Language mishaps happen －言語のミスは起こりますよ－

There were two funny stories about language mishaps I read about in Japan this week.  I’d like to share these, as well as relate a funny language mishap I had recently with one of my students.

Osaka Metro tried to make things easier for English speakers by translating their web pages from Japanese into English.  Unfortunately, they used an automatic translation programme, and it made a literal translation of everything, including station names.  So The Sakaisuji Line became The Sakai Muscle Line, and the third carriage became three eyes.

There was also a report this week of a language mishap in a Japanese convenience store.  Staff were shocked to see a foreigner walk into the store, take a look in the drinks section and then pull out a bottle of tea and start drinking it without paying.  When they confronted the customer, he got angry.  He pointed to the bottle, on which was written, “Free Tea”.  Free Tea is the name of the brand, the idea being that drinking the tea leaves you feeling refreshed and free from stress or care.  You can see why the customer got confused.

The mishap I experienced was when I was teaching a lesson about school.  I asked my female student what her favourite subject had been at school, what after-school clubs she had been a member of, and so on.  Things were going fine until I said, “Were you good at P.E.?”

She said, “Teacher, I don’t know that word.  What is P.E.?”

“It stands for Physical Education,” I said. “Do you understand now?”

“Ah yes,” she said.  “I understand.”

“So,” I continued.  “Were you good at Physical Education?  You seem to me like the kind of person who would be good at it.”

She made a little noise as if clearing her throat and then said nothing for a long time.  She seemed very embarrassed and I didn’t know why.

“Hold on a minute,” I said.  “Are you sure you know what Physical Education means?  Tell me how to say it in Japanese.”

“It’s karada no kyouiku,” she said.  In other words, “Education about the body.”

Physical Education of course means learning to play different sports, and learning to run and jump and use your body.  But she thought I had said to her, “Were you good at sex education classes?  You seem like the kind of woman who would be good at that.”  No wonder she went quiet.

And if you make such a mistake, my advice is not to worry about it.  Mishaps happen.

Vocabulary:

automatic - working by itself without direct human control

a literal translation – a version of something changed from one language into another language word for word, exactly as it was originally written

to stand for – of an abbreviation, for the letters to represent (eg. BBC stands for the British Broadcasting Corporation)