Faux Amis – And other Translation Mistakes

During this chaotic time when most of us stay home, and almost all public events are canceled, I have spent time reading and researching topics that I love. One of the topics I found amusing, is the mistakes made by someone while translating texts. Some of them are very funny.

Why translation mistakes happen? There are many reasons.

One of the most common reasons is the existence of false cognates. According to the Macmillan dictionary, false cognate is: “a word in one language that has a different meaning from a similar-sounding word in another language…”. They are usually called “faux amis” with literally mean: False friends. They often cause confusion among language students, polyglots and sometimes, among experienced translators as well.

Here are some funny examples which are taken from real life.

1.- According to Chamizo Dominguez, In an international conference in Europe, after a Spanish delegate delivered a speech, a British colleague came and congratulated him saying: -your speech was fastidious! This caused a minor diplomatic incident due to a faux ami. The Spanish word fastidioso means “boring”.  

2.- During an international meeting, a Spanish delegate was invited to talk. His opening caused a general laugh among the French delegates. The delegate speaking in Spanish said: -¡Estoy constipado, perdonádme! (I have a cold, Sorry!). The distracted interpreter in French said: « Excusez-moi, je suis constipé » (Sorry, I am constipated).  

3.- One of the most common mistakes committed by Czech students of English and beginner translators, is to translate the sentence in Czech language “ Dej to na polici ” as “ Put it on the police ”. The Czech word police mean shelf and the word policie means police in English. 

Polysemous words very often cause problems in translations. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, “Polysemy occurs when a word form carries more than one meaning”. Some translation errors occur when the translator chooses the wrong meaning of the term they want to translate. Here are some funny mistakes:

4.- The name of the comedy film Married to the Mob directed by Jonathan Demme has been translated in Latin-America as Casada con la Mafia. But in Spain, they translated this title as Casada con Todos. The translator took the wrong meaning for the word Mob so for a Spanish the title says actually Married to the multitude. 

5.- During the 2016 general election campaign, Spanish politician Mariano Rajoy was in the middle of controversy due to a campaign poster in the Basque country. They used the word Alde, the translation his team found in the Basque language for his slogan “in favor”. The problem is that this word means also: -Get out! 

When Machine translations (MT) appeared, life became easier for those who need to deal with different languages in their daily life. But MT’s are far from being perfect and you have to double-check the results. Not everybody does this work and this has been a source of funny mistakes. Here are some:

6.- In Galicia, northwest Spain, in the town of As Pontes, there is a typical festival known as “ Feira do Grelo ” where grelo is a leafy green vegetal (rapini). In 2015, local officials prepared the announcements in Galician and then used Google translate to put it into Spanish. They were all shocked when they found out that the original text: “O grelo é un dos produtos típicos da cociña galega…” was translated into Spanish as: “El clítoris es uno de los productos típicos de la cocina gallega…” (The clitoris is one of the typical products of the Galician cuisine). The text is longer but the MT kept translating grelo as clitoris so the festival received a new unwanted name. We don’t know for how long this mistake remained unnoticed in the official website. 

7.- A funny story happened in the Basque country, in a construction site, where a traffic sign was placed at the entrance stating that entry of private vehicles is prohibited. The bilingual sign read in Spanish: “la entrada de vehículos particulares está prohibida”. But in Basque, the sign read: “Bilatu duzun hitza ez da hiztegian agertzen”. The problem is that the announcement in Basque actually says: “The word you searched does not appear in the dictionary”. Another mistake after using an MT. 

8.- Translation errors using an MT can happen to everybody. It can happen to a private company, to a local government department, and to world leaders as well. In May 2018, After Israeli singer Netta Barzilai won the Eurovision, the PM Netanyahu wrote a congratulations message on Twitter in Hebrew. The first part said in Hebrew: “...נטע, את כפּרה אמיתית” [Netta, at kapara amitit..]. The problem is that the translation of the tweet into English performed by Bing was: “Netta, you’re a real cow”! Bing was not aware of Israeli slang. The word “kapara” is an informal word to express endearment. 

Here are some other embarrassing situations, maybe because they did not call a professional translator

9.- According to a story, after World War II, the US army distributed food packages in Germany. But not many people took them. The problem was that the packages had a label that read “Gift of the US”. In German, the word gift means “poison”.  Better not to offer gifts in Germany, although you can always offer a geschenk. 

10.- in 1982 Mitsubishi Pajero was launched. This SUV was successfully commercialized except for Latin-America and Spain. The word Pajero is synonymous of “lonely pleasure” in Spanish. Thus, a new name came out to market it in those countries: Mitsubishi Montero. 

11.- Restaurants have a hard time when they have to translate the name of the local dishes they serve. Sometimes they just consult an MT. Then, we can see some funny errors. A Spanish dish called Pimientos con Bonito was translated into English as “Peppers with beautiful” (Bonito actually means beautiful, but this word is also the name of a tuna-like fish also known as albacore). A typical stew from Leon in Spain, Cocido Leonés, somebody translated as “Cooked Lions”. But the one that shocked me the most was the translation of the name of a Catalan dessert Mel I Mató, made with Mató cheese (is a kind of goat cheese), honey and nuts. Somebody used an MT and got the name translated as “killed with honey”.