Lost in Translation

by Charlie Croker

We offer you peace and seclusion. The paths to our resort are only passable by asses. Therefore, you will certainly feel at home here.

  At Mallorca airport:

  Distinguished Visitor: It is known that all the turistic services in Mallorca are maintaining a correct relation price quality, but even though, we wish to prize the establishments and services that to the opinion of our visitors, surpass notoriously for their quality.

  To be able to fill out these questionnaires you must write the name of this establishment, installation or turistic service, as is shown below, and you must give a punctuation between 6 and 10 points hoping that the service that you must punctuate has been the best in the relation price-quality.

  Florence, Italy:

  You are in a monumental palace, alike an Ufitzi’s galley of Florence. You are therefore kindly requested to behave consequently.

  Tourist site in Beijing:

  No fight, scrap, scrabble, rabble, feudal, fetish or sexy service.

  Yudu scenic spot in China:

  Please don’t surpass the cautionary driftwood while having the aquatic visiting.

  Kyoto Imperial Palace, Japan:

  If a tour group contains more than the number stiputed above, it is different in application. The particulars will be asked the clerk at the window. A man below 18 years old should be accompanied by the adults.

  Rules for climbing Mount Fuji, Japan:

  A teffific gust often overtakes three times consecutively. Keep yourself lying flat on the siope until it’s completely blown over.

  Danger comes soonest when it’s despised.

  In case of bad weather such as, storm, fain, snow and a dense fog, avoid climbing futher than the fifth staition. when the weather breaks suddely. just give up half-way and return.

  The nearest-to-the-sky location in Japan is far colder than the feets of the mountain.

  Bring garbage back to your home.

  Cash machine in China:

  Help oneself terminating machine.

  Chinese temple:

  Please take one step forward and crap twice.

  Some locations seem to possess a special genius for befuddled signs. Swimming pools, for instance . . .

  Hotel pool, Istanbul, Turkey:

  No diving. No nakedness. No ruining.

  France:

  Swimming is forbidden in the absence of the savior.

  Eldorado, Santa Fe, New Mexico:

  Violations will be enforced.

  Plantation Bay resort, Philippines:

  Swimming pool suggestions: Open 24 hours. Lifeguard on duty 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Drowning absolutely prohibited.

  Sri Lanka:

  Do not use the diving board when the swimming pool is empty.

  Lifts have a similar talent . . .

  Leipzig, Germany:

  Do not enter the lift backwards, and only when lit up.

  Hotel in Tokyo, Japan:

  Do not open door until door opens first.

  Hotel in Belgrade, Serbia:

  To move the cabin, push button for wishing floor. If the cabin should enter more persons, each one should press a number of wishing floor. Driving is then going alphabetically by national order.

  Serbia:

  Let us know about an unficiency as well as leaking on the service. Our utmost will improve it.

  Tokyo:

  Keep your hands away from unnecessary buttons for you.

  Also zoos . . .

  Phuket, Thailand:

  Common Wild Pig

  Don’t Eat The Animals

  Budapest, Hungary:

  Please do not feed the animals. If you have any suitable food, give it to the guard on duty.

  Japan:

  Children found straying will be taken to the lion house.

  Czech Republic:

  No smoothen the lion.

  . . . and finally, the Great Wall of China:

  The most magnificent strange stone city in China

  Don’t climb on the U-shaped opens.

  At a zip-wire slide near the Great Wall, Simatai:

  1. Those who suffer from high blood pressure, mental disease, horrifying of highness and liquour heads are refused.

  2. Those who are above 65 years old and the disabled are refused.

  3. Each set of belt for one person only. Hold tightly the belt when you are seated.

  4. When you are using the belt, please follow the instruction of the staff. Never use only by yourself.

  5. Take good care of your personal belongings to avoid the drop-off from your hand.

  Romantic Ramblings

  That old devil called love has had us all in its spell at one time or another. Finding the right words to describe how we feel can be a challenge. For some people, it’s a real challenge . . .

  Israeli lonely-hearts advertisement:

  41, with 18 years of teaching in my behind. Looking for American-born woman who speaks English very good.

  Message on an Internet dating site, from a Thai woman to her prospective partner:

  I started go aerobic dance, because I am fat. I think, when you come Thailand, you want to see me on slim body!

  Russian woman’s lonely-hearts advertisement:

  I am looking for an realy educated man who can be joke to himself.

  Sometimes, whole relationships can get lost in translation . . .

  Text message from an Italian boyfriend to his English girlfriend:

  Here is coldest. I need your familiar worm burning kisses.

