Google Translate is a great tool, but it is far from perfect. Producers working on Episodes, a new BBC show staring former Friends star Matt LeBlanc found themselves in bit of a pickle recently when they tried to use it to translate a phrase into Hebrew for a recent episode.
Jewish blogger Shahar Golen was watching an episode of Episodes when he noticed a message written in Hebrew on a tombstone in the background. As a Hebrew speaker he was confused by the message underneath the English as it appeared to be gibberish. Once he got a closer look at the phrase, the first thing Shahar discovered was that the Hebrew was backwards. Hebrew, unlike English, is read right to left and English is read left to right. Once that was corrected, Shahar was able to translate it, but he was suprised as to the actual message. Instead of something that resembled the English above it, "Beloved Husband and Father Dearly Missed" , he discovered that the literal translation of the Hebrew was, "he was pickled at great expense".
At first, Shahar didn't know where such a bad translation could have come from. However, the thought occurred to him to take a look at Google Translate, and there he found his answer. Entering the English phrase into Google Translate, Shahar found that it returned the exact Hebrew that was on the tombstone. He found it humorous, especially in the light of the conspiracy theories about Jews running Hollywood, saying, "Someone at set design couldn’t find a Jew to save his life and decided to wing it. Which begs the question: Aren’t we running this joint?"
1. http://frgdr.com/blog/2012/05/31/jews-do-not-run-hollywood-the-proof/
2. http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=4027
3. http://translationmusings.com/2012/06/14/lost-in-google-translate-u-s-shows-attempt-at-hebrew-runs-afoul/
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
BBC,
conspiracy,
Friends,
Google Translate,
Hebrew,
Hollywood,
Jew,
Matt LeBlanc,
pickle,
Shahar Golen
Pickled at great expense
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4 comments:
This one sounded so crazy I didn't believe it at first! Way too funny :D
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