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hilarious english guides to other languages

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D

Dio

Banned
I saw this image re: Japanese and I want more.

JYmAbqe.png
Click to expand...
Anyone have more stuff like this? IIRC this is for Yokohama dialect from 1879.

NANNY!?
Click to expand...
 
D

Dio

Banned
Piano said:
I don't get it.
Click to expand...

Get what? It's a guide on 'how to say' Japanese words and phrases using words that we'd know how to pronounce, to make it as easy as possible to get the 'sound' close so people understand you.

That being said, some of the ways that manifests are hilarious.

I.E. "Your a shee" for yoroshi, 1-2-3 being "stoats" for hitotsu, "stats" for futatsu, and "Meats" for mittsu.
 
T

ThreePiMatt

Member
Its definitely interesting to look at. This is only a few decades after Matthew Perry opening up relations with Japan, which basically ended centuries of Japanese isolation from the west. So you kind of got to look at this like trying to completely decipher a brand new language.
 
C

Cocaloch

Member
ThreePiMatt said:
Its definitely interesting to look at. This is only a few decades after Matthew Perry opening up relations with Japan, which basically ended centuries of Japanese isolation from the west. So you kind of got to look at this like trying to completely decipher a brand new language.
Click to expand...

I think it's less about the fact that Japanese was "a brand new language" and more that the pedagogy of teaching languages in the 19th century was very different than that of today. I own a number of 19th century workbooks for learning Irish and they use a similar strategy for the early lessons.

Of course you could make the case that both Irish and, though to a much greater extent, Japanese have radically different orthographies compared to English and most other European languages, and that is what lead to this teaching style.
 
H

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
These read like capcha: Skoshe am buy worry arimas
 
R

Randam

Member
Dio said:
Get what? It's a guide on 'how to say' Japanese words and phrases using words that we'd know how to pronounce, to make it as easy as possible to get the 'sound' close so people understand you.

That being said, some of the ways that manifests are hilarious.

I.E. "Your a shee" for yoroshi, 1-2-3 being "stoats" for hitotsu, "stats" for futatsu, and "Meats" for mittsu.
Click to expand...
How about you mention that this is for Japanese in an introduction sentence before the picture?
 
C

cpp_is_king

Member
Dio said:
Get what? It's a guide on 'how to say' Japanese words and phrases using words that we'd know how to pronounce, to make it as easy as possible to get the 'sound' close so people understand you.

That being said, some of the ways that manifests are hilarious.

I.E. "Your a shee" for yoroshi, 1-2-3 being "stoats" for hitotsu, "stats" for futatsu, and "Meats" for mittsu.
Click to expand...

I figured most of them out, but some of them i still have no idea what the corresponding Japanese is
 
U

UFO

Banned
What is the price of your horse?
The price is a penny
It is not much
Is he ill?
He has been off his feed but merely for a shirt time.

This is oddly specific.
 
S

Scrooge McDuck

Member
UFO said:
What is the price of your horse?
The price is a penny
It is not much
Is he ill?
He has been off his feed but merely for a shirt time.

This is oddly specific.
Click to expand...

Presumably it's a guidebook for 19th century traders, so those seem rather useful to have in their vocabulary.

What I want to know is what part does "ghost of a departed cattle" play in all of this.
 
R

RangerBAD

Member
cpp_is_king said:
Like "is he ill?" I would say "kare ga byouki desu ka?"

"Am buy worry arimasu?" Sounds like nothing i can even imagine
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's hard to figure out if you aren't familiar with the language. And if you said it with an American or English accent the results are pretty funny.
 
A

Apzu

Member
Oh, I thought this would be about things like "My tailor is rich".

Anyway, "Cheese eye" is the best, because they are actually using english words and not just english giberish.
 
Thelonelykoopa

Thelonelykoopa

Member
I understand most of what they are trying to write but some of it I'm completely lost at maybe it's the dialect specific vocabulary.
Really most of the second page I have no clue.
 
H

Hastati

Member
Thanks for sharing this, really interesting especially considering the era.

If I ever own a boat I'm christening it The Jiggy Jiggy Fooney.

edit:
Cybrwzrd said:
I found some background to that first page. This is in Japanese though....

https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jeigakushi1969/2000/32/2000_32_1/_pdf

Also found a copy of the book.

https://archive.org/details/revisedenlargede00atki
Click to expand...

awesome, thanks for digging this up!


omg otera --> "oh terror" XD that works amazingly well for certain temples
 
Cybrwzrd

Cybrwzrd

Banned
The short and nasty version it is that the book was more of a joke type of a book made to dupe new arrivals for trade. Yokohama being a major port at the time had it's own pidgin dialect of Japanese which had picked up English, Chinese and Malaysian words as well.
 
