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Source: (consider it) Thread: English as she isn't spoke
Kasra
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# 10631

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One of my varied duties is to language edit for a particular journal in Europe. The authors of said journal typically have English as a second or third language. This results in many papers which have English words, but, say, Greek sentence structure. So of course, there are some entertaining moments when the actual written line does NOT mean what one anticipates the author intending...

This got me thinking about creative translations... which can often be highly amusing.

I'm thinking of a favorite from a trip overseas, where "don't walk on the grass" became "littel grass is smilling slightly - please walk on pavement" (sic).

What else do you have to offer?

Kx

PS - I'm full of admiration for my authors, since my Greek (to use the example above) is atrocious. But there are times (like right NOW) when I'm tearing my hair out trying to fathom a meaning and a little gentle levity is Good.

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no prophet's flag is set so...

Proceed to see sea
# 15560

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"A Dutchman shall be driving no car here" - a reference to traffic etc when visiting us in Canada post the 50th anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands.

Also the same man said "my wife possesses gallstones" which we felt was very cute.

I remember from Guyana in the 1970s: "capsize the coffee [pot] alongside the cup".

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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/

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Graven Image
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# 8755

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I once had a Chinese cookbook translated into English which instructed me to hang my duck in my windy place. [Eek!]
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Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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I was just reading a summary of Hungarian history in which, after the Uprising, people were punished mercifully. So that's all right then.
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Lothlorien
Ship's Grandma
# 4927

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I remember reading once that a man at a dinner party announced, "My wife, she is impregnable," when he meant she was infertile.

These are funny, but I guess we would make similar mistakes in a language other than English.

[ 05. September 2013, 06:41: Message edited by: Lothlorien ]

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comet

Snowball in Hell
# 10353

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My favorite was on the english translation of a menu in a Syrian restaurant in Doha. Everything went down the list making basic sense until the second to last item: catnip in aspic.

I mean, sure, that could be a perfect translation and that's what they were serving....

My arabic was almost nonexistant so I decided not to ask for details.

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Evil Dragon Lady, Breaker of Men's Constitutions

"It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.” -Calvin

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Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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I think it was a restaurant in Ljubljana which offered a sort of kebab, enticingly described as Gypsy Spit.
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Moo

Ship's tough old bird
# 107

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I once bought two cheap compasses, one large and one small. The packaging of the large one said, 'Always travel in right direction'. The packaging of the small one said, 'Always travel'.

After that in our family we referred to compasses as 'Always travel'.

Moo

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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.

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Gwalchmai
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# 17802

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My family were delighted to encounter chevre chaud on the menu in a restaurant in France, helpfully translated into English as "goat on heat".
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L'organist
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# 17338

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Some years ago a friend encountered the following in a small restaurant in the Basque country: Frid arse.

He ordered it thinking it would be steak but it turned out to be a local delicacy - crispy donkey's ears [Hot and Hormonal]

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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet

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Welease Woderwick

Sister Incubus Nightmare
# 10424

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Indian spelling of English can be pretty far-fetched at times - Cornflex for breakfast?

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I give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way.
Fancy a break in South India?
Accessible Homestay Guesthouse in Central Kerala, contact me for details

What part of Matt. 7:1 don't you understand?

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Baptist Trainfan
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# 15128

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Aren't they what the Queen eats?
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Barefoot Friar

Ship's Shoeless Brother
# 13100

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I had a shoe customer from Peru once who always was in a hurry.

"Time is clicking!" she would exclaim to her companions, if she thought they were taking too long in their selections.

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Do your little bit of good where you are; its those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. -- Desmond Tutu

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Baptist Trainfan
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# 15128

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There are, of course, Gerard Hoffnung's letters from Tyrolean landladies - which may (or may not) be genuine.
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Carex
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# 9643

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I was going to be out in the forest in China, and we were told it consisted of "pan trees". We scoured our books on the flora of China and couldn't find any such reference.

On arrival the problem was obvious: we weren't pronouncing it with a Dixie accent. These were "pahn" trees, with pahn cones...

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Baptist Trainfan
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# 15128

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And here I was, thinking of kitchen food-cupboards and larders.
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The Midge
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# 2398

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This one has to be seen to be believed. It is a pond difference.

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Some days you are the fly.
On other days you are the windscreen.

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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492

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I'm from LA, but I still know what that word means. The principal / head teacher when I was at grammar school was actually given that word for her first name!

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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.

