Two from Chinese:
Cantonese:
Q: Did you hear the one about the three shrimp?
A: No, how does it go?
Q: Ha ha ha!
(“Ha” is the Cantonese word for shrimp)
Mandarin:
Q: What’s a pirate’s favorite city?
A: Beijing
(cf. 1) the pirate joke genre and 2) the fact that the Beijing accent of Mandarin uses the “ar” sound a lot–aka the “rhotic suffix -r”)
I used to know a joke that relied on a little knowledge of French and Spanish. My Spanish teacher told it when we were learning how to use pronouns that go before the verb (i.e. “me la dio,” instead of “dio ella a mí”). I don’t remember the details, but I think someone fell and hurt himself, the French guy said, “Ah, c’est la vie” (such is life) and the Spanish guy replied, “Ah, sí señor. Yo se la vi.” (Yeah, I saw it happen to him).
Roughly…
Two from the POV of a traveller in Montreal.
All the stree signs are in Italian. Stop Arrete.
At the hotel everyone was peeing in the pool. There was a sign that said piscine.
A Spanish lady is in the airport, waiting to board her flight. The announcement comes over the PA: “Passenjaros abordar.”
“Oh no,” the lady exclaims, “I don’t have my knitting needles!”
(Abordar = embark, a bordar = knitting.)
Not a great one, but I heard this 20 years ago from a friend’s Spanish father and this is the first time I’ve gotten to tell it. Sorry if there are spelling errors; this joke represents pretty much the sum total of my knowledge of Spanish.
There’s a cartoon showing two tourists in Montreal under a big for rent (à louer) sign. “What a great city! All over the place, signs for “A LOVER,” with a phone number!”
I’m also told a good way to dick with anglo tourists is to let them know that the province runs a chain of hotels in every town in Quebec, called Hôtel de Ville… (“hôtel de ville” means city hall!)
Finally, I myself made up the following pun in Catalan:
Si una dona té cinc fills i cinc filles, que és la mare de deu?
("If a woman has five sons and five daughters, is she the ‘mother of ten’?)
Mare de Déu means the Virgin Mary (“mother of God”); deu means “ten.”
Bennett Cerf told this one better than I will.
A wealthy lady decided her three cats had shredded their last curtain. She told her French butler to take them out and drown them in the river. He lured them into a burlap bag with a piece of fish, but once he got them out of sight, he gave them away. He put a rock in the sack and heaved it into the river. Later, his boss demanded, “Maurice, did you drown those pussycats?”
“Oui, Madame. Un, deux, trois cats sank.”
What do you say to a Mexican steer that has fallen off a bridge?
“Nada, buey!” (Swim, ox!) or (Nothing, fool!)
Annamaria is a “parts model.” From the knees down, she is worth her weight in gold. She makes $5,000 an hour modeling in shoes, but she really hauls in the money when she is photographed rubbing lotion on her fabulous toes. They are her pies de resistance.
Pies, in Spanish, are toes. Piece de resistance, in French, is (roughly) the best part.
(I don’t speak French or Spanish worth a peso. I hope I haven’t mangled these too badly.)
I know very little about the Neti Pot. However, as a child, I was called “le petit Nott.”
L.h.o.o.q
Pies are feet, not toes (which are dedos del pie).
Sienkiewicz wrote an important historical novel about 17th century Poland called *Ogniem i Mieczem
There is the story that after the British General Charles Napier conquered the province of Sindh (in what is now Pakistan) he sent back a one word message in Latin: “Peccavi”, which means “I have sinned”.
oooo! Puns (dajare in Japanese) are the mainstay of 3rd and 4th grade humour so I am learning a lot via my son! When his same-grade friend from a totally different part of Japan came to stay, they found to their delight that they both knew different ones, and spent their holidays swapping them. When they went back to their respective schools they got uber cool points for all the new ones they knew.
Here are a couple:
Obachan ga ike ni ochita.
O! Bachan!
(My aunt fell into the pond. Oh! Splash!)
Rabu retaa wo yabureta
(I ripped up the love letter)
Chiitaa ga ochiitaa!
(The cheetah fell dowwwn!)
Itchy knee, son?
Cookbook author Peg Bracken has a recipe for “Boeuf and Oeufplant.” Not quite a pun, but still funny, considering the French call eggplant “aubergine.”
The publicity campaigns of the Berlin Municipial City Cleaning Service did not shrink from puns:
We kehr for you (kehren = to sweep)
Bemannte Räumfahrt (manned sweeping mission) - Bemannte Raumfahrt = manned spaceflight.
Herta BSR - Herha BSC = the local football/soccer team
Saturday Night Feger - Feger = sweeper
Die vorfahren und die nachkommen (those who drive in front (showing a bus driver) and those who come after - Die Vorfahren und die Nachkommen (the difference is just in the capitals) = the ancestors and the descendants.
Fleiß am Stiel (industriousness on a stick) - Eis am Stiel = ice on a stick.
Laubburschen (leaves boys) - Laufburschen = messenger boys
Feger und Sammler (sweepers and gatherers) - Jäger und Sammler = hunter-gatherers
Er kam, sah und fegte (He came, saw and swept) - Er kam, sah und siegte = he came, saw and won.
Unser Fegen auf all Euren Wegen (Our sweeping on all your ways) - Unser Segen auf all Euren Wegen = Our blessing on all your ways.
Dreckig wars ('Twas dirty) - the allusion is apparent from the picture
Laubbub (leaves boy) - Lausbub = boy up to mischief
Matschos - Matsch = mud
Old Streuhand - Old Shatterhand, Old Surehand etc. are heroes of Karl May’s books.
Frühstücksflocken (breakfast cereals/breakfast (snow)flakes)
Fest zubacken (intensely baking) - Fest zupacken = heartily lend a hand
Oh Tonnenbaum (Oh garbage bin tree) - Oh Tannenbaum = Oh christmast tree
Oh yes. In the anime series Ranma 1/2, one of the characters keeps changing into a panda. At one point he’s standing outside a bakery munching on a bun; one of the other characters comments Pan da (it’s bread).
Puns are fairly commonplace in anime, since Japanese is rife with homophones. One of the most common is “koi,” which means both “love” and “carp.”
I remember a non-English pun posted on this board a while back. I think the language was German. It was a pun on “To be or not to be,” and the pun resulted because one of the words could also mean “is the child of” or something like that. The source of the humor was somebody’s uncertain paternity.
Anyone remember this?
I didn’t see the post you refer to, but this does work in German. Sein oder nicht sein can be read as “To be or not to be” or as “His or not his”. (in the latter case the implied noun that “his” refers to must be of male gender).
I posted that. http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=5849136&highlight=sein#post5849136
Of course, there’s Asimov’s mystery story, “The Key”, the solution of which involves a pun spanning English, German, and Latin.I’m keeping this short, so it’s a bit disjointed. A person had written a cryptic message which he said was “the key” to where an alien mind-expander was located. The person was soon found dead with his apparent attacker, also dead. Wendell Urth, knowing the message was “the key”, figured out it was the only clue. “Key” in Latin is “clavis”. “Clavis” sounds like “Clavius” is a crater on the Moon. Its name is the Latinized version of Klau, the astronomer it was named for. “Klau” sounds like “clue”. The alien object was located near the crater Clavius.
Great! Thanks. That was a fun thread to revisit in general.
