Something silly...........

So here I am thinking about something a little less serious to blog about and my mind was drawn to an email conversation I had at work with a guy from Poland.

The subject of the email was quite serious so in the initial email I wanted to be a precise as I could with my wording to get the message across but the reply I received was in Polish and using Google translate it roughly translated as "I have no idea what you are saying"

AHA I thought! Maybe I should just shorten the original email down and use Google translate to translate it. Now I know that Google translate can be more than a bit dubious which is why I wanted to shorten the email down to key phrases and just get those translated.....that was the theory anyway so that's what I did.

Soon after I got a reply in English from the same guy so I thought "Hang on! This thing actually worked"......Happy days :-)

So anyway emails went backwards and forwards and we actually ended up having quite a good conversation but something was puzzling me because why did he not just reply in English the first time if he could read and write it so well anyway ?!!?

Turns out he just looked at my email signature and from my name assumed I was Polish too which I suppose has some logic but then I asked him what he thought of my translated email and he just said it kind of got the message across but had he not known our company and what we do then it would have been complete gobbledegook.

So this is my idea. I'm going to have a quick game of "Euro Whispers". It's a new game I've just thought of and it's based along the same lines Chinese whispers except that instead of using the same language I'm going to use Google translate (or some other online translator should Google translate not do that particular language) to translate a simple phrase from English to others and try to have a little euro road trip through different languages and see what I end up with when I get back to England.

And the phrase "Hello, It's fantastic to be in your country and I'm very looking forward to exploring it and meeting some new people"

So where should one start this little journey? It's a road trip so we might as well head off through the tunnel to France.

"Bonjour, C'est fantastique d'être dans votre pays et je suis très impatient d'y explorer et rencontrer de nouvelles personnes"

Oh France with your beautiful scenery, your amazing cuisine and your bountiful wine. I need to see more of you but alas my journey must go on...

Hmmm where next? I really want to get to see more of eastern europe so I'll give Spain a miss and drive through Belgium, Holland and Germany before getting to the Czech Republic.

No need for a translation for Belgium as one of the languages they speak is French so as I drive into Holland -

"Hallo, Het is geweldig om in je land en ik ben echt op zoek naar het verkennen en nieuwe mensen te ontmoeten"

Couple of cup of coffee in Ansterdam and I'm off over the border to Germany -

"Hallo, es ist toll, in Ihrem Land haben, und ich freue mich wirklich zu erforschen und neue Leute"

An efficient drive along the efficient roads via the Nurburgring and a night at Cocoon in Frankfurt I head off to unknown lands......The Czech Republic, could get interesting from here -

"Ahoj, to je skvělé, že ve vaší zemi a já se opravdu těším na prozkoumání a nové lidi"

Being English it's just Prague for beer and I'm off again. Next stop has to be Poland -

"Hej, to dobrze jest mieć w swoim kraju, a ja z niecierpliwością do odkrywania i nowych ludzi"

Krakow oh how I love you so but yet I must leave on my quest. Slovakia here we come -

"Hej, to je dobré mať vo svojej krajine, a teším sa na preskúmanie a nových ľudí"

Now I'm sure Slovakia is a lovely place but all I can think about is that film "Hostel" so I'm not stopping until I get to Hungary -

"Hé, ez jó, hogy az országukban, és várom, hogy felülvizsgálják az új ember" -

Oooh I met a lovely guy selling Hungarian wine recently so I'll stop by his vinyard and camp up for the night or in the morning we're off to Romania -

"Hei, e bine ca ţară, şi aştept cu nerăbdare să revizuiască omul cel nou"

Hmmm Romania.....lets just head to the Ukraine -

"Ей, це добре для країни, і з нетерпінням очікуємо розгляду нової людини"

What do you mean Chicken Kievs don't come from here? That's it, I'm off to Belarus -

"Эй, гэта добра для краіны, і з нецярпеннем чакаем разгляду новага чалавека"

They eat a lot of Pork here and the countries name derives from the term "White Russian" which of course is also the name of a cocktail so lets have a few of them and then head off to Latvia -

"Hey, tas ir labs uz valsti, un ceram uz atlīdzību par jaunu cilvēku"

Growing venue for all male stag parties and the health system consistently ranks as one of the worst in the world....not a great combination but I'm sure it's still a great country as is our next stop Estonia -

"Kuule, see on hea riik, ja loodan, et vastutasuks uute inimestega"

Not really too much to say about Estonia other than it's really as far a we can go by road. Next stop is Scandinavia and to get there we need to hop on a ferry to cross the gulf of Finland -

"Hei, tämä on hyvä maa, ja toivon, että vastineeksi uusia ihmisiä"

Finland maintains a one of the highest levels of health care and standard of living in the world. Life expectancy is 82 years for women and 75 years for men however it is the 3rd most sparsely populated country in Europe. Perhaps they live so long because the have to walk so far to see each other. Sweden next -

"Hej, detta är ett bra land, och jag hoppas att i gengäld för nya människor"

I've always wanted to go to Sweden. I get the image or a place that's really clean and full of lovely, bubbly people. I also imagine there to be plenty of rock bands that play power ballads and that can only be a good thing. Off to Norway -

"Hei, dette er et godt land, og jeg håper at i bytte for nye mennesker"

Norway has the second highest GDP in Europe behind Luxembourg. All this prosperity seems to be down to it's capitalist welfare state and I'm all for that to be honest.

So that's it, the roadtrip comes to and end. All that remains is to get catch one of Norway's massive merchant ships back to England and the ultimate goal of finding out what these multiple translations have done to my original phrase..............

God I hope this is worth it -

"Hi, this is a good country, and I hope that in exchange for new people"

HaHa I like it. Imagine washing up on the shores of Norfolk and coming out with that.

Oh well at least last nights Steak was good.