12 Comments

I'm glad that your boss had a good sense of humor. It reminded me of when I had to tell German friends that their term for cell phones, handies, might not go over well in the USA.

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Haha, ah I forgot about that. My sister used to live in Berlin and that always amused me.

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I can't immediately remember a good story about a short/long vowel mistake in Japanese (which also has that distinction), but it did remind me of a story about an American man in Tokyo who wanted the taxi driver to drop him off (oroshite kudasai), but was instead asking the driver to kill him (koroshite kudasai).

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The joys of language

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I really enjoyed this. Thanks for sharing.

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Thanks, Brian. Really appreciate that.

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Accidental miscommunication is often the funniest part of learning a language for me. When I was learning Bemba in Zambia, I tried to joke with a friend that my host father had a stomach bug but accidentally said he was pregnant. They cackled and must have told everyone they passed after they left because by the time I got home, my entire host family teased me about it for the rest of the day.

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It can be a lot of fun I totally agree. We could share stories all day I bet. Most recently I discovered the Finnish for grape and, well, diarrhea are also very similar.

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You’ve come up with an elegant solution Will. I’ve been struggling with the same dilemma. I find it irritating when I’ve committed to reading a post then after an extended teaser it cuts off. My internal process goes something like “don’t waste my time”.

I guess it’s as tricky as learning Finnish.

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Great post as per usual.

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Makes I’m a hamburger look tame ! I love that story wil I could hear it a thousand times . How pretty you were when you were 21 if not a little camp ♥️

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Bless you, mother.

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