«اِلْكَحْكَهْ فِي إِيدِ الْيَتِيمْ عَجَبَهْ»

The saying observes that a trifling thing becomes a source of disapproving astonishment once it lands with someone vulnerable. A cheap, ordinary pastry would pass unnoticed in most hands, yet in an orphan's grasp people stare at it with grudging surprise, not admiration, as though it were remarkable.

Its sharper edge is social criticism: people begrudge the weak even the smallest good fortune. The proverb exposes the habit of treating any modest gain by a disadvantaged person as excessive or undeserved, while similar advantages enjoyed by others draw no comment.

Suitable for remarking, often with irony or sympathy, when onlookers envy or grumble about some small benefit that has come to a poor, dependent, or powerless person, as if even that little were too much for them.