Well, it depends. Some metaphors are more or less universal.
Things that are in common across cultures like metaphors
relating to physical systems for example. Yet some other
metaphors are very culturally imbued. If you look at how
languages are built - metaphors are a very large part of their
structures. It's not just words+meaning+grammar but conceptual
constructions. Thankfully a good portion of language can
translate. Some languages are more difficult of course. Chinese
for example is full of metaphor. They seem to understand
metaphors from other cultures more easily because their language
is littered with them. They're very structural in Chinese. Of
course all languages use them as far as I know and, outside of
some wacky ones, a short explanation is usually enough to
comprehend an uncertain metaphor from one language to another.