  And another:

  Are you like spend your free time in contry or in town? shopping or walking on the hilly, or long the cost on the beach. or just seat look the landscape. I did like know more about you, that i try to make for you my best. let my know about you We had so little time (so nice), i would like spend more e more time with you I remember your eyes,(bellissimi) last things i was looked in you. Beautyfull memory.

  He’s still going:

  Life is very peaky for me here but knowing that someone is on the other side of the sleeve sea is thinking on me makes me strong.

  Now he’s been to the doctor and is suffering from . . .

  high blond pressure.

  Things are tense between the Italian and his girlfriend. He suggests a tête-à-tête to resolve matters. Or rather, he suggests an . . .

  air-cleaning vis a vis.

  Miscellaneous Musings

  Some of the things that get lost in translation defy not just understanding, they defy categorization . . .

  Taiwanese poster publicizing Guinness World of Records exhibition:

  In this kaleidoscopic world, nothing is too strange, extraordinary men and affairs, including all phenomena. Welcome to ‘surprising world of Guinness World of Records Museum to enjoy the records’ maintainers’ live performances and world folk-custom show.

  American advertisement for Scandinavian vacuum cleaner:

  Nothing sucks like an Electrolux.

  The American slogan for Salem cigarettes is ‘Salem – Feeling Free’. In Japan, this was translated as:

  When smoking Salem, you will feel so refreshed that your mind seems to be free and empty.

  Translation of ‘Permanent Under-Secretary’ on Japanese business card:

  Everlasting typist.

  Portuguese patent agent:

  It will not be necessary to state the name and address of the inventor if the applicant is not himself.

  In 1855 Pedro Carolino published The New Guide of the Conversation in Portuguese and English. Unfortunately, Carolino didn’t actually speak any English – he wrote the book by referring to a Portuguese-French phrase book, then a French-English dictionary. The ‘conversation’ section included:

  Apply you at the study during that you are young.

  I am catched cold in the brain.

  If can’t please at everyone one’s.

  I dead myself in envy to see her.

  This girl have a beauty edge.

  Do no might one’s understand to speak.
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  The vocabulary section included:

  Of the Man:

  The brain

  The brains

  The fat of the leg

  The ham

  The inferior lip

  The superior lip

  The entrails

  The reins

  Defects of the Body:

  A blind

  A lame

  A bald

  A left handed

  An ugly

  A squint-eyed

  A scurf

  A deaf

  President Heinrich Lubke, welcoming Queen Elizabeth II to West Germany in the 1960s:

  Who are you?

  On the same trip, at the theatre (attempting to tell her that the performance would begin any minute):

  Equal goes it loose.

  Sewage treatment plant, as marked on a Tokyo map:

  Dirty Water Punishment Place.

  Advertisement in US Asia Times for a professional interpreter:

  Are you unable to express your in English? I can help you in the right earnest.

  Translation agency’s advertisement in the Moscow Times:

  Bet us your letter of business translation do. Every people in our staffing know English like the hand of their back. Up to the minuet wise-street phrases, don’t you know, old boy.

  Liverpool FC slogan ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’, as printed on a shirt in Liaocheng, China:

  You’ll Never Pickle Again.

  Madras (Chennai, India) newspaper:

  Our editors are colleged and write like the Kipling and the Dickens.

  Norwegian Prime Minister after a service in Brazil:

  Thank you for the mess.

  Newly appointed Danish minister:

  I am in the beginning of my period.

  German-English textbook:

  After a certain time cheques are stale and cannot be cashed.

  Helpful words and phrases listed in Learn Greek with Me, an English-Greek dictionary:

  Bring me a partion of . . .

  Only half a partion of . . .

  Smocking/No Smocking.

  Bring me, we are in a harry!

  Greek flavourable sweets and candies.

  Chocolates: plain, milk, Pavlidoo, bitter.

  This is to go at deffered rate (halt rate).

  I cannot speek.

  In a Paris guidebook:

  To call a broad from France, first dial 00.

  Japanese-English conversation textbook:

  mother – brother – sister – ground father – ground mother . . .

  Italian reader’s review of About A Boy by Nick Hornby:

  It is the perfect kind of reading for having some relax and enjoying one’s own free time. Despite the subject of it might seem trivial, it provides indeed some interesting starting points for reflecting on some issues of our life, which often seem more troublesome of what they deserve to be.

  Italian furniture advertisement:

  Big leather pieces only joint by an intangible stitching create a perfect balance of proportions.

  Cairo, Egypt, Internet café:

  Please you are not allowed to enter or open the following sites: a, the sexual sites; b, religion sites; c, political sites. Thank you for your co-operator.

  Russian chess book:

  A lot of water has been passed under the bridge since this variation has been played.

