looked at each other, looked at each other in consternation, and thought: "I will come here." The fourteenth volume of Feng Menglong's warning to the world in Ming Dynasty: Professor Wu was looking at each other and could not speak. He saw a toady Taoist looking at Professor Wu and said, "the evil spirit of Guan Gong is too strong. I will get rid of it early to avoid future trouble."