Author Topic: Amusing translation errors  (Read 34961 times)

Cudzoziemiec

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Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #76 on: 27 November, 2020, 05:41:12 pm »
Here are lots of Germans saying squirrel and at the end Klaus saying Eichhörnchen

https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F161094258&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true&show_comments=true&color=false&show_user=true&show_reposts=false#
So what does
Quote
Scheißbuchfertigstellungbedürfnis
mean? Something along the lines of ''the need to finish a shit book''?
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Mrs Pingu

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #77 on: 27 November, 2020, 05:42:17 pm »
Ok I think I can say it if I do it really fast repeatedly ;D
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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #78 on: 23 December, 2020, 01:44:51 pm »
Quote from: Randonneurs Tokyo
注意 Cautions
Heavy traffic are expected at major route (national route). Please watch very carefully at city area where cars tends to go into shops and restaurants along the road. Please make much time for your riding plan. Please have enough sheep time, it will be very dangerous to ride without proper sheep.

https://randonneurs.tokyo/?p=11173


Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #79 on: 23 December, 2020, 01:53:05 pm »
I have a merino baselayer, will that do?
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Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #80 on: 08 January, 2021, 01:13:50 pm »
Transliterating placenames can be tricky. There are rules or conventions but most well known places are exceptions, and then the conventions themselves are subject to change, eg Peking > Beijing. I've been reading a story set in nineteenth century Poland but translated from Yiddish. It mentions many small towns which, obviously, are given the Yiddish versions of their names. It's a bit odd seeing eg Lentshno instead of Łęczna, but of course most readers won't be familiar with these names at all, so that doesn't matter. In addition, the Yiddish names are more accessible for the English reader: Shebreshin looks quite readable, whereas Szczebrzeszyn might make you  ??? and  :o . But world events can change even the most anonymous small town in the middle of nowhere or Central Europe. When the translation was made, no one had heard of Tchiernobil...
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hellymedic

  • Just do it!
Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #81 on: 09 January, 2021, 01:58:56 am »
I usually have little trouble dealing with transliterated entities.

I'm often puzzled by names ending with ...cki.

Is that pronounced ski or key?

Seems like the named one chooses...

Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #82 on: 09 January, 2021, 07:59:31 am »
Its pronounced -tski.

The place I always find strange for transliterated placenames is the Czech Republic. Because historically both Czech and German were spoken there, all the towns have names in both languages. Unfortunately Czech contains sounds which don't exist in German, and vice versa, so the transliteration gets somewhat mangled. The town of Winterberg, for example, is awkward in Czech and comes out as Vimperk. Or in the other direction, Kroměříž is unpronounceable in German (or pretty much any language other than Czech) and ends up as Kremsier.

Kim

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #83 on: 02 March, 2021, 12:50:05 am »
Just spotted a Chinglish translation of 'Live' and 'Neutral' (in the electrical sense) as 'Zero line' and 'Firewire'.  Put those on your tragic hipster toilet doors.   :thumbsup:

Steph

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #84 on: 02 March, 2021, 03:48:53 am »
Now, I admit I have advantages in that I am someone who picks up languages easily, as well as pronunciations, and I do lack the attitude seen in too many people I know*, but I found the immediate refusal to even attempt to pronounce this easy one depressing. All it is is a tongue click and a guttural voiced 'g'...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-56182349


*I was attempting to explain how to pronounce Liechtenstein to a colleague, who is a tit. Attempting to explain the blindingly simple rule in German that 'ei' and 'ie' are pronounced (in essence) by simply saying the English name of the second letter, I was met with "You've got a degree in this shit. How are ordinary people supposed to remember?"

Actually listening to what I say would probably be a good starting point.
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Beardy

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #85 on: 02 March, 2021, 08:12:05 am »
Now, I admit I have advantages in that I am someone who picks up languages easily, as well as pronunciations, and I do lack the attitude seen in too many people I know*, but I found the immediate refusal to even attempt to pronounce this easy one depressing. All it is is a tongue click and a guttural voiced 'g'...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-56182349


*I was attempting to explain how to pronounce Liechtenstein to a colleague, who is a tit. Attempting to explain the blindingly simple rule in German that 'ei' and 'ie' are pronounced (in essence) by simply saying the English name of the second letter, I was met with "You've got a degree in this shit. How are ordinary people supposed to remember?"

