Internet Security, music, and Dad Jokes. And pets - it's a blog, after all.
Thursday, October 6, 2016
Nice translation
I worked for a company that once saved money by using a domestic translator for an ad to be run in Tokyo. They translated "RISC technology" as "risky technology". Good times, good times.
In the cemetery where my mother is buried, there is what was obviously meant to be a double grave for husband and wife. On her side the standard name, dates, phrases for "beloved wife and mother". By the date given,she passed away almost ten years ago. The other side, presumably his, reads PLEASE LEAVE BLANK
Perhaps it was a prayer to Above. More likely, the stone cutter just blindly followed what was on the paper in front if him.
If he was close to his wife in age, and still alive, he would be close to a hundred now. I am guessing the family decided to simply wait to recut the stone and not fix it then.
When I was in Portugal, we got a *new* digital microwave system put in. GTE Italian, which was owned by Siemenes Germany, with the manuals *mostly* translated from German into Italian, and then into English, by *trained* translators. Who unfortunately had now idea how to translate technical Languages into other languags, and then again.
Note that Diesel Fuel is in "Arbic".
ReplyDeleteLike the infamous Chevy Nova. It was a drastic failure in Mexico because "no va" in Spanish translates roughly to, "it doesn't go."
ReplyDeleteI will give you a purely American example.
ReplyDeleteIn the cemetery where my mother is buried, there is what was obviously meant to be a double grave for husband and wife.
On her side the standard name, dates, phrases for "beloved wife and mother". By the date given,she passed away almost ten years ago.
The other side, presumably his, reads
PLEASE LEAVE BLANK
Perhaps it was a prayer to Above.
More likely, the stone cutter just blindly followed what was on the paper in front if him.
If he was close to his wife in age, and still alive, he would be close to a hundred now. I am guessing the family decided to simply wait to recut the stone and not fix it then.
When I was in Portugal, we got a *new* digital microwave system put in. GTE Italian, which was owned by Siemenes Germany, with the manuals *mostly* translated from German into Italian, and then into English, by *trained* translators. Who unfortunately had now idea how to translate technical Languages into other languags, and then again.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I understand about Siemens, c-90, those translations were probably every bit as good as the hardware provided...
ReplyDelete}:-]