This whole thing got started when I contacted a Finnish person at work, who's last name is Koljonen. A perfectly normal Finnish surname. I picked up the phone and said "Yes hello may I speak with Mr. Koljonen please". I found myself surrounded by snickering co-workers. Apparently the word "Koljonen" sounds very much like the italian word "coglione", which means jerk/moron/asshole. Well isn't that just nice and mature.
Also, if your name is Pirjo and you need to work with the Italians you're always in trouble because they automatically think you're a man. One might think that it's because your name ends with an O (98% of italian names for male-people end with an O). But it's not that, because then they would have the same problem with Marjo, but they don't. Poor Pirjo, forever the she-man.
A friend of mine from Canada sent me this piece of news of a weird coincidence that had happened with CocaCola (thanks Jonathan!).
 |
| my precious.... |
They had had an idea to have people collect different bottle caps with words on them and then make sentences.
First of all, what a brainstorm.
Now, Canada being a country with 2 official languages, they had the words in English and also in French. The problem was that there are words in French that mean something totally else in English.
Example.
The word "douche" in French means shower, but in English it means, well, that you're a douche (as in a little stupid). Also, when this lady opened her vitamin enhanced Coca Cola juice type of a drink, she was a little offended having found a cap that said "You're retard". In French this would mean that you're late, but this poor woman had also a family member who had some type of a mental disorder, so... way to go CocaCola.
I also talk with the Swedes at work. I speak a little Swedish, and they in turn say the two things to me that they know in Finnish, which would be "Haista paska"
(= f*ck you) and "Perkele" (= hell). Gots to love our brothers behind the border eh?
Anyways, our dearly beloved Swedes are often on a coffee break, because just like us Finns they believe that the coffee break is the most important break of the day (like breakfast is the most important meal). So what do they do? They go "fika". And so they should, only that this causes the Italians to snicker again. You see, the word "fika" is very similar to the word "figa", which in italian means.... well actually a lot of things. But let's just say that "andare a figa", as in "go fika", means that instead of having coffee you're looking for the company of a nice lady with not so many clothes on. And the Italians snicker again.
I once found something really useful at a store in Frankfurt, I believe it was Urban Outfitters. They had these books where they teach you how to say different things in different languages using words from a language that you know already. Yeah, that was clearly put right?
Example.
If you want to learn how to say "Je m'appelle Erika" in French, but you don't know how to pronounce it, they would ask you to say it like you would say these English words: "Jam apple Erika". Very handy if your not that good with languages, but still want to learn how to say a few useless things on your vacation abroad.
A lot of times when I'm doing a spot for the Finns (for radio or TV) they want to use English words, but the right pronunciation isn't at all acceptable. The words in English need to be pronounced in a Finnish way, so that the dude still living at home and farming reindeer at Utsjoki won't get confused about the "strange languages in TV".
Example.
Once they had me say Bosch Car Service. They had me pronounce it like this:
Bosch = Pos
Car = Kaar
Service = Servis
I almost died of embarrassment, but they thought it was da bomb.
And the dude with the reindeer says "Thanks".
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