  Advertisement in an Indian newspaper:

  For sale to kind master: Full grown tigress, goes daily walk untied, and eats flesh from hand.

  From the Soviet Weekly:

  There will be a Moscow Exhibition of Arts by 15,000 Soviet Republic painters and sculptors. These were executed over the past two years.

  Names of buildings in Bangkok, Thailand:

  TIT Tower and PMT Mansion.

  Business card pushed through a letter box in Pattaya, Thailand:

  Exceuse me! Are You Toilet Full? If it full. We take out for you. If not it. O.K.

  Financial institution in Detroit, USA:

  Ask about our plans for owning your home.

  On a Danish website for pesticides:

  Pests: Trips constitutes only a small problem. Use utility animals or insecticide soap. Eventually showering with water.

  Watering: Scarcely watering is recomended. Tolerates drying out periodes between watering. No special demand to the housewive’s green thumbs.

  Taxi driver in Cairo, trying to chat up English tourists:

  Jubbly lovely.

  From a Japanese newspaper article:

  Four people were killed, one seriously.

  International dormitory in Kansai, Japan:

  Do not bring the newspapers to your room. It might disturb other residents.

  An invitation to a picnic:

  Join! You will meet strange people!

  Advertisement in Beijing, China:

  Our watches are waterproof, shock-proof and time-proof.

  Notice to tenants of an apartment building in Montreal, Canada:

  A thorough extermination of the building is presently necessary.

  From the Montreal Gazette:

  Ordinary People has been falling in popularity ever since Mary Tyler Moore’s real life son committed death.

  At a Montreal club:

  During the renovation of the main entrance, members should use the old ladies’ entrance.

  Card of ‘recommandation’ for a miniature golf course in Ostend, the Netherlands:

  Level with the feet holes or mound do by playing on the game.

  No working players are invited to stay on the stony mat.

  On a T-shirt, Hong Kong:

  Child be a public servant. The best balance of music and technology within a vaguely.

  On a Japanese T-shirt:

  Polygon Form: It is a solid image by the line and plane. Anyone is assembled on the screen.

  On a French pest-control firm’s website:

  Small animals nibble you the life? They give you the cockroach?

  Brochure for Odaiba, Japan:

  Some people just think that Odaiba is just like a double sided magic mirror. Yes, exactly. Whatever dream you have, you may find its trace and realize it in Odaiba. Just tour through Odaiba by Free Shuttle Bus. To your surprise, you may make new friends.

  East African newspaper:

  A new swimming pool is rapidly taking shape since the contractors have thrown in the bulk of their workers.

  Sign in the Netherlands advertising a Dutch-English grammar tutor:

  Englisch as she is goodly pocken.

  Label on an electric shower, Thailand:

  Shower of happiness. Total safety guaranteed.

  Marketing mailshot from a Spanish company:

  Half statement of press publishes and distributes free sectors publications of the most representative Spanish industry in order to collaborating exporter of the products and manufactured of happiness in the expansion companies, for the one which we have considered you could be of their interest know to the detail the reference of the fabric industrial Spaniard, of the that they are facilitated the reasons social, complete adresses and description of the productive activity for medium from journalistic reports.

  Brochure for an amusement park in Odaiba:

  In this real environment replicated entertainment park, you can enjoy the very things of Hongkong by just stepping your foot one step in. Here lies the amazing experience never elsewhere.

  Taiwanese advertisement for a laptop computer:

  Take it to take off away from where other majority has stayed long since. Not only abreast it keeps you but also ahead of the cornfield of computing.

  Brochure for Odayku Museum, Japan:

  There are a newspaper publishing company and a special exibition by own company plan. Be planned a wide genre from a picture to a photograph by richness.

  Brochure for Idemitsu Museum, Japan:

  Have formality of the first kabuki play ground. There is the earphone guide who can
hear explanation which enjoying the play.

  Italian marketing mailshot:

  This publication has dedicated the necklace of nature classical hybrid and is extensive in four tongues to scholastic custom, whose production, that to full rhythm will be of menstrual lilt, satisfies the Italian market, for which we retain, might fully interest you it am because the commodity is economic.

  Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi:

  I never use shampoo with milk or eggs. These are imperialist ideas.

  From a Japanese website:

  The contents of this website make service offer in Japan now.

  The direction which does not understand Japanese well is this advanced ON prohibition.

  Message from a successful eBay bidder (in Japan) to the item’s seller (in America):

  I was not seeing your explanation well. Very much I was excused as for the remittance to you, I remitted Pursuit is produced easily by the cord in the time that EMS forwarded even from America. The number is early to be linked to the arrival to you and be late on 5th I am scheduled to arrive within 9 days. Please send the destination to my parents’ home. Please the my best regards.