Language Mess-ups

[lucybelle]

Do you and your SO have 2 different native languages? What kind of mess ups have you had?

We mainly speak in English to each other so it's mostly my SO messing up. I think his English is much better than my Spanish (he practices more than I do!) but little mess ups are always funny to me.

-He works at a food plant and they have some machine called a "sheeter" which sounds like "shitter" when he says it. Never gets old.
-He called me a bitch once and I told him it wasn't okay to do that. He says "but they always do it on TV!"
-He didn't know polack was considered an ethnic slur, since in Spanish they're called "polacos"
-He used to say "teeths" instead of just "teeth". It sounded an awful lot like "tits"

And for me...

-I recently was talking with his whole family and wanted to say that the school I work at is very "warm" instead I used the word for "horny"
-During a parent conference I told a parent her child worked slow, which in Spanish translates to "mentally ******ed"


How bout you guys?

[kittyo9]

My boyfriend's primary language is Spanish, but I hardly speak any Spanish, so our language is English, although we're also both learning German and I can't wait until he learns enough so we can use that.

- He still puts an "e" before words starting with sp- and st-. I think it's funny when he says, "It's so estupid."
- In vs. on is a constant battle. Sometimes he'll say "in" for things like "sitting in the couch" and I have to take a moment to giggle. I try to correct him when I can, but to his credit, it is really hard to figure out in some cases.
- Sometimes he translates literally from Spanish and tries to tell me jokes. It doesn't always work...

As for me, my biggest issue in Spanish, when I do try to speak it, is getting my "to be"s right. I almost always get them backwards and I'm sure I sound pretty funny. I just can't seem to remember when to use which when I'm speaking.

[elina]

I can only think of one recent mess-up at the moment.. by me

We were goofing around and at one point he jokingly acted like he fainted. I tapped his cheek to wake him up, he "woke up" and said "What?" to which I replied "You passed away :o" when I was meant to say 'pass out' That wasn't nice D:

[ChibiFelicia]

Well we both speak english.

He speaks korean fluently and i speak cantonese fluently. Im trying to learn korean but im barely passable. Not too many screw ups but i always get my tenses wrong in korean - I alawys get "im leaving now bye" and "You're leaving now bye" the wrong way round. His family hasnt said anything yet but he laughs...openly at me lol. They get what im trying to say. I always get formalities wrong too. I speak too "formal" because thats the way im learning.

He isnt really learning cantonese so i cant relaly laugh at him.

[Dziubka]

Lucybelle, you weren't talking about us, were you? (It's actually Polak in Polish as well, so they might not be too upset about it.)

We get things like that all the time. We usually speak Polish together, which is a foreign language for me and sometimes German, which is his 2nd language.

Lately he has been picking up really odd phrases.
There's an expression that's mainly used in the area I come from in Germany that translates to "Old Swede!" and is used to express astonishment or surpise. It's really really colloquial and regional (and probably hoplessly outdated).
The other day my boyfriend used it and when I was finished laughing I asked him where he got THAT from
"What's wrong with it? You use it all the time, when you're on the phone with your family!!" Oops.
I should be more careful of what I say.

There were more, but most of them don't make sense when you translate them to English.

The first year I lived in Poland, I lived by the Baltic Sea.
Polish people saying "beach"... well... my boyfriend still claims that he doesn't hear the difference.

[kittyo9]

I have fun language mess-ups from my previous roommate. I know she isn't my SO, but I lived with her for 4 years... it has to count for something. She's from Turkey, and her English, while excellent, is not perfect.

- Most commonly: Instead of to "turn on" and "turn off" the lights, she will ask you to "open" and "close" them, which is how you say it in Turkish, but not in English...
- When she asks us about her clothes and whether you can see her underwear through her clothes or if her dress is too short, she asks, "Is my ass open?" Apparently, in Turkish, they also use "open" for naked.
- On rare occasion, she will come up with things like, "Do you want one meats or two?"

Which reminds me of another one from my boyfriend...
- I was telling my boyfriend that I was having french toast for breakfast and he asked, "What's the difference between regular toasts and french ones?"

[roosie]

We speak English as it's his first language. He tries to learn my first language Finnish though so he always wants to know new words. He has this weird habit of randomly saying those Finnish words in the middle of normal conversation (and sometimes even repeating some adverts etc. ) which can be quite confusing sometimes.. Once we were sitting on a beach in Malaysia and we were quietly talking and enjoying the sunset when he suddenly shouted "lentokookos!!" which basically means a flying coconut.. He meant he saw an airplane. He comes up with the weirdest combinations sometimes and he thinks that you can make any English word Finnish just by adding 'i' at the end. Sometimes it works, like with words like 'bussi' (bus), 'kuppi' (cup), 'elefantti' (elephant) but often it doesn't. Doesn't stop him from trying with every word though. He gets to laugh at me too (and feel embarrassed) since his mum is Chinese and speaks Cantonese so he understands some of that. It's really important to get the tone right in Cantonese because the same words can mean so different things depending on how they are pronounced. For so many times I've mixed like for example the word dog with the word penis that he has asked me not to do it anymore in public.

[Kiyama]

We speak English with each other.
It's not my native language but I have a degree in it and lived in English speaking countries for a bit but there are still mess ups haha. Just yesterday I texted him about my flight back to Germany and I wrote:".... I was able to fly in piece" ..s
Funny little things like that.
Hi German is waaaaaay worse than my English so it's super cute when he speaks.

