Abrir una lata de gusanos
Open a can of worms. That does not work, translated literally into Spanish. I saw a thread about the English spelling and someone said this was a "can of worms". I have my own opinion about Americans who think they know how to spell the English language! Is there a Spanish equivalent of "can of worms"?
4 Answers
sacar los trapos al sol.... to expose the clothes to the sunlight... meaning to reveal something that can be embarrassing or wrong to the public knowledge...
It's not exact, but a close feeling "Meter la pata" if you consider opening a can of worms a mistake.
"Sacar a la luz un asunto espinoso"
I'd never heard this expression before but it certainly makes sense (and I rather like it). References to Pandora's box are more problematical. The legend speaks of releasing all sorts of ills. Following the release of ills, there remained "hope". Some versions would suggest that "hope" was not released. Others would suggest that "hope" was, indeed, released but that this was, in fact, the worst of ills (because the hope was ill-founded and.inevitably led to disappointment [since it was a false hope]).
At any rate, "open a can of worms" and "open Pandora's box" (as usually used) mean quite different things.
"Sacar a la luz un asunto espinoso" is the definition on the dictionary on this site, however, I do not believe that this correctly defines the subject.
According to my dictionary it translates as "Abrir la caja de Pandora" which seems logical as to open Pandora's box is effectively the same as opening a can of worms, i.e. to take an action that results in very troublesome consequences and is not worth the trouble it causes.
No doubt other parts of the Spanish speaking world have other expressions for this.
