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* Pick any online text translator. Pick a block of text - the beginning of Hamlet's most famous soliloquy, for example. Now translate it to any other language, and back again.
** English -> French -> English
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** English -> Japanese -> English
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** English -> Spanish -> English
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** There are actually translators that do this ''deliberately'' like [http://tashian.com/multibabel/ Lost in Translation] (not the film). As in, that's the sole reason for their existence. Same with [http://www.translationparty.com/ Translation Party].
*** For instance, the classical ''To be or not to be, that is the question'', after a English-Japanese-Chinese-French-German-Italian-Spanish-English trip, becomes
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* One of the first websites to deal with this phenomenon, particularly as applied to hilarious usages of English in Asian countries, is [http://www.engrish.com/ Engrish.com].
* Need I remind you guys that WE WILL BURY YOUUUU!!!!!!!
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* [http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/7639/44723110448bb4ab671co.jpg This], spotted at a mall in Malaysia, but no doubt was already like that when it was brought in from China. Doubly funny if you had [http://img97.imageshack.us/img97/2584/447231046838722e2054o.jpg looked at the ride] [[Unfortunate Implications|from the side]] first...
* ''[http://clientsfromhell.net/ Clients From Hell]'', a site that publishes anonymous anecdotes about insufferable web design clients, featured this beautiful post:
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'''Me:''' Ok, well we’ll need to get a price for the translation.
'''Client:''' Can we not just do it in house? I’m sure between us we can speak Italian. }}
* This trope was invoked by the defence of one of the accused during the trials of the 2004 Madrid train bombings. Apparently the thing that got him arrested as a possible coordinator of the attacks was a Spanish translation of an Italian translation (the guy was living in Italy at the time) of a sentence in Arabic that could be interpreted in more than one way.
* On the pedestal of the St. Wenceslas statue at Wenceslas Square in Prague there used to be a sign: "Keep of the statue and the basement".
* On the back of a piece of Chinese candy named "Soft sugar happy flavor" is this helpful description:
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is being rich the happy gift which and
the after taste is accompanies us to grow
is childhood many joyful recollections. }}
** For some reason that made me think of [[Just Shoot Me|Lemon Wacky Hello]].
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* An ad for what appears to be some kind of translator. The ad was in Swedish, and, judging by the quality of the translation, it wasn't a very good translator. Word-for-word transcript:
'''Läsa några webbplats på alla språk!''' En klicka översättning, hämta nu fria!
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webbplats: website (singular)
på alla språk: in all languages
En: An
klicka: (to) click
översättning: translation
hämta nu: retrieve now
fria: free (opposite of incarcerated, not opposite of expensive)(plural) }}
* One promising-looking place in Quimper, France offered a ''crêpe aux avocats'' which was duly translated into the restaurants English menu as ''Lawyer crepe.'' ''Avocat'' is a homonym for two words in French, one meaning "avocado" and the other "lawyer."
* In Subway restaurants in Japan, the written advertisements on cups are unintentionally suggestive:
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* During the [[Cold War]] Soviet espionage conveyed lots of information about the Manhattan Project to Soviet nuclear scientists. Unfortunately the translation work was often uneven. The famous example is that because no one understood what the English phrase "squash court" meant, for many years the Soviets believed Enrico Fermi had constructed his first breeder reactor in a pumpkin patch.
* [[YouTube]]'s "Transcribe Audio" function can result in this, especially if the person's voice is speaking fast or is slurred.
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