Actually listening to what I say would probably be a good starting point.
Being deaf and dyslexic means that language has always been a challenge for me, even English and I’ve been trying to use that with varying levels of success for nearly 60 years. Being somewhat aspergic also adds my almost teenage tragicomic inability to read even the most basic of human emotion/body language to the mix so I in effect walk around in my own personal fog of confusion. Fortunately Sarah is mostly tolerant of my apparent stupidity and can get cross with people who start to treat me like an idiot because I’ve reacted in an unusual way to some attempt at their communication with me.
For every complex problem in the world, there is a simple and easily understood solution that’s wrong.

T42

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #86 on: 02 March, 2021, 08:50:50 am »
Just spotted a Chinglish translation of 'Live' and 'Neutral' (in the electrical sense) as 'Zero line' and 'Firewire'.  Put those on your tragic hipster toilet doors.   :thumbsup:

The toilets in a restaurant we ate in once had a rooster on the door of the gents.  After my son had been, I asked him where it was.

Son: Round there at the back. You can tell it's the gents, it has a cock on the door.
MrsT: What's on the ladies?
Son: Dunno... a knocker?
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #87 on: 02 March, 2021, 10:46:44 am »
Now, I admit I have advantages in that I am someone who picks up languages easily, as well as pronunciations, and I do lack the attitude seen in too many people I know*, but I found the immediate refusal to even attempt to pronounce this easy one depressing. All it is is a tongue click and a guttural voiced 'g'...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-56182349


*I was attempting to explain how to pronounce Liechtenstein to a colleague, who is a tit. Attempting to explain the blindingly simple rule in German that 'ei' and 'ie' are pronounced (in essence) by simply saying the English name of the second letter, I was met with "You've got a degree in this shit. How are ordinary people supposed to remember?"

Actually listening to what I say would probably be a good starting point.
By a spooky coincidence, in 2019 I spent a short time working with a trans woman called Steph who had recently moved from PE, as she called it ("So whereabouts in South Africa did you live?" "PE" "Umm... Pietermaritzburg?")
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Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #88 on: 11 March, 2021, 07:24:00 pm »

Not an error or a translation, just a FOREIGN LANGUAGE pun. Bać means fear, so the placard says "I fear fascism". Except it says more than that, because they've used the infinitive rather than the first person of the verb (go straight to Grammar thread, do not pass go, do not collect 200 złoty!). This makes it only one letter away from the verb jebać, so it also means "Fuck fascism".
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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #89 on: 11 March, 2021, 07:38:23 pm »
When taking my degree course in the early-90s, I wrote an essay in Swedish about the First Gulf War. My point was supposed to be that we only made the effort because of the oilfields. Only I got my German & Swedish mixed up and used 'ölfält', which actually means 'beerfield', rather than 'oljefält'. Knowing me as she did, my lecturer thought it rather appropriate.
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Salvatore

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #90 on: 08 April, 2021, 10:28:52 am »
Transliterating placenames can be tricky.

You'd think that machine translation would have enough problems translating Finnish, with its 14 cases, non-gendered pronouns, vowel harmony, agglutinating and compound nouns etc etc etc, and you'd think that placenames would be comparatively easy. But no



This is from a couple of years ago, and I think it's improved now, but Jaala=Nottingham?
I also remember Moskova=London, even though Finnish has it's own name for London - Lontoon.
BTW Hki = Helsinki, Sln=Savonlinna
Quote
et avec John, excellent lecteur de road-book, on s'en est sortis sans erreur

Steph

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #91 on: 08 April, 2021, 10:36:42 am »
Now, I admit I have advantages in that I am someone who picks up languages easily, as well as pronunciations, and I do lack the attitude seen in too many people I know*, but I found the immediate refusal to even attempt to pronounce this easy one depressing. All it is is a tongue click and a guttural voiced 'g'...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-56182349


*I was attempting to explain how to pronounce Liechtenstein to a colleague, who is a tit. Attempting to explain the blindingly simple rule in German that 'ei' and 'ie' are pronounced (in essence) by simply saying the English name of the second letter, I was met with "You've got a degree in this shit. How are ordinary people supposed to remember?"

Actually listening to what I say would probably be a good starting point.
By a spooky coincidence, in 2019 I spent a short time working with a trans woman called Steph who had recently moved from PE, as she called it ("So whereabouts in South Africa did you live?" "PE" "Umm... Pietermaritzburg?")

