montezuma's revenge
/ˌmɔ.ɾ̃əˈzu.məz ɹəˈvɛndʒ/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.60 in modern English
34
Scrabble Score
17
Letters
5
Syllables
12
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
Diarrhea experienced by tourists after drinking water or eating food in Mexico as a result of a microorganism to which native Mexicans are immune.
Humorous; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "Montezuma's Revenge, everybody knows, is the persistent intestinal illness that spoils the good humour of tourists in the tropics. Could there be a Montezuma's Revenge of the soul? There could. We caught it."
- "There's a lot of flu bugs floating around. I think it is commendable that he thought enough of his fellow senators to keep his diseases to himself. I don't know what he had, but I suspect it was Montezuma's Revenge. (Mexico is the only country in the world where the expression "Royal Flush" has nothing to do with playing cards.)"
- "President Jimmy Carter arrived in Mexico City for a state visit on February 14, 1979, and proceeded to recall for his hosts a previous encounter with Mexican culture, decades earlier as a naval officer, in which he had contracted what he described as "Montezuma's revenge." This indelicate reference to tourist's diarrhea became something of an international incident; Mexican Preident José López Portillo insisted that his country be treated with respect, while the local press denounced the remark as a "typical Yankee slur.""
- "We warily sipped the lemonade, knowingly flirting with the tourist stomach disorder known here as Moctezuma's revenge."
- "When we were together in Mexico in the early seventies, she came down with a bad case of Moctezuma's revenge, complaining that she'd never been sick to her stomach before."
Etymology
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˌmɔ.ɾ̃əˈzu.məz ɹəˈvɛndʒ/
- British English: /ˌmɒn.təˈzuː.məz ɹɪˈvɛndʒ/
Usage
Inflected Forms
Moctezuma’s revenge (alternative)