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Humorous Blunders in Your Target Language | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| psy88 Senior Member United States Joined 5591 days ago 469 posts - 882 votes  Studies: Spanish*, Japanese, Latin, French | Message 113 of 185 02 September 2009 at 2:40am | IP Logged | ||
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This is my first posting but I have been a reader of the forum for quite awhile. My embarrassing moment came when I was trying to get a native speaker of Spanish to tutor me. I told her that it might be difficult because - I wanted to say I was a little deaf-sordo-but instead said I was a little cerdo-a pig. The tutor did not react and it was only later that I realized my mistake. The tutor's not reacting made me wonder if the mistake was noticed but politely overlooked, or if she agreed.
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| lancemanion Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5572 days ago 150 posts - 166 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Thai Studies: French, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 114 of 185 13 September 2009 at 6:17am | IP Logged | ||
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How do the French even walk with a horse on their heads?
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 meramarina Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5967 days ago 1341 posts - 2303 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: German, Italian, French Personal Language Map | Message 115 of 185 17 October 2009 at 1:02am | IP Logged | ||
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Since I have almost laughed myself sick reading this thread, I guess it's only fair to participate in it. Here's an incident where I really blundered--and surely not my last!
My Swiss friends had a German calendar in their home featuring a cat character named Kater Jacob. I liked it and wanted to buy one. So we looked in several stores, and no one had it. One day, as I was waiting for my friend to park the car, I wandered into a card shop, where a saleslady approached and asked if she could help me. I said: "Haben Sie Kater Jacob?" in what I thought was my best German, and the look on her face was so shocked and bewildered that I wondered what I'd done wrong. Later, I found out the slang meaning of the word "Kater" -- the poor lady must have thought I'd asked if she had a hangover! 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| rggg Heptaglot Senior Member Mexico Joined 6325 days ago 373 posts - 426 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Indonesian, Malay Studies: Romanian, Catalan, Greek, German, Swedish | Message 116 of 185 17 October 2009 at 3:01am | IP Logged | ||
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When I was studying French, my teacher brought along one of her friends to my class, I started talking to her and we were having a nice time .... and then I felt we were ready to move to the next level =), so I asked her: "Est-ce que je peux vous tutoyer?"
She opened her eyes and mouth wide open and replied to me: "Non, tu ne peux pas me tuer" .... suddenly I realized that I had used the word "tuer" (to kill) instead of "tutoyer" (addressing someone with "tu" instead of "vous").......Oh my God, I was so embarrassed, but then she looked at me and started to burst out laughing ... so no harm done =). 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Envinyatar Diglot Senior Member Guatemala Joined 5536 days ago 147 posts - 240 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: Modern Hebrew | Message 117 of 185 18 October 2009 at 9:03pm | IP Logged | ||
Did you know that the Spanish word for the chess bishop is Alfil? Directly from Arabic. I've been having a good laugh reading this thread, awesome stories! Unfortunately i don't have any funny personal anecdotes but I'll share one my father told me about an American missionary here in my country. When he finished his preaching he politely asked "Por favor cierren sus ojos que vamos a orinar" (Please close your eyes, we're going to piss), he tried to say orar (to pray) instead of orinar (to piss). My dad told me he also made references to the "libro de los ebrios" (book of the drunken) trying to say "libro de los hebreos" (Book of Hebrews). 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| psy88 Senior Member United States Joined 5591 days ago 469 posts - 882 votes Studies: Spanish*, Japanese, Latin, French | Message 118 of 185 19 October 2009 at 1:23am | IP Logged | ||
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A similar story- an American bishop was called upon to ordain the new priests in a certain Latin American country. The bishop believed himself to be quite fluent in Spanish. You can imagine the congregation's reaction, and the expressions on the about to be ordained men's faces, when he loudly proclaimed he was going to "ordeñar"( to milk) the new priests rather than "ordenar" (to ordain). Yes, the little squiggle over the "n" has an important purpose, it is there for a reason.
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| janababe Triglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 5514 days ago 102 posts - 115 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, German | Message 119 of 185 21 October 2009 at 9:40pm | IP Logged | ||
She might not have noticed ur mistake there psy88. The 2 words are similar and in a foreign language u will have an accent anyways. Good for u learning a language when ur a little deaf, it's hard enough when ur not. Cool ;) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Marc Frisch Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6665 days ago 1001 posts - 1169 votes Speaks: German*, French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Persian, Tamil | Message 120 of 185 30 October 2009 at 9:06pm | IP Logged | ||
As a sidenote: 'Ivory' is 'marfil' in Spanish, equally from Arabic. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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