That means “YOU don’t work”, what you are triying to say is “no funciona” = “it doesn’t work”. (Literally “It does not function” but “No trabaja” would sound weird.)
:smack: I had trabaja and changed it to trabajas, like an idiot. But yeah, I don’t think it sounds right, either, but was trying to correct the conjugation and delete the confusing pronoun.
I’ve seen NO FUNCIONA on signs in Spain, and that’s the wording I would have suggested. Example. Maybe that would look odd in Mexico, though.
Only if you’re not a Spanish speaker.
English speakers try to translate “work” in the sense of a machine working directly by using trabajar, but as Frodo says, that doesn’t work. Spanish speakers would use funcionar instead.
I think that would be OK anywhere, although fuera de servicio would be more common.
Similar to the way we say “hot” in English to describe both temperature and the spiciness of our food. But Spanish distinguishes between the two: caliente (high temperature) and picante (spicy).
What motivates people to post their speculations about how to say things in Spanish when they don’t speak that language? It’s not like it’s about an obscure Polynesian accent that you might be able to take a stab at and if you don’t, the question will remain forever unanswered. It’s Spanish, tons of people speak it, no one needs your guesswork.
You must be new around here.
Right. I have been to Mexico on vacation before. The correct answer is ‘No worko’. In Chinese, it is ‘Workee na’. Translations are hard because not everyone is multilingual like us.
Spanish is probably the worst language around here for people making uneducated guesses. Everybody who took a year of Spanish in high school 20 years ago wants to take a crack at it. I have 25 years experience living in a Spanish speaking country but am not a native speaker. When I have any doubt about a translation I’ll generally wait until one of our many native speakers has a crack at it.
Fuera de servicio works.
No. That would mean it’s useless, rather than it’s temporarily unusable.
No. Way too informal.
Descompuesto would work, although it would be more common in some dialects than in others and I can’t say how common it would be in Mexican dialects. It doesn’t imply completely and finally broken: someone who has “a bad tummy” is descompuesto as well and we generally don’t expect them to die from it.
As has been explained, but just adding a +1 from Spain, trabajar is just the wrong verb; machines/laws and trabajar don’t go together in Spanish, the verb is reserved for people or groups thereof. It can be used for animals but only in specific circumstances (“leave the police doggie be, honey, he’s at work” - deja tranquilo al perrito, cariño, está trabajando).
I don’t remember seeing it in Mexico, but I’ve spent a lot less time there than several of our posters.
No funciona is sort of more informal than fuera de servicio. IME you’re more likely to see fuera de servicio in something like a sticker from the service company, and no funciona in a sign written by one of the people who use it. I expect both would be understood by anybody.
I would expect to see Fuera de Servicio on a sign placed by the rightful operator of the machine, and No Funciona on a sign placed by a helpful user.
Leave the sign in English - just make it BIGGER:D
Would “Esta rota” work?
Yes, but it would be even more informal than “No funciona”.
Is “clothes dryer” feminine? Or does it fall under “la machina”?
A piece of duct tape on the coin slot would say it in every language. Pull the fuse for insurance.
The word is secadora, and is feminine. (Likewise lavadora, washing machine.)
Here in the Yucatan, we call it “la secadora”