Lost In Translation (9/21)
September 21, 2008 Posted by ChrisThroughout my travels in Asia, one thing I’ve noticed is that a lot of signs look really funny because of poor translations. It could be one gigantic joke on English speakers, but somehow I doubt that. In tribute to this similarity throughout Asia I’ll post one or two ‘Lost In Translation’ pictures a week. It really is not very hard to find signs with poorly translated English, I see several everyday without even looking for them. I hope you guys enjoy these and perhaps even get a chuckle of out them.
The first picture for my ‘Lost In Translation’ Series was taken at a train station in Taiwan. This was on the wall and had a general list of the rules and usage of the train station, kind of like guidelines.
My little disclaimer to go a long with the photos to come is that I have much respect for the many cultures in Asia. It is only that many Asian ideologies inherent in their languages translate poorly into English. Even with these translation errors, I am completely grateful that most signs are translated into English, it has been infinitely helpful to me.
Posted: September 21, 2008 under Lost In Translation
5 Comments
If only they have read this post:
http://www.blogtactic.com/2008/08/adding-language-translation-option-for.html
Haha. Problem with tools like that is you might end up with something like this:
http://www.beyondtaiwan.com/images/lit/transl.jpg
Thanks for the comment =P!
hahaha! I’ve seen a lot of those during my first few weeks in Taiwan…after a while, never noticed those anymore…i have more tolerance then, lol!
We have the same here in Thailand of course, but what I particularly enjoy is the “English” writing one sometimes sees on t-shirts. I am sure if some of the wearers realised what it said they would die!
Especially some of the pretty Thai girls with inviting invitations emblazoned across their chests.
right Chris. as foreigners we are grateful no matter what for these translations. they are better than nothing. imagine if they are all written in Taiwanese characters. we will be lost (not in only translation). like i couldn’t imagine living in Thailand with only Thai characters or in Finland with Finnish only. it’s good to have English translations.