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hanginginthere
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# 17541

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From the brochure of the Hotel Metropol in Dresden, in the days of the old DDR:

'The arrangement of the seat groups spreads an individual, intimate fluid.'

'In the rooms you will be enjoyed by nice reproductions of well known paintings.'

and from the menu:

'Half pheasant, as by the nice wine-dresser's woman'

not to mention:

'Our young team surprises you by dressing at the table.'

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'Safe?' said Mr Beaver. 'Who said anything about safe? But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.'

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The Midge
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# 2398

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quote:
Originally posted by Sir Kevin:
I'm from LA, but I still know what that word means. The principal / head teacher when I was at grammar school was actually given that word for her first name!

It is the juxtaposition with 'warm and moist' that makes it a killer.

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Some days you are the fly.
On other days you are the windscreen.

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Gideon
Apprentice
# 17676

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A restaurant in Aix en Provence insisted on handing us the menu in English on which we were interested to find a number of dishes containing sprockets.
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Baptist Trainfan
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# 15128

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Very chewy!
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Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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A notice in a church in Budapest drew attention to the particularly fine puplit.

(It also told you that a bishop died while preaching in it in 1827. But not whether the congregation noticed.)

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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
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# 11274

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quote:
Originally posted by Sir Kevin:
I'm from LA, but I still know what that word means. The principal / head teacher when I was at grammar school was actually given that word for her first name!

As was John Keats' lady friend (her actual given name).
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Ariel
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# 58

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quote:
Originally posted by Gideon:
A restaurant in Aix en Provence insisted on handing us the menu in English on which we were interested to find a number of dishes containing sprockets.

I have to ask, did you order any?
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Sandemaniac
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# 12829

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quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
As was John Keats' lady friend (her actual given name).

The wife of Alfred Barnard, first whisky writer, , was the splendidly gynaecological Fanny Ruffle. What's really intriguing is that the euphemism long predates the words use as a name.

AG

[ 05. September 2013, 20:41: Message edited by: Sandemaniac ]

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Gideon
Apprentice
# 17676

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quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
quote:
Originally posted by Gideon:
A restaurant in Aix en Provence insisted on handing us the menu in English on which we were interested to find a number of dishes containing sprockets.

I have to ask, did you order any?
Being rather fond of pine nuts I think we did. Got to love a language that uses the same word for 2 such different commodities.
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chive

Ship's nude
# 208

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A couple of years ago my sister and I were making up a bike trailer for her toddlers. We found ourselves laughing really quite a lot when the instructions told us to 'envaginate the screws.'

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'Edward was the kind of man who thought there was no such thing as a lesbian, just a woman who hadn't done one-to-one Bible study with him.' Catherine Fox, Love to the Lost

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Wesley J

Silly Shipmate
# 6075

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quote:
Originally posted by comet:
My favorite was on the english translation of a menu in a Syrian restaurant in Doha. Everything went down the list making basic sense until the second to last item: catnip in aspic.

I mean, sure, that could be a perfect translation and that's what they were serving....

My arabic was almost nonexistant so I decided not to ask for details.

Comet for Syrian president! She'll kick butt. [Overused] [Cool]

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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)

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Lord Jestocost
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# 12909

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When I worked in medical publishing, we published a textbook on hysterectomies by an Indian doctor who was always ready with a quaint turn of phrase. The two methods of performing a hysterectomy are either to make an abdominal incision, or (his preferred method) to go in via the vagina. Or, as he put it, "the portal provided by God".
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Latchkey Kid
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# 12444

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I think it was in an Iranian eating place I saw Foul with Oil.

It was a long time later that I discovered that they were Fava beans, and the oil would have been olive oil ( as served with hummus). A search for it now shows that 'ful' is the preferred spelling.

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'You must never give way for an answer. An answer is always the stretch of road that's behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.'
Mika; in Hello? Is Anybody There?, Jostein Gaardner

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Karl: Liberal Backslider
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# 76

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quote:
Originally posted by chive:
A couple of years ago my sister and I were making up a bike trailer for her toddlers. We found ourselves laughing really quite a lot when the instructions told us to 'envaginate the screws.'

Sounds like something you could get an extra five years for in a women's prison.

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Might as well ask the bloody cat.

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Galloping Granny
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# 13814

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My favourite:

Coming across recipe for “velouté d'avocats à l'orange et cumin", and hitting the ‘translate’ button, someone found that it was "Velvety lawyers with orange and cumin", and the ingredients given were "500 ml of orange juice, 2 quite ripe lawyers, 1 C with tea of powder poultry bubble, 1 C with table of ground cumin".
Oh, and when you start cooking, don't forget to 'remove the bark and the core of lawyers'.