PMBurg, or, as it became in Tom Sharpe's books, Piemburg
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Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #92 on: 21 September, 2021, 04:19:06 pm »
Not an error (AFAIK) and not even a faintly amusing story, but what a wonderful word!
Quote
“I am greatly concerned about the radicalisation of the Querdenker [Germany’s movement of pandemic sceptics]”, she added.
Google translates it as "lateral thinker" but it reminds me of the Russian инакомыслящий, the dissidents' own word for dissident; literally a "different thinker" or (guesstimating from the German) "counter-grain thinker".
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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #93 on: 21 September, 2021, 04:55:24 pm »
Not an error (AFAIK) and not even a faintly amusing story, but what a wonderful word!
Quote
“I am greatly concerned about the radicalisation of the Querdenker [Germany’s movement of pandemic sceptics]”, she added.
Google translates it as "lateral thinker" but it reminds me of the Russian инакомыслящий, the dissidents' own word for dissident; literally a "different thinker" or (guesstimating from the German) "counter-grain thinker".
A present active participle! You don't see those in the wild very often. As such, a more literal translation of инакомыслящий would be "who is thinking differently". Incidentally, Querdenker is a direct translation of lateral thinker (or thinkers).

Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #94 on: 23 September, 2021, 04:28:55 pm »
Bandcamp fed me this cheerless ditty. I guess Nicholas Michaux is French. Only a foreigner would use a word like tocsin, and only human-created captions would spell it correctly!
https://youtu.be/BUtW80yI_vY?t=122
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JennyB

  • Old enough to know better
Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #95 on: 23 September, 2021, 04:59:31 pm »
My mother, living in the Northern Irish village of Ballinamallard, once ordered something by phone from England. It came, eventually, addressed to Ballingham Allard.  The perfect location for a cosy mystery?
Jennifer - Walker of hills

Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #96 on: 24 September, 2021, 09:07:40 am »
Irish place names, other than really well known ones such as Dublin and Belfast, always need spelling out for non-Irish people. As do English names as well.
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Mr Larrington

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #97 on: 24 September, 2021, 11:47:50 am »
Indeed.  I for one used to struggle with Cork.  Or was it corks?
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Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #98 on: 24 September, 2021, 12:24:19 pm »
This morning I have had Henderson as Tennyson, Ranui as Runway, Swanson as Watson, and Waiomoko and Piha weren't even attempted. (These are in Kiwiland not Ireland.)
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Cudzoziemiec

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Re: Amusing translation errors
« Reply #99 on: 14 October, 2021, 08:24:33 pm »
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2021/oct/14/squid-game-netflix-translations-subtitle-problem
Do you really need to ask if something was lost in translation? Translation is the art of knowing what to lose. And occasionally the joy of being able to add something to the experience. Anyway, this is about subtitling and the difference between translated subtitles, closed captions and dubbing; all of course different to the original.
Quote
“Closed captions” were initially devised for deaf viewers and include audio description. (“A door slams.”) The dialogue used on closed captions is usually a direct transcript of the dubbing script. Subtitles use another script entirely.
Back when I was doing subtitling, which admittedly was a long time ago, before Netflix even existed, that's not how we did it. We prepared a "Master English File", essentially what the characters were actually saying, which was the basis for both translated subtitles and closed captions (which we called SDH – "subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing"). The MEF was timed and adjusted to fit the limitations of screens, reading speeds and so on, and the SDH team then added the necessary sound descriptions for their stuff. They may have had to remove a little more, because after all they still had to fit on the same screen, but they were starting with the exact same material.

Quote
A dubbing script translation is always going to be less accurate as it faces two challenges. First, it must translate a phrase in such a way that it takes exactly the same amount of time to say out loud in both languages. Second, if there is any opportunity to copy the mouth movements, then you’re supposed to take it. This is why in Squid Game the Korean honorific “oppa” was translated as “old man” in the dubbing script. It’s “babe” in the subtitle script. In fact, in Korean it’s a term of respect meaning “older brother.”
In what variety of English is "babe" a term of respect or anything vaguely comparable to "older brother"?

Quote
Deryagin has been subtitling English to Russian for 11 years and worked on the Russian subtitles for the Netflix films Birdbox and Mank, the streamer’s series Orange Is the New Black, and David Lynch’s short film What Did Jack Do?, also released on Netflix. He watched the latter 15 times before trying to translate it (“I was so excited that I could barely sleep. Any complex film is exciting to translate as you need to understand it to convey it. Imagine doing that for Twin Peaks.”)
Ideally this would be the case, not just for translating but also for creating the captions, subtitles and dubbing script in the original language. In practice it rarely is.
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