featherynscale: Schmendrick the magician from The Last Unicorn (Default)
[personal profile] featherynscale
As it happens, this morning, I learned how to say "Plenty of cheese" in Gaelic. This joins a number of other odd phrases that I know in languages I don't speak. I mean, you learn things like 'yes', 'no', 'thank you', 'where's the bathroom', 'I don't speak your language', and 'I'd like a beer' as a matter of course, even if you never intend upon learning anything else in that language. But I, in my apparent quest for weird shit, have also learned to say things like:
  • "Please stand clear of the doors" in Spanish
  • "hedgehog" in Russian (thanks to [livejournal.com profile] kittenpants
  • "My dear boy" in Welsh
  • "Sheep with teeth" in Latin (thank you, Drix)
  • "We wander around at night and are consumed by flames" in German (Thank you, Einsturzende Neubauten [who ought to have umlauts]
and other things of that nature.

I'm not counting anything odd I can say in French, since I'm fairly literate in French, and so odd phrases are more likely.

So then, what stupid things can you say in foreign languages you're not fluent in? Bonus points if the weird thing is the *only thing* you can say in that language. No points for "I can eat glass, it does not hurt me".

Date: 2005-07-26 08:07 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mildlyderanged.livejournal.com
kleiner affe, or 'little monkey' (German) is popular 'round here.

We also greatly enjoy piecing together sentences about the cat in our feeble spanish: 'el gato es muy...malo?'. Etc.

Date: 2005-07-26 08:09 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] featherynscale.livejournal.com
I have a similar habit in Spanish -- I have the construction for "Where is...", so I do a lot of "Donde esta los pantalones?" "Donde esta mi cerveza?" etc. The nouns that I know are very few, though, so I think I can ask about the location of: my pants, the cat, my beer, the cockroach, the bathroom, and the door.

Date: 2005-07-26 08:10 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] featherynscale.livejournal.com
And really, I ought to know the word for "monkey" in a lot more languages than I do...

monkey

Date: 2005-07-26 09:36 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rfunk.livejournal.com
In that case, go ahead and ask about the location of el mono.

Auf Deutsch

Date: 2005-07-27 12:54 pm (UTC)

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