Language Log

China's netizens are taking the recent diplomatic contretemps in Anchorage, Alaska in an extremely lighthearted spirit:

(Source:  Weibo)

[This is a guest post by S. Robert Ramsey]

You’ve probably heard Korea referred to as the “Land of the Morning Calm.” That’s a nickname for Korea that’s been used in the West at least since the 19th century.

And perhaps because Koreans agree that “Morning Calm” sounds mystical and romantic, it’s been picked up lately—often for commercial purposes—in South Korea, too. Korean Airlines, for example, has frequent flier perks for members of its “Morning Calm Club.” In 1996, an arboretum east of Seoul was given the name, “Garden of Morning Calm.”

But the nickname is a chimera, the result of a mistake—and probably one made by some starry-eyed Westerner infatuated by the mysterious Orient. ‘Morning Calm’ is a mistranslation of an ancient name for Korea, a name known only from ancient Chinese records.

From a miscellaneous collection of Chinglishisms:

From Guy Freeman:

From Philip Lutgendorf:

Have you tried the Google Translate app on your phone? It has a camera tool that automatically translates text that you point it to, but it looks like it needs some work for Mandarin…

I tried to translate a bag of chinese rice crackers using google translate and these are some of the ingredients it gave me pic.twitter.com/cWIghhrWOs

— Claire!!!!!!! (@awkwardfoxes) February 10, 2021

This has been making the rounds:

1. Go to Google Translate.
2. Set the input language to Spanish.
3. Paste in "soy milk"
4. Set the output language to English or X language.
5. Hilarity ensues.

The obligatory screen shot:

This is all over the Chinese internet:

(source)

Photos taken and curated (also here) by Ruan Qi:

1. "Chī duōshǎo ná duōshǎo 吃多少拿多少" – "Take as much AS YOU CAN" –> "Take as much as you eat".

This is from a hotel in Shaoxing, Zhejiang, serving buffet.

Sign at a shop in Changzhou, Jiangsu, specifically at the Computer City mall:

From Engrish.com:

Liwei Jiao sent in this screenshot:

From Jeff DeMarco:

I’m sure you’ve seen the Facebook translation artifact where it repeats “and I’m going to go to the middle of the day.” This post does that and something similar with “of the 912th.” I keep advising Facebook that these are unintelligible, but they seem to be a low priority.