Faux Pas in Foreign Languages

In my attempt to continue to inject humour I have thought of another thread:

Have you (or have you heard) of any mistakes made in a foreign language that have caused amusement.

First one from me:

In Germany I was at McDonaolds (my first night thre, couldn't find anything else) asnd ordered my meal, which they put on a try. I looked at it and said "zum ausnehmen" which I thought meant "to take away", but the odd look made me just pick things up and leave. In fact this means "to gut please" (as in gutting a fish).

A friend of mine is married to an Italian woman who, when in Germany, was called "Maedchen" at a party (i.e. a girl) she hotily replied "ich bin ein Jungfrau" hoping to say "I am a young woman", but unfortunately this means "I am a virgin"

and finaly, a polish woman I met in Germany was in the UK buy cheese and got confused with the words, and asked for 12 stone of cheese (instead of ounces). The woman on the counter apparently asked "have you brought a car?"

One other German one for you. A perfume company tried to sell a product in Gemany called "Mist", but unfortunately "MIst" means "shit".

Finally,
An Italian food supplier in the UK found that they could not fit the whole "General Italia" name over their shop, so abbreviated it to "Gen.Italia"

I seem to remember an urban myth about a Spanish au-pair in a French household who was asked to put the cake (gateau) in the fridge, and put in the cat (gato) instead.

My linguistic ability is so rudimentary that I have never had the confidence to make a blooper in any language.

The most famous german faux pas/faux ami was by JFK when he wanted to day I am an inhabitant of Berlin, he said "Ich bin ein Berliner"

Unfortunately this translates to "I am a doughnut!!!!"

My local shopping centre (here in Iceland where am at the moment) is called Glera Torg - which means something like the Happy Shopping Centre.

Mispronounce it as Glera Tort and it means Happy Blowjob.

I like the one about Tide washing powder - apparently in Denmark it just didn't sell because Tide means 'menstural flow'.

I spent a year in Spain as part of my degree...they have coffee called Bonka and sliced bread called Bimbo! They also have condoms called Holysex, kind of ironic given that it's a Catholic country. Wondered if they were for use only on Sundays?

Girls in my Spanish class at school once said 'estoy caliente', trying to say I feel hot - 'estoy caliente' actually means 'I'm horny'!

In Germany again...

I was travelling with a couple of guys who needed to use the public toilets - Damen for ladies and Herren for men. Whilst doing their business they heard some women come in talking and realised they'd gone into the wrong toilet block. Their logic - Damen sounds like 'Da Men' and as Herren is a bird it must mean ladies!

I was once describing my fear when out walking and coming across a snail (meaning to say snake - schlanger and schnecker). Got some strange looks at that one!

tubs - seem to remember there's a similar faux pas available in German if you feel too hot and say "Ich bin warm" - that could easily guarantee you some interesting (same-sex) company!
And (if female, and feeling a bit chilly) "Ich bin kalt" may also result in being ignored by the opposite sex - though for a slightly different reason....

I said "estoy caliente" to my mother-in-law by mistake once. In case you are wondering "Tengo calor" is the correct phrase. My mother -in -law and I get on very well.

Have you ever invited someone to go skiing with you on the SECOND highest mountain in Germany? Believe me its a bit of a hoot.............look it up on the internet and then when someone asks you where your going for the weekend reply in a bold voice "I'm going to spend some time on the ...."







Can you work it out?

Easy. Jungfrau again!

Another one for you all: a baby food company found that it was not selling very much food at all in an African town. They had a jar with the name and a picture of a smiling babay on the front - what could be wrong. On investigation they discovered that many people in that area could not read, and so to get around this companies did not label the tin with words, but with pictures of what was inside...

This is a bit obscure but... the mistress of some politician had a last name which, in Norwegian, means c**t - so, in the Norwegian books that mention her, it is always without her last name.