H

hirokazu

Member
Cybrwzrd said:
Maybe it is "Anno ba warui arimasuka"?

I know it isn't correct Japanese, but Ba is on reading of Horse...
Click to expand...
But everywhere else refers to horse as mar (uma), so it can't be that...

Cybrwzrd said:
I found some background to that first page. This is in Japanese though....

https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jeigakushi1969/2000/32/2000_32_1/_pdf

One more in English:

https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jeigakushi1969/1982/14/1982_14_53/_pdf

Also found a copy of the book.

https://archive.org/details/revisedenlargede00atki

Also here is a research paper in English on the book.

http://revije.ff.uni-lj.si/ala/article/view/2239
Click to expand...
Good find!

EDIT: Based on that study, "buy" is cow, though I can't think of how that is - gyuu, maybe? So maybe the phrase as "ano gyuu warui arimasuka?" Which still doesn't make much sense.

Cybrwzrd said:
The short and nasty version it is that the book was more of a joke type of a book made to dupe new arrivals for trade. Yokohama being a major port at the time had it's own pidgin dialect of Japanese which had picked up English, Chinese and Malaysian words as well.
Click to expand...
I don't think it was a joke phrasebook - that article you linked to is a serious study of it, but it is a bastardised pidgin form of Japanese, enough for traders to get by.
 
Cybrwzrd

Cybrwzrd

Banned
hirokazu said:
I don't think it was a joke phrasebook - that article you linked to is a serious study of it, but it is a bastardised pidgin form of Japanese, enough for traders to get by.
Click to expand...

Read some of the later pages, and the intro as well. It becomes painfully obvious that the book was a joke, but it also does shine light on the local pidgin dialect.

This is classic:

On page 21 of the book.

"You must make less disturbance driving nails into the wall, or I shall be obliged to punish you"

In "Japanese" : "Oh my pompom bobbery wa tarkshee pumgutz"

Also "Perambulator" (baby carriage/stroller) - "Baby san bashaw"

Also, this very important phrase:

" The great depreciation of the value of the paper currency value of the Imperial Japanese Government renders it impossible during the prolonged absence of my partners to accept your tempting offer"

"Kinsatz yah dai oh Dora your a shee"
 
H

hirokazu

Member
Cybrwzrd said:
Read some of the later pages, and the intro as well. It becomes painfully obvious that the book was a joke, but it also does shine light on the local pidgin dialect.

This is classic:

On page 21 of the book.

"You must make less disturbance driving nails into the wall, or I shall be obliged to punish you"

In "Japanese" : "Oh my pompom bobbery wa tarkshee pumgutz"

Also "Perambulator" (baby carriage/stroller) - "Baby san bashaw"

Also, this very important phrase:

" The great depreciation of the value of the paper currency value of the Imperial Japanese Government renders it impossible during the prolonged absence of my partners to accept your tempting offer"

"Kinsatz yah dai oh Dora your a shee"
Click to expand...
The book does seem to genuinely translate the English phrases into whatever the Pidgin Japanese form may be though. For example the baby carriage seems to be "baby-san basho." Which makes no sense but I can see where it's coming from as a pidgin term. But that's not to say it's not light-hearted in nature. Some of the phrases are a bit wild and I'm not gonna try work out the equivalent Japanese.
 
E

Erigu

Member
hirokazu said:
Based on that study, "buy" is cow, though I can't think of how that is - gyuu, maybe? So maybe the phrase as "ano gyuu warui arimasuka?" Which still doesn't make much sense.
Click to expand...
I imagine it's the other way around: buy -> 買う -> cow
 
Cybrwzrd

Cybrwzrd

Banned
hirokazu said:
The book does seem to genuinely translate the English phrases into whatever the Pidgin Japanese form may be though. For example the baby carriage seems to be "baby-san basho." Which makes no sense but I can see where it's coming from as a pidgin term. But that's not to say it's not light-hearted in nature. Some of the phrases are a bit wild and I'm not gonna try work out the equivalent Japanese.
Click to expand...

Ok, but how about this one from page 26


"Excuse my plain speaking, I am not like other Japanese dealers, and have always made it a rule to ask only the price I will take for my goods. I have travelled in Christian countries and have learned to despise the double faced dealings of our nation"

Is apparently:

"Watarkshee atchera kooni maro maro arimasu. Japan otoko bakka, kono house stoats neigh dan backary hanash"

Which I think translates to "I have been around to many different countries. Japanese men are stupid. This place(house?) only has one price I say!"
 
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