What does "andar medios sucios" mean?

Question

What does "andar medios sucios" mean? Here is the context: "son gente pobre y trabajadora y han de andar medios sucios por esa razon."

Thank you!

Welcome to the forum! - actorgirl, May 12, 2014

This same word has been asked about in other such postings. Is this a homework question? - rac1, May 12, 2014

Thank you! - lmwolf, May 13, 2014

Oh I searched for the question before posting but didn't find anything, although I know there are several with "andar". No it's not homework, it was in an email from a friend I was just curious of how you would translate the meaning of the phrase she used - lmwolf, May 13, 2014

Answer 1

Another word for "medios sucios" in Spanish could be "andrajosos" which means "ragged'. Like my mom used to call me that when I was little. She would tell me to get dress because we were going out so I would go to my room and dress up. I was probably between 7-10 years old. I would come out of my room and she would say "Por que te vistes toda andrajosa, vé y cámbiate que eso es para estar aquí en la casa". "Why are you dress so raggedy, go back and change because that is to be here at home".

An idea

Answer 2

My attempt: They are poor, hard-working people and have to be (go around/walk around) fairly dirty for that reason.

Here is something else I found:

[por medios sucios][1]

[1]: http://www.wordmagicsoft.com/dictionary/es-en/por medios sucios.php

Sorry I can't get the link to work.

Thanks gringojrf! That is a fairly straight forward translation. I was wondering if maybe there was another meaning to "medios sucios". But perhaps not! - lmwolf, May 13, 2014

Answer 3

I was wondering if maybe there was another meaning to "medios sucios". But perhaps not!

In this context probably not, but in the context of corruption we use it the same as in English, ie: Gente media sucia / corrupta .... people a little dirty / corrupt (a term constantly used describing most government officials of any country).