Funny Language Barrier: Why English Is So Hard To Learn?

Andy Watkinson wrote:

You might find some of these amusing too....

"A new book by Richard Woolcott, who ran Australia's foreign service for four years, points to the pitfalls of translating thoughts into different languages.

Take the Australian diplomat in France who tried to tell his French audience that as he looked back on his career, it was divided in two parts, with dull postings before life in Paris.
"When I look at my backside, I find it is divided into two parts," Woolcott quotes the diplomat as telling his highly amused audience.

Woolcott recalled a speech he gave on a visit to Palembang shortly after he had arrived on a posting in Indonesia.

"Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of my wife and myself, I want to say how delighted we are to be in Palembang," he said in English. The interpreter said something entirely different.
"Ladies and gentlemen, on top of my wife, I am delighted to be in Palembang."

Woolcott said former Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke left his Japanese audience bewildered when he used the Australian colloquial phrase "I am not here to play funny buggers" to dismiss a trivial and pesky question from Japanese lawmakers.

"For Japanese interpreters, however, this was a real problem. They went into a huddle to consult on the best way to render 'funny buggers' into Japanese," Woolcott wrote.

The interpreters told him they had then told the audience: "I am not here to play laughing homosexuals with you".

Australia's Labor Party leader Kevin Rudd is regarded as a master of Mandarin. But his language skills were far from perfect as a young diplomat in 1984, when he interpreted his ambassador's speech on the close relationship enjoyed by Australia and China.

"Australia and China are enjoying simultaneous orgasms in their relationship," Woolcott quoted Rudd as telling the audience in Mandarin."

I'd give you the URL but can't seem to find it.

Andy