I had a friend in the Peace Corps who didn't know the Kyrgyz word for 'rain' so he called it 'sky ink.' A bit confusing, perhaps, but it still got his point across and has provided endless amusement for me whenever I remember that story.
To me, that story shows why languages are so fascinating. Each language has a strict set of rules - sentence pattern, verb conjugation, etc. - and yet, if you're creative, you can communicate without knowing all the rules. In essence, you can cheat.
It's easiest to cheat on vocabulary. Much like my Peace Corps friend did when describing 'rain,' you can talk your way around the problem spot. For example, if you don't know the word for 'wild boar' you can say 'a really big pig.' If that doesn't do it, you can say 'with really long teeth' (you probably don't know the word for 'tusks'). If you don't know the name for 'honeymoon,' you can call it 'marriage travel.' If you don't know the name for those little floating trays they serve alcohol on at some onsens, you can call them 'sake boats.' The possibilities are endless!
It's like a really big word puzzle and it's quite fun. And an added benefit is that people automatically think you're funny, even if you're not. Referring to 'rain' as 'sky ink' is pretty much gauranteed to get a few laughs. We don't have this flexibility in our own languages because we're too aware of the rules and anything outside of them is deemed inarticulate or uneducated. When speaking a second or third language, people find it charming when you make a few mistakes. Therefore, I will continue to charm and cheat my way through Japanese through the next month and a half and enjoy it thoroughly the entire time.
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