[milaya]

I speak better Japanese than he speaks English, so our communication is always in Japanese. Of course sometimes he has to write English e-mails for some job related things and then asks me to correct them. Can always be some funny mess-ups there. Most he just doesn't get the use of "the, a, an etc."
I have also tried to explain to him that sayings things like "I like street walking" and "please got me off here" is not really good sentences to use... XD

Well, I don't get to hear many interesting mistakes since we always speak Japanese together - so guess it's me who's doing the mistakes. Just not sure I've done any funny ones...

Except that I in the beginning kept mixing up the word for "sit" and "touch" ... only one damn vowel in difference (Suwaru vs. Sawaru). So once I got annoyed with him and said loudly "Just sit!" or actually I ended up saying "Just touch (me)!"

I still have a hard time saying the word cockroach... and my Japanese family in-law likes to laugh at that. Lately I think I have it.

I think for me the most embarrassing thing was when we were in Denmark, and he discussed something on the bus and then I said in a loud voice "It's a habit!" ... the problem is that "habit" in Japanese sounds just like the dirty word for a girl's "thing" in Danish... so half of the bus just looked at me.

Sometimes I also get nervous about saying the word "population", because if you don't prolong the vowel in the end properly... it sounds like "penis" instead... (-_-'') my SO has made fun of me for that before.

In last Japanese class I made everyone laugh because I said that Japanese children are cute because they have huge heads... I wanted to say that they have big cheeks and are chubby.

I alawys get "im leaving now bye" and "You're leaving now bye" the wrong way round.

Yep, I'm studying Korean as well and I don't like those two phrases that much. But, you can't just say Annyeong not have to worry about the gaseyo and gyeseyo in not formal situations. My mother in law taught me a trick. Since gyeseyo sounds a bit like "I'll turn off (the lights)" in Japanese... so yeah the person leaving is saying "I'll turn off the lights XD" kinda thing.

[Tooki]

We speak English together. I use some very basic Estonian, which annoys her because she likes speaking English more than Estonian . I don't think I would ever become fluent in it, but I'll learn the basics.

I remember I went to her sister-in-laws birthday at their house. I ended up playing with some babys toy, which taught you basic Estonian words like numbers and whatnot. I had so much fun!

[Anja]

I've really enjoyed reading everyone's language mess ups, a few laugh out load moments Unfortunately I don't have any to share, because my boyfriend speaks perfectly fluent English. Although I'm sure he has fun listening to me mess up when he is trying to teach me his native language which is Xhosa (one of god knows how many South African languages) I really admire people who are multilingual makes me feel ashamed of myself, especially as im half German and I cant even speak that!

[DemonxOisin]

I remember I went to her sister-in-laws birthday at their house. I ended up playing with some babys toy, which taught you basic Estonian words like numbers and whatnot. I had so much fun!

Hehe I love those! Miguel teaches me nursery rhymes that he used when he was little to learn English (which work the reverse way too), and I also bought a bunch of children's books last time I was in México :P

Jesus we have so many silly mess ups between us. He is more fluent in English than I am in Spanish, but he uses English way more than I use Spanish, so the number of goofs is a lot larger for him xD Something that I love, and that we both do, is that, for example, there are some vowels that are pronounced a little differently in English and Spanish. An example is the letter "i" - In English it can be hard or soft, but in Spanish it sounds like "ee" always. Miguel canīt hear the difference between beach and bitch LOL. Also, when we are writing, he tends to spell "these" like "this" and I sometimes forget to write "mi" and put "me". But thatīs more of an accent thing being translated onto paper than a language barrier :P

Iīm super tired right now, but I have a feeling I will definitely be adding to this discussion again as time goes on. We are constantly making ridiculous slip ups, but I just canīt think of any at this moment D:

[kittyo9]

An example is the letter "i" - In English it can be hard or soft, but in Spanish it sounds like "ee" always. Miguel canīt hear the difference between beach and bitch LOL.

My boyfriend does the same thing! All his i's come out like "ee" and I'm trying to break him of that habit, but it's really, really hard for him because he's never had to read an i any other way. There have been times when I won't understand which word he's saying because of his pronunciation of the i, and I make him say it again the right way, but he slips back into it quickly afterwards. I think that's the one biggest pronunciation challenge for a Spanish speaker learning English.

Oh oh, also, he always thinks the word "people" is singular, so he'll say things like "that people is..." and I have to remind him that it's a plural word, not collective singular.

[nickki]

- In vs. on is a constant battle. Sometimes he'll say "in" for things like "sitting in the couch" and I have to take a moment to giggle. I try to correct him when I can, but to his credit, it is really hard to figure out in some cases.

My SO speaks Basque, Spanish, & English and we used to have this issue as well. He would say "I am going to get this or that tattooed IN my hand or IN my neck." instead of on. I corrected him a few times & now I hardly notice him doing it. His English is really good for being his 3rd language.

[lucybelle]

I almost wish my SO still put the "e" in front of "s" words. e-stapler, e-Spain... so cute! But he's gotten really good at it now. When he says "beach" it still sounds like "bitch" but it's not a big deal.

Another language thing I was just thinking about is the word school. In the USA "school" is super general, it basically means a student taking classes. You can use the word school for any level, like a college kid could say "I have to go back to school" or "I go to school in Washington". But in Spanish, school (escuela) means elementary school. Then they have high school (colegio) and university (universidad), but if you say "escuela" it only refers to elementary school. I get mixed up on that a lot because I'm so used to using the word "school" for all levels!