I was inspired by an earlier posted thread to go to www.engrish.com, and after laughing for most of the day I am borrowing an idea from their site and bringing it here.

Make an ordinary phrase:

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

translate from english to Japanese, then Japanese to English, and get:

The orphan of fast brown jumps over the lazy dog

I am sure we can come up with much funnier than this.

Now your turn! :)

Babelfish sometimes doesn't translate "unknown" words :P  Kinda upsetting.  But I guess if you've taken a language or two in school you can figure it out in context ;)

Oh, but it can be so much fun!  Here is another:

Why do fools fall in love? Why do birds sing so gay?

translate into Japanese, then translate that back to english and get:

Why, does the idiot falls to love and enter? why does the bird sing cheerfulness very?

;D

Altavista Translator

OK, taking a Wendy's commercial line from the 1980's…

Where's the beef?

I translated it into Spanish, then back into English…

Where it is the cow meat?

Translated into French, then back into English…

Where is the ox?

Translated into Portuguese, then back into English…

Where it is the meat?

And finally, translated into Italian, then back into English…

Where it is the manzo?

In a similar vein, slang words differ in meaning from common language country to country.  In Puerto Rico "guagua" means bus.  In Chile, it means "baby".  Imagine the consternation on the man at the bus stop in Santiago when I asked him when the guagua would arrive.

After giving rather rudimentary Spanish lessons to members of a dance troupe I belonged to before a trip to Ecuador, one member got a bit lost in Quito, approached a policeman and told him "Yo SOY perdido" (Soy, "I am" perminant condition, as "I am Don Carlos").  His response was "I'll take you to a priest".  What she meant to say was "Yo esto perdido" (I'm not sure where I am, I'm lost).  The priest (who spoke Engish) directed her to our hotel.