BEIJING (AP) – Fed-up with menus offering delicacies such as “fried pawns” and “bean eurd,” Beijing is declaring war against incomprehensible and misspelled English-language signs and notices, the state-run China Daily reported Friday. “There are many ‘Chinglish’ words on road signs, public notices, menus and signs describing scenic spots, which often puzzle foreigners,” Xiong Yumei, vice director of the Beijing Tourism Bureau, was quoted as saying. The signs feature misspellings, obscure abbreviations and jarring word-for-word translations of Chinese characters into English.
Some examples: “Collecting Money Toilet” for a public toilet, and “To take notice of safe, the slippery are very crafty” on a sign warning that roads are slippery. Restaurant menus are also fertile ground for indelicate misspellings.
“When I had dinner with my friends at a Chinese restaurant, it took us a while to realize that the ‘crap’ on the menu was, in fact, a misspelled but very tasty fish,” said Janet Clause, an Australian tourist, referring to “carp.” Students at prestigious Peking University have launched a six-month campaign to root out problem signs at 60 well-known tourist spots, relying in part on tips from foreign visitors, the newspaper said.
—Dammit, Engrish is charming and hilarious; I suggest China offer rewards for the best misspellings!
But… ‘Engrish’ is from Japan, not China! The Japanese sound which is written ‘r’ in romaji is midway between our /l/ and /r/. It’s the sound that led to the name Engrish. Chinese doesn’t have the same sound I believe.
The article even mentions that the mangled Chinese English is called ‘Chinglish’.
Of course, menus are famous worldwide for hilarious errors; I see a lot of them right here in new York. And my British friends tell me how appalled they are to come to the US and see signs everywhere for people to invest in their “IRA.”
I hear that alot of investment in the IRA comes from Boston…oh, wait!
I lived with a guy from Japan who spoke very poor English. He needed help with a stats problem, not my best subject, and kept asking me about “multicollinearity”. That conversation went nowhere.
I have seen tons of bad English in China but only during my last visit I thought I’d take some pictures. Most of these were taken in just one day in Baiyun park, near Guangzhou: http://sailor.teemingmillions.com/engrish.htm
[amusing anecdote]
While on a business trip this past summer, a colleague accompanying me to dinner ordered the “Broiled Pollack”, pronouncing it as Archie Bunker used to describe Polish Americans. As my colleague enjoyed seniority over me, I stifled my laughter.
Did anyone ever suspect that that charming little pendant made in the form of a Chinese Character actually said “gullible fool” instead of prosperity? The possibilities of ideographic equivalents to the engrish/chinglish phenomenon in the other direction are just too likely not to already be real. They just aren’t telling us about those.
Triskadecamus, that is an excellent point! And rather horrifying when you consider how many people have Chinese or Japanese words and phrases as tattoos!:eek:
The guy who runs engrish.com mentions in his FAQ that there are Japanese websites that are the equivelent to his in reverse (i.e. westerners improperly using Chinese/Japanese characters).
They could start with my freaking roommate and the guy across the hall who talk freaking “Chinglish” or whatever the heck you want to call it about 8 freaking hours a day. It’s half my room too.
