Summer has arrived and the multitudes of foreign students who come to Ireland to learn the intricacies of the English language have come with it. I wish them bienvenu and bienvenidos and I certainly don't envy them their task. There are many pitfalls involved in learning English, of course - too many to consider here. But now that our esteemed visitors have arrived, it might be timely to consider one of the more charming consequences of their incomplete mastery of the English language.
I remember hearing a snippet of a radio programme which was examining the humorous side of foreign translation into English. The part I heard was reporting on notices spotted in public places. One, in an airport in the Far East, was certainly not what you would want to read, because it stated: "We send your luggage all over the world". Another, in a hotel in the same part of the world, you might like to see if you were a male guest: "You are encouraged to take advantage of the chambermaids".
If chambermaids realised what some of their employers were offering on their behalf, they might not be too impressed. For instance, a Swiss hotel had the following invitation to its guests: "If you have any desires during the night, pray ring for the chambermaid". And a Yugoslav hotel had an even more intriguing notice: "The flattening of underwear with pleasure is the job of the chambermaid".
A Japanese rulebook for hotel chambermaids had some sound advice for them but got the wrong part of the guests' anatomies: "Light pranks add zest to your services, but don't pull the customers' ears".
Hotels around the world have certainly been the source of many a translation howler, especially in relation to their lifts. You may well be familiar with this notice, but may not know it was displayed in a Bucharest hotel: "The lift is being fixed for the next day. During that time we regret you will be unbearable". The Atlas Hotel in Cairo advised: "Take the elevator and press the 12th bottom, could get you into trouble". And you would need to spend quite an amount of time in a Belgrade hotel lift just to read, never mind make sense of, the following helpful notice displayed there: "To move the cabin, push button of wishing floor. If the cabin should enter more persons, each one should press number of wishing floor. Driving is then alphabetically by natural order. Button pressing retaining pressed position shows received command for visiting station."
Some overseas hotels are certainly very willing to entertain customers' complaints. In fact, this Athens hotel positively encouraged them: "Visitors are expected to complain at the office between the hours of 9 a.m.and 11 a.m. daily." Likewise, the Hotel Caravel in beautiful Sorrento tried to be most solicitous towards its clients' gripes: "We would ask you to contact the concierge immediately if you should have any problem regarding the hotel and its services, so that we are able to do all possible to give you complete satisfaction, and make stay a happy one. Please don't wait last minutes, then it will be too late to arrange any inconveniences."
I'm not sure what the Japanese hotel with the notice, "Sports jackets may be worn but no trousers" was encouraging, but the following from a Swiss hotel seemed to offer a particular solution to a particular problem: "Because of the impropriety of entertaining guests of the opposite sex in the bedroom, it is suggested that the lobby be used for the purpose." This could give a whole extra dimension to what is generally understood as "lobbying".
To finish with hotels, one Norwegian establishment was determined that there was a time and a place for everything when it gave notice that: "Ladies are requested not to have children in the bar".
Translations have also given rise to some bloomers relating to clothes, if you get my drift. A number of dry cleaners, from Bangkok to Barcelona, have urged customers: "Drop your trousers here for best results." A Swedish clothes shop has offered the gruesome prospect of "fur coats made for ladies from their own skin". I don't think these Rhodes tailors would have enticed too many English-speaking customers if their notice meant exactly what it said: "Order you summer suit. Because is big rush we will execute customers in strict rotation."
Travel agents, restaurants, doctors and dentists, as well as many others, have provided countless more humorous mistranslations. So you are welcome to our shores, beloved foreign students, now that another summer brightens our horizons, but not to master English to the extent that your wonderful translations should make our linguistic world the poorer for their disappearance.