Is the Chinese good? The Korean?

zhenlijiang

May 19, 2010, 03:41 PM posted in General Discussion

We're in Japan, browsing in a clothing and accessories shop. We see this sign by the fitting room. The original is Japanese--it's all good (on second thought, maybe not).** The English, Chinese and Korean must have been translated from the Japanese.

fitting room

Is the Chinese 正确? The Korean?
Can you figure out what happened with the English--?

** edit： Changye's point is well taken. The Japanese in the sign is no model either. It says

ご試着の際は、スタッフまでお声掛け下さい。
go-shichaku no sai wa, sutaffu (staff) made o-koe-kake kudasai

It would have been better to say

ご試着の際は、スタッフまで声をお掛け下さい。　
go-shichaku no sai wa, sutaffu (staff) made koe wo o-kake kudasai

The difference is where to place the honorific お "o". In the sign the decision to place it on 声 (apparently because it's the customer's voice and they thought it would be disrespectful not to place it there) resulted in the concoction of the "O-V" verb 声掛ける koe-kakeru which Changye and I agree is not good as a verb in Japanese.
Anyway 掛ける kake-ru is one of those verbs that need many different translations, collocate with so many different kinds of objects--and that is at the heart of the English disaster!

好，那今天的 J-Pod 初中级课程就到这儿！

changye

May 05, 2010, 11:29 AM

I'm afraid I can't see the photo, as is often the case in the PRC. Would you kindly post the phrases here?

zhenlijiang

No! I have to open yet another account with a different image hosting site?

(Changye I think it must be just in your 小区 as Bodawei has said before. What have you done, to get your privileges restricted--?)

The Japanese:

ご試着の際は、スタッフまでお声掛けください。

The Chinese:

使用前請尋求服務員協助

The Korean sorry I don't know how!

OK and I said the Japanese was "all good", but strictly speaking it's probably a case of "too much kanji". You can see where the problems with the English came from.

changye

Hi zhenlijiang

The Japanese phrase "お声掛けください" sounds somewhat strange to me. Is that a modern way to say "声をお掛けください" in Japan now? If so, I'm afraid I need to learn Japanese from scratch.....

I don't think “請尋求服務員協助” is natural Chinese, even though local people would understand what it means. Perhaps something like “请告知服务员” might be more appropriate, although I'm not sure about that. I've never seen such a sign here in China in the first place, hehe.

As for the English translation, in a sense, it's very precisely translated word by word. I love "the sense of humor" very much.

I believe the Korean translation is not as disastrous as the English one.

suansuanru

changye is right,the chinese part is unnatural.

bodawei

Hi Zhenlijiang

In this case it is not Changye's behaviour that is the problem. ;-) I cannot see the photo either - Flickr works for me. How come Changye can see the English.. aaah .. he is just looking at tal's post.

On this topic (sort of) .. I was in Xinjiang for a week over the May holidays. At present the Internet is entirely cut off from the rest of the world! So it is really a Xinjiang intranet. Used mainly for playing games? Also I took a few photos of Uighur translations of revolutionary posters - I would love to know if they are 'machine translated' - do any poddies read Uighur I wonder? i imagined them saying something quite different to the Chinese, with most Chinese people blissfully ignorant. :)

changye

Hi zhenlijiang

Thanks, now I can see the photo. I feel the Korean translation is also "disastrous". I would say "시착하실때 스태프 한테 연락해 주십시요", and I think at least this makes sense, but I don't know if it's a natural way to say it in Korean.

zhenlijiang

Changye you're not alone. And I agree also. お声掛けください is probably "modern" but also a mis-use, of Japanese. I'll go edit my post.

http://nplll.com/mutter/archives/2008/04/post_1906.php

So you can see the photo now--? I didn't put these photo on Flickr, because the last time I did you weren't able to see them. And now Bodawei can't see? It's a time-shift kind of block is it? Very strange.

bodawei

Changye & Zhenlijiang

I have posted a photo of a revolutionary slogan poster in my Signs group (it took me a good ten minutes to find my own Group). :) It includes some 维吾尔语 .. to make it challenging a 维吾尔 guy told me that 维吾尔语 is not standard Arabic script, it includes some unique characters.

changye

Marie-san

As far as blocking concerns, the PRC has very sophisticated and state-of-the-art techniques. "Time shift blocking" and "regional blocking" are as easy as 一二三！

zhenlijiang

May 05, 2010, 01:46 PM

Baba 真的很 literate! 佩服！ Despite everything wrong with this English you read on, and read in. Yes of course what they mean to say is hey, don't just go and use the fitting room--you got to ask us first (but much more politely).

zhenlijiang

May 05, 2010, 11:46 AM

No! I have to open yet another account with a different image hosting site?

(Changye I think it must be just in your 小区 as Bodawei has said before. What have you done, to get your privileges restricted--?)

The Japanese:

ご試着の際は、スタッフまでお声掛けください。

The Chinese:

使用前請尋求服務員協助

The Korean sorry I don't know how!

OK and I said the Japanese was "all good", but strictly speaking it's probably a case of "too much kanji". You can see where the problems with the English came from.

bababardwan

May 05, 2010, 11:52 AM

please multiple the voice=please raise your voice=please sing out=please grab the attention of/please get the assistance of[ [please get the permission of ,please don't try on 3 layers and return 2,are you sure you can afford that,have you seen pretty woman?]

by=of

the staff

when=at that time you decide you want to try it on=before

you try it on