finefriend

Blog closed for now

2006-09-17T21:25:00.000+02:00

Dear Reader,due to insufficient participation and traffic I have decided to discontinue this blog for the time being. Please visit my latest blog instead. Thanks for your interest and for stopping by.

Business Proposal (SPAM)

2006-06-22T16:23:00.000+02:00

Would you trust this business partner...? Forwarded via e-mail by a colleague:Attn.Geschäftsvorschlag.Zuerst muß ich um Ihre Zuversicht in dieser verhandlung bitten. Das istauf Grund seiner lage, als das sein total VERTRAULICH und Geheimnisvoll. Aber ich weiss, dass eine verhandlung dieses Ausmaßes irgendeinenÄngstlich und besorgt machen wird,aber ich versichre Ihnen, dass alles am Ende des tages

Grosse Pointe Blank

2006-06-11T15:33:00.000+02:00

This blog may have left you with the impression that there are ONLY poor examples of English-to-German translation - far from it! Occasionally, albeit rarely, we get to see true brilliance: I'd rate Grosse Pointe Blank one of those 'lucky accidents' that display real language savvy in terms of getting not only words, but meaning across. For example, we hear Alan Arkin alias Dr. Oatman, John

Carrie Doolittle

2006-05-18T23:07:00.000+02:00

A very amusing title for today's King of Queens-episode: It 's an allusion to the classic My Fair Lady, where Audrey Hepburn stars as Eliza Doolittle, who is educated by Professor Higgins, a language teacher. He takes a bet that he will succeed in turning 'commoner' Eliza, a flower girl, into a distinguished upper class lady.Key to this 'metamorphosis' according to Prof. Higgins is a refined way

Deppenapostroph continued

2006-05-17T22:27:00.000+02:00

Deppenapostroph continuedAn unexpected sequel to Deppenleerzeichen:This noon, I was lining up at the traffic light and came to halt behind another MINI Cooper. I let my eyes wander over its rear, checking out, which model it was, trying to determine, whether steered by a lady or a male person. Suddenly a little bumper sticker caught my attention: "Mini's dürfen das!" Dürfen was? What are they

In Her Shoes

2006-05-15T23:08:00.000+02:00

Another example of a movie title as unaptly translated as possible: "In den Schuhen meiner Schwester", originally 'In Her Shoes'. What's THAT supposed to say?The original meaning reads "sich in jmds. Lage versetzen". And I'd have to add that this makes perfect sense to me with regard to the plot. Translators could have come up with something at least remotely related to the idea of someone

Celebrity or 'VIP'?

2006-05-12T23:53:00.000+02:00

05/11/06: Boinx company meeting. We're trying to figure out criteria for defining a key account customer. The boss goes 'any VIP, of course'. A VIP then? And carefully, but tenaciously asking back soon reveals, he's actually talking about 'celebrities': Persons, who - through their careers - have acquired an amount of recognition that you might call 'fame' with some businesses. Famous directors,

Comment blocker removed

2006-05-12T23:16:00.000+02:00

Hi,since this blog - thanks to Schockwellenreiter and Philipps support - seems to be picking up some traffic, I decided to remove the comment blocking for now. Let's hope, the Spammers won't take over...

Weighing your Options

2006-05-10T23:25:00.000+02:00

Here's a real life, hands on example: Over at Boinx Software , where I work, we're currently in the process of localizing some application. I am lucky to have the opportunity of giving engineering a hand with translation from English to German.Today we collectively racked our brains over some English expressions, the usage of which has become so common in German that we weren't all sure, whether

Pre and Post

2006-05-10T22:44:00.000+02:00

No, I'm not talking about a blog posting in the heading. There's another expression, I want to get to. Actually, it's kind of driving me crazy. What I'm referring to is an expression from the marketing/advertising sphere and it's called 'Aftersales'. With 'After' being a typical false friend according to Wikipedia's comprehensive list of false friends, it already makes me a bit uneasy. But made

False Friends as far as the Eye can see!

2006-05-09T21:49:00.000+02:00

Wow! Now that's a pretty comprehensive list my blogger friend and de facto co-blogger Philipp just alerted me to: The Wikipedia List_of_false_friends. Not only does it cover German, but a host of other languages, too, mostly European ones, though. Go check it out and find for yourself, how many spellings seem to indicate semantic equivalence...Also, don't miss to contribute to Philipp's blog. For

Rumour has it...

2006-05-08T08:33:00.000+02:00

... is the apt title of the equally named movie. You have to give him his due: Rob Reiner knows romantic comedy. But that's beside the point. Our point is the German title "Wo die Liebe hinfällt...". I guess, I will never figure out, why German movie titles are so often a complete miss when it comes to a striking title. Especially in this case. A literal translation would have been "Es wird

'Idioms-Night'

2006-05-07T15:01:00.000+02:00

Out of a sudden mood, I decided to go see Brokeback Mountain last night. Although I would like to think of myself as a fairly fluent speaker of English, I must admit that I wouldn't have had a chance of understanding a thing, if the movie hadn't been subtitled. Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal are mumbling their 136 minutes of film to a degree, where their utterances can barely be perceived as

'Professional Blogger' - Not a Job Category...

2006-05-06T17:40:00.000+02:00

...according to some German civil agency. Says the civil servant 'It's not listed in my directory, so you can't use it. Find a German word', and sends my friend Philipp away. He then came up with 'Internet author', which the civil servant was o.k. with, albeit muttering 'it's not a German word, either', and complaining that it didn't exactly fit the bill.So the challenge is on: What is a good

Wunderkinds Eigenwert

2006-05-05T07:43:00.000+02:00

Thanks again to Philipp, who seems to become a regular reader and contributor to this little stop on the web. He found these examples of German words that made it into English without getting translated (a phenomenon we discussed here, but vice versa, with English words making it into German without translation).Apparently, the source who reports these examples, concludes that some German

Introducing 'Deppenleerzeichen'

2006-05-04T15:44:00.000+02:00

Introducing 'Deppenapostroph'A widely seen habit is the use of blanks where they aren't really needed or more precisely: Decomposition of formerly compound nouns. I'm still figuring out to what end people tend to separate compound nouns...See some examples (thanks Philipp for alerting me to them):- 'Deppenapostroph' and 'Deppenleerzeichen'- Deppenleerzeichen and D-Englisch