lost in translation... is this the most embarrassing comment someone could make in all innocence?

[oricella]

Posted this before in bilingual, but it deserves a wider audience..

My dad recently stated that my lovely 2 year old was acting like a cat, 'giving heads'.... (the Dutch expression 'kopjes geven' describes the way cats nudge you with their head)

That one had me under the table... (and blush at having to try and explain to him why!)

Anyone else have any good mistranslations?

An Italian student of mine once wrote an essay about his perfect woman. He was looking for someone who would occupy his mind in an appropriately intellectual way. It ended with the words "...but most of all, she would tie me up and I would let her."

I used to live in Indonesia, and had a great friend who told us all the stupid things he had said while trying to preach in church in Indonesian (all these are just one letter different)
Phew it's hot in here, lets all open our trousers (should have been windows)

whole sermon about Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a soyabean (donkey obviously)

and a very common one. I have a dreadful coconut ache (headache)

My DH was staying in Italy for a while, trying to improve his Italian. An old lady asked him where is was from. He meant to say 'I'm Australian but my parents are Italian' He actually said 'I'm Australian but my genitals are Italian'.

Apparently the old lady almost died laughing

not surprised, it makes a strange kind of sense!

oh god I have just said VERY LOUDLY in class,
J'haBITE with a pause on the "bite" pronounced beet - which means "cock" in French.

The whole back row of boys were giggling - I gave them a stern look!

My son used to get very excited about seeing the Fat Controller at Thomas' events. Or pictures of aforementioned rotund train person.
Trouble what he shouted sounded distressingly like : ''Fuckin' Troller''

At dinner once a spanish friend exclaimed "I see that you are very constipated" noticing that I was all full of snot from a cold...

Well, being very naive of all things naughty and their associated names... once I was telling a colleague that I was going to run a race with my dogs over the weekend, I said I was going to "do a spot of cross-country dogging".

Just remembered the classic, from a wine list. "This wine will leave you with nothing to hope for".

A friend of mine once went into McDonalds and asked for a McPolla instead of a McPollo (we live in Gran Canaria). The poor girl behind the counter didn't know where to put herself as he's just ordered a McCock

In Prague, on a menu, 'sack of mr town councillor'. Turned out to be chicken Kiev.

steppemum that has just finished me off! I am not a pretty sight having just read that, it's absolutely hilarious.

I had some fun with raised eyebrows with the thong thing in Australia too - the British friend I went to stay with over there had coped fine with it til I turned up but then all was lost as I kept collapsing with laughter every time I heard it. So grown up, me

Our czech aupair said she didn't like to wear skirts in the summer as her uncles always got swollen!

agree trudy - jesus on a soyabean sent me over the edge

A Dutch friend emigrated to Canada and all the new immigrants were invited along to meet the locals. Another young Dutch man was asked what he did in his spare time. Solemnly he declared, "I fuck canaries". Fokker being the Dutch word for breeder.

I was at the vet's in East Belgium with a German-French speaking vet and a Dutch dog. I couldn't find the word for breeder in German or French and yet on a loop all I had going through my mind was "DOG FUCKER DOG FUCKER DOG FUCKER" - I couldn't even think of the English word by this point and was horribly close to acting out "dog fucker" with hands & body motions. :(

I've just remembered an incident a friend told me about - back in the days when computers used floppy disks, you used to get large ones which were, in fact, floppy, and small ones which weren't. We Brits just used to call them all floppies, but my friend discovered that the Australians differentiated between the two types when one of them asked 'hey John, have you got a stiffy?' He didn't quite know how to reply.

When my cousin first went to live in Australia she was somewhat taken aback at her boss asking her for Durex - what we call Sellotape.
I'm sure my brother (who lives in Stockholm) told me the Swedish word for "plate" was "fart".

Going past a classroom, I heard someone shouting 'Wanking, wanking!' so I went in and found some students clustered round a map of the British Isles. The girl merrily calling this out at the top of her voice meant 'One King!' ie that the UK has one monarch. She was from Taiwan, I think.

A friend of mine wanted to ask for a machine to tape her voice (in the days when we used tape recorders) in a shop in Spain. By mistake, she asked for something to make herself pregnant ('para ponerme encinta'). Then, the next day, our heroine went into the same shop and asked to see some bollocks. She meant little boxes ('cajones' for her cassettes).

If you are on Mumsnet, , you know who you are. Still makes me laugh.

We used to fall about laughing at gros farter in Germany. Not very mature of us.

When I was about fifteen I was thinking about studying law. I told my dad that I was really thinking of going in to soliciting.

He laughed so hard he fell off his chair :o

My in-laws are all Austrian. BIL announced to us on Skype recently that he had just "fisted his fiance". Turns out he meant fist-bumps (like the Obamas did).

Same BIL did an English exchange with a classmate that declared to a pizzahut waitress "I would like to become a pizza with lots of scum on it" (mushrooms).

My MIL has a few amusing mispronunciations- retrievers (the dog) is said red-rivers and she calls dumplings "dumps". I've not yet been told what horrors my shitty German has made up. I'm nearly certain I've done the warm/ cold one mentioned before.

can't believe pizza hut's "we'll toss in the salad for free" what's their excuse!!?