Red-faced China tries to reword 'Chinglish'

Cox News Service ^ | 01.05.2007 | Craig Simons

[cripplecreek]

I remember reading one of the earliest translations of "Coca Cola" saying something like "Bite the wax tadpole".

[Mark was here]

It is a little tacky to make fun of folks who are trying to do something the right way. This may be a tad amusing I agree, but it is still not very polite.

[King Moonracer]

"Racist Park," the English name given to a theme park extolling China's minority cultures, was obviously a bad translation, director Liu said.

Get used to it, we're just round-eyed devils.

[zook]

htpp://www.Engrish.com

[WashingtonSource]

I was in China a few years ago visiting Shenyang, the capital of Liaoning Province. Not a big destination for tourists, I suspect. I arrived in the early evening as the sun was going down with two Chinese men and we were walking along a row of restaurants looking for a place to have our evening meal. When the waitresses saw me -- a white foreigner -- they began smilling and saying, "Good morning. Good morning. Good morning." Apparently they thought "Good morning" was equivalent to "Hello" or something like that. It was unnerving at first, but then I had to smile to myself (couldn't laugh out loud for fear of offending someone.)

[Mr J]

Eaxctly. Use those people skills. Big smile, suck it up, keep the conversation breezy.

[NewCenturions]

When I attempt to speak Chinese, sometimes I get quite a laugh from my waiter! It goes both ways.

[martin_fierro]

enjoy a plate of "Crap in the Grass"

[ZOOKER]

Next time get Rosie to help you, she's got a knack for languages.

[Moonman62]

"Bite the wax tadpole".

As Dave Barry would say, that's a great name for a rock band.

[Nakota]

I remember an advertisement for a vacuum cleaner in a Hong Kong magazine proudly stating "Nothing sucks like Electrolux".

[sono]

That's what they get for ripping off Babelfish.

[MAexile]

I work with someone from China that I have described as having excellent English, but being "idiom poor". For example, he told one guy that he wasn't as fat as he used to be, and told a woman once that her hair looked like grass.

I used to think it was just him, but now I'm not so sure.

[bluesagewoman]

A Chinese student once asked me to explain a phrase he'd read in a magazine..."I am a chocaholic and fell off the wagon." It took several days. We became very good friends.

[joylyn]

A long time ago I worked with a Chinese woman who was reading Philip Roth's Portnoy's Complaint to improve her English. It wasn't easy to explain some of the references in that one.

[Noumenon]

Here's one for the retards over at DU:

[ckilmer]

It is a little tacky to make fun of folks who are trying to do something the right way. This may be a tad amusing I agree, but it is still not very polite.
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all true. But it would be worse to have that stuff up when the klieg lights of the world shine on bejjing during the olympics. better to let a little light in now and make the necessary changes.

[L.N. Smithee]

"Racist Park," the English name given to a theme park extolling China's minority cultures, was obviously a bad translation, director Liu said.

That's right. It should be "Fascist Park."

[EternalVigilance]

That's right. It should be "Fascist Park."

Ah so... Someone who understands the new China...