You turnip! Vegetable insults around the world
In Zambia, an opposition politican has been charged with defamation for comparing the president to a potato. Speaking on the radio earlier this week, Frank Bwalya…
Translation – any ideas?!
A friend of mine who is a big cheese in Chinese food circles (or should we say ‘a big tofu’ in these parts?) has asked me…
Fancy a buckwheat noodle enema?
I know it’s something of a cliche to giggle at Chinese menu mistranslations, but the menu I came across at lunchtime today was such a spectacular…
Public explosion chicken!
This is the best mistranslation on a Chinese menu that I’ve seen in a long time, Gong Bao chicken rendered as ‘Public explosion chicken!’ Whoever came…
You say tomayto I say tomahta
Last week I gave a talk at the Free Word Centre in London about the challenges of translating into English the language of Chinese food and…
Grapple factor
I’m pleased to see that an American blog has picked up on the term ‘grapple factor’ – a term invented by my father to describe foods…