GG

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The Kingdom of Heaven is spread upon the earth, and men do not see it. Gospel of Thomas, 113

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BroJames
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# 9636

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quote:
Originally posted by Sandemaniac:
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
As was John Keats' lady friend (her actual given name).

The wife of Alfred Barnard, first whisky writer, , was the splendidly gynaecological Fanny Ruffle. What's really intriguing is that the euphemism long predates the words use as a name.

AG

Does it? OED cites references only as old as 1879 for the British English usage and 1928 for the American English usage.

The name (usually as a diminutive of Frances) goes back much earlier than that Keat's fiancée had already died by 1879, and Fanny Crosby (Frances Jane van Alstyne - 1820-1915) was known as Fanny from girlhood. (And Wikipedia has a long list of holders of the name, many predating the OED reference dates.

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Firenze

Ordinary decent pagan
# 619

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quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
I think it was in an Iranian eating place I saw Foul with Oil.

It was a long time later that I discovered that they were Fava beans, and the oil would have been olive oil ( as served with hummus).

I used to be forever seeing, in middle-eastern grocers, tins labelled 'Foul Medames' - which always suggested some cackling tricoteuse in a grubby mob cap.
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Sioni Sais
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# 5713

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quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
I think it was in an Iranian eating place I saw Foul with Oil.

It was a long time later that I discovered that they were Fava beans, and the oil would have been olive oil ( as served with hummus).

I used to be forever seeing, in middle-eastern grocers, tins labelled 'Foul Medames' - which always suggested some cackling tricoteuse in a grubby mob cap.
Here's a recipe. It's OK if you like bean goo.

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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"

(Paul Sinha, BBC)

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LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216

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quote:
no prophet: "A Dutchman shall be driving no car here" - a reference to traffic etc when visiting us in Canada post the 50th anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands.
I'm trying to reconstruct the Dutch phrase he was trying to use here, but I'm not really getting anywhere. Do you know what he meant to say?

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Sandemaniac
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# 12829

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quote:
Originally posted by BroJames:
Does it? OED cites references only as old as 1879 for the British English usage and 1928 for the American English usage.

Blimey - given that I looked it up at OED.com yonks back, that shows how your preconceptions can colour your memory. I stand corrected! [Hot and Hormonal]

AG

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"It becomes soon pleasantly apparent that change-ringing is by no means merely an excuse for beer" Charles Dickens gets it wrong, 1869

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Aggie
Ship's cat
# 4385

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About 20 years ago when I was at college, I used to work as a part-time demonstrator in various large department stores and supermarkets, inviting customers to try samples of food and drinks.

For the demonstrations where food was cooked before sampling, demonstrators worked in pairs, and one day I was paired with an Italian demonstrator, who was working in the UK in order to learn English.

The brief that day was to cook and sample a well-known brand of turkey rashers. These were new on the market at that time, and we had to explain to customers what they were, e.g,thin strips of turkey made to resemble bacon rashers, which could be cooked in the same way.

Unfortunately, the Italian demonstrator's level of English was such that she got rather muddled and invited customers to "come and try some delicious Turkish bacon." !!

[ 06. September 2013, 15:03: Message edited by: Aggie ]

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“I see his blood upon the rose
And in the stars the glory of his eyes,
His body gleams amid eternal snows,
His tears fall from the skies.”
(Joseph Mary Plunkett 1887-1917)

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Thurible
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# 3206

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quote:
Originally posted by Sandemaniac:
quote:
Originally posted by BroJames:
Does it? OED cites references only as old as 1879 for the British English usage and 1928 for the American English usage.

Blimey - given that I looked it up at OED.com yonks back, that shows how your preconceptions can colour your memory. I stand corrected! [Hot and Hormonal]

AG

Nonetheless, it was certainly current when Enid Blyton wrote about Dick and Aunt Fanny.

Thurible

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"I've been baptised not lobotomised."

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no prophet's flag is set so...

Proceed to see sea
# 15560

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quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
quote:
no prophet: "A Dutchman shall be driving no car here" - a reference to traffic etc when visiting us in Canada post the 50th anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands.
I'm trying to reconstruct the Dutch phrase he was trying to use here, but I'm not really getting anywhere. Do you know what he meant to say?
Not sure what the line was, but context was that he felt the traffic was simply too stressful and that he should not be driving. He might have said "should" rather than "shall". So perhaps the context of phrase would be "[the traffic here is so overwhelming such that I, a] Dutchman should avoid driving in it." We had picked him and his wife up in Calgary. He said a lot of, to us, amusing things, and we thoroughly enjoyed the visit. It was in follow-up to my in-laws going for the anniversary of the liberation. We went the mountain national parks with them (Banff, Jasper).

