Spanish speakers sometimes have problems with English
There was an interesting thread about English speakers embarrasing themselves with Spanish. It got me thinking about my ex-girlfriend from Argentina.
One day she said to me: I am going to the pool with my bath suit.
I replied: "No, you mean your "birthday suit", you cannot do that here!"
No, she said, It is not my birthday, I mean my bath suit.
"Oh, you mean your bathing suit."
Her mind was on "traje de baño" which she had translated literally.
Has anyone heard any other examples of this type of thing?
3 Answers
I had a boyfriend many, many years ago that had trouble with prepositions.
When we were getting ready to go out he'd say "I'll be on the car" instead of "I'll be IN the car." It was hard to explain to him why you can be "on" the bus but you have to be "in" a car!
Another impossible thing to explain was how much the word "up" is used in English for no apparent reason: For example:
Call up
Hang up
Clean up
Shut up
Beat up
Meet up
My Argentinian girlfriend had a very strong accent in English. She told me about what happened to her in London.
She went into an English pub and said: "With permission, I would like a pizza please".
The barman was quite busy and said to her: "Not here, round the back."
She then said: "Why can't it be here?"
He replied, quite rudely: "Of course not, the bathroom is round the back like I told you"
Those situations happens all the time to someone who's learning a language. Not only to Spanish or English speakers. I got laughed at many times at work. I just take it as it is: an opportunity to correct my mistakes and keep learning.
