一粒老鼠屎壞了一鍋粥

一粒老鼠屎坏了一锅粥
yīlìlǎoshǔshǐhuàileyīguōzhōu
  1. lit. one pellet of rat feces spoiled the whole pot of congee (idiom)
  2. fig. one bad apple can spoil the whole bunch

CEDICT

Entry Composition

1 一 yī
  1. one
  2. single
  3. a (article)
  4. as soon as
  5. entire; whole; all; throughout
  6. "one" radical in Chinese characters (Kangxi radical 1)
  7. also pr. yāo for greater clarity when spelling out numbers digit by digit
2 粒 lì
  1. grain; granule; pellet; particle
  2. classifier for small round objects (peas, bullets, peanuts, pills, grains etc)
  3. (Tw) classifier for larger round objects (watermelon etc)
3 老鼠屎 lǎoshǔshǐ
  1. (figurative) bad apple
  2. bad apple
4 壞了 huàile
  1. shoot!
  2. gosh!
  3. oh, no!
  4. (suffix) to the utmost
5 一鍋粥 yīguōzhōu
  1. (lit.) a pot of porridge
  2. (fig.) a complete mess

Related entries

一顆老鼠屎壞了一鍋湯 yīkēlǎoshǔshǐhuàileyīguōtāng
  1. lit. one pellet of rat feces spoiled the whole pot of soup (idiom)
  2. fig. one bad apple can spoil the whole bunch