My father-in-law had been in their town in 1944 Appeldoorn with the Regina Rifles. There was a catchy rhyme he recited to our children when very young that he picked up there, something like "duh cobble's in de clinkah", which is the only line of that I can recall.

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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/

Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010  |  IP: Logged
Keren-Happuch

Ship's Eyeshadow
# 9818

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We have one of those Italian hob top coffee makers - moka, is it? - with interestingly translated instructions. We particularly like the one that tells you to "strongly screw the little tank but do not prise on the handle".

Of course, the moral of the story is that you should always hire a professional translator... [Biased]

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Travesty, treachery, betrayal!
EXCESS - The Art of Treason
Nea Fox

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Zacchaeus
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# 14454

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quote:
Originally posted by Thurible:
quote:
Originally posted by Sandemaniac:
quote:
Originally posted by BroJames:
Does it? OED cites references only as old as 1879 for the British English usage and 1928 for the American English usage.

Blimey - given that I looked it up at OED.com yonks back, that shows how your preconceptions can colour your memory. I stand corrected! [Hot and Hormonal]

AG

Nonetheless, it was certainly current when Enid Blyton wrote about Dick and Aunt Fanny.

Thurible

I grew up watching the TV Fanny Cradock, which adds to the joke in the original link..

She was always assisted by her meek husband Johnny

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Higgs Bosun
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# 16582

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Many years ago, looking that the instruction manual for a Japanese dot-matrix printer, I found a table of codes which you sent to the printer to output characters for different countries. These countries included 'Engrand' and 'Itary'.

There was also a five line paragraph in the instructions which was one incomprehensible sentence.

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Fr Weber
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# 13472

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According to a friend of mine who taught English in Sanda, Japan, there is a billboard on one of the approaches into town that reads (in English) "Please come on our beautiful city."

Standing in line for a fast-food restaurant he saw in front of him a young woman wearing a leather jacket which had the words "I am a very sleazy girl" spelled out on the back, in rhinestones. So maybe it was just that kind of place.

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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."

--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM

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LeRoc

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# 3216

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quote:
no prophet: My father-in-law had been in their town in 1944 Appeldoorn with the Regina Rifles. There was a catchy rhyme he recited to our children when very young that he picked up there, something like "duh cobble's in de clinkah", which is the only line of that I can recall.
A belated thanks to your father-in-law, we owe much to these people.

I'm afraid that the line doesn't ring a bell for me. 'Clinkah' seems to be klinker (either "vowel" or "street brick"), or maybe it could be kikker ("frog") or knikker ("marble"). If I happen to find the words of this rhyme some day, I'll let you know.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Galloping Granny
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# 13814

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A friend sent a clipping quoting publicity material from Sardinia. Here is one sentence:

Thanks to the financings allocate you from the Independent Region of the Sardinia, the airport of Alghero Fertilia have supplied to the realization of the new know it arrivals endowed of new tapes give back baggages, to the adaptation of know it departures and to the realization of the centralized system of conditioning, beyond to numerous other investments

By he tenth reading I begin to have a glimmer of the writer's intention

GG

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The Kingdom of Heaven is spread upon the earth, and men do not see it. Gospel of Thomas, 113

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Wesley J

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# 6075

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That's brilliant. I love it! Undoubtedly, it's from a know it leaflet. [Big Grin]

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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)

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Ricardus
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# 8757

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quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
I think it was in an Iranian eating place I saw Foul with Oil.

It was a long time later that I discovered that they were Fava beans, and the oil would have been olive oil ( as served with hummus).

I used to be forever seeing, in middle-eastern grocers, tins labelled 'Foul Medames' - which always suggested some cackling tricoteuse in a grubby mob cap.
There's a shop near here that sells tins marked 'Foul Lebanese Recipe'.

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Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)

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Hugal
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# 2734

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There are several cafes and take always where I live. One cafe had posh eggs on the menu. Turned out to be poached eggs. They changed it when the mistake was pointed out. So posh eggs became pouched egg.
On of the take away menus that came through our door pointed out that, if didn't see anything we liked on the menu we should sak the manager. I hope they sacked their proof reader.

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I have never done this trick in these trousers before.

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