Babelfish, You Bastard
posted on february 5, 2003, tag: random
Japanese looks really complicated. And it is. I had friends in highschool who took Japanese when they finally started offering it in our junior year, and they spent two full semesters just learning how to draw and pronounce the alphabet. By the end of the year, they were able to count and read/say hello, goodbye and similar things that even retards could learn. It's that complicated. So much so, in fact, that even computers can't understand it most of the time.
Babel Fish, via AltaVista, tends to translate Japanese into very funny gibberish. Today I took a look at Apple's Japanese Switch Campaign via Babel Fish and got some great stuff. The names are the best—since Japanese names tend to have actual meaning, Babel Fish makes these people sound crazy. Click the picture of "Bamboo Warehouse Hiroshi Atsushi" up there for a look at the entire list.
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Sarah Grissinger on 03/10/2004:
I know japanese is a VERY tough language because I am studying it a little on my own. I am also trying to learn japanese, and kanji which is equally as difficult, if not harder! Sometimes I'll believe that I have a certain saying down, and the meaning is not what I think it is because the translators have really screwed up! I must say, I have my work cut out for me! But anyways, good luck to you! I hope you can figure out what I can not!