Among the Thaayorre of the northern coast of Australia, there is no word for ‘left’ or ‘right’; instead all orientation is done according to compass points, so that you might tell someone, ‘Your southeast shoe is untied’. What’s more, in the Thaayorre language, the way to say ‘hello’ translates as ‘Which way are you going?’ and the proper response is along the lines of ‘West-northeast, in the middle distance,’ so that if you don’t know which way you’re pointed, you can’t even get past hello.
lera boroditsky, how does our language shape the way we think