Kachū no Kuri wo Hirou (火中の栗を拾う – Taking a Risk for Someone): Part 1

Taking risks for someone else, with no benefit to oneself, can be described as kachū no kuri wo hirou (火中の栗を拾う).

Since kachū (火中) means “in the fire,” kuri (栗) means “chestnuts,” and hirou (拾う) means “to pick up,” the literal meaning of kachū no kuri wo hirou is “to pick up chestnuts in the fire.”

This proverb originates from the French fable “The Monkey and the Cat (Le singe et le chat),” based on Aesop’s Fables.

In the story, a monkey has a cat retrieve chestnuts from the fire while promising to share them, but the monkey eats all the chestnuts, and the cat gets burned.