拖泥带水 — Chinese idiom
拖泥带水
tuō ní dài shuǐ
Traditional: 拖泥帶水
Meaning
- muddy and wet
- (of speech, writing etc) slovenly; sloppy; (of actions) indecisive
Character by character
- 拖tuōto drag, to haul, to tow; to delay
- 泥nímud, earth, clay; plaster, paste
- 带dàibelt, strap; band, ribbon; area, zone; to carry, t
- 水shuǐwater, liquid, lotion, juice
Idioms sharing a character
- 拖家带口 tuō jiā dài kǒu
- 连拖带拉 lián tuō dài lā
- 判若云泥 pàn ruò yún ní
- 泥古不化 nì gǔ bù huà
- 泥沙俱下 ní shā jù xià
- 泥牛入海 ní niú rù hǎi
- 烂醉如泥 làn zuì rú ní
- 雪泥鸿爪 xuě ní hóng zhǎo
- 云泥之别 yún ní zhī bié
- 一笔带过 yī bǐ dài guò
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.