Language difficulties

[tcm]

I recently was approached by a distinguished crewmember who asked me qite urgently for Red Bull. Strange request but no matter, I did in fact have some so I quite triumphantly dug some out of a distant locker and handed him a few cans. But he was not pleased. Eventually it turned out he was asking for a "red bowl" and our differing accents led me to misinterpret. Has anyone else had similar misunderstandings on board?

 

[Sixpence]

ex wife got sea sick on a hovercraft crossing once , I heard her say gonna fart so I said go ahead but keep it quiet and hope it doesn't smell , she said somthing like " Don't be disgusting I'm gonna barf , get me a bag " , can't satisfy some

 

[billskip]

funny you should ask that ..a couple of hours ago a dutch man ask me "do you have sharts of these waters?" I said "there is a chandlers in Polamar they may have charts there" he said "they sell sharts in a shop!" I said "well this is Venezuela you can buy most any thing here but they are not allways original." then it dawned on me... and he looked totaly confused that they sell sharks in Polamar
/forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif av anuver /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

 

[tangofour]

Just after having moved from South Africa to the UK I asked a PA if she could give me a stiffy.

In SA a floppy disk was always a 5 1/4 inch diskette, the ones in the soft, usually black, plastic sleeve. A stiffy was naturally a 3 inch mini diskette, those one in the hard casings. After all down there we call a spade, sorry, a shovel a shovel.

Took a while to live that one down!

/forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

 

[jenku]

Probably has been posted here before (don't bother about the German in the beginning, the fun starts later).

I am sinking!

 

[Pye_End]

I was in Calais a few years ago when a dutch couple asked me - 'What is the goat'.

Eventually I worked it out, and the answer was 'no need - you just pull the string'.

Anybody work this one out?

 

[Lakesailor]

We have many people with various languages and accents visiting in our fine accommodation emporium and I treat them all with the same look of total bafflement.

 

[NPMR]

Code?

 

[Pye_End]

Very good. What about the string bit?

 

[Pye_End]

Probably hard for the dutch to pronounce 'mountain' and 'hill' even in their own language.

At least you don't have all those strange words that the Scots call their hills I suppose.

 

[whipper_snapper]

My favourite is still the Australian skipper's advice to 'wash your dicks every day with seawater'.

 

[silver-fox]

I was sailing in my first ever gale in a small boat with a good friend and our respective wives.

Both the women were below and starting to feel seasick. On their behalf I leaned out into the cockpit and asked the helmsman to pass me a bucket out of the locker he was sitting on.

This request was blown away unheard on the wind and not knowing what I said he bellowed back at me "WHAT?"

Realising that brevity was everything I shouted back "BUCKET" and then repeated it for emphasis "BUCKET"

At this the helmsman did an anxious full 360 degree scan of the horizon followed by an equally anxious quick visual check of the boat before replying confusedly "FOOK WHAT?" /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

 

[Matrosen]

In our early days of sailing together I asked my German wife to go to the stern. As she started towards the bow I asked her what she was doing. "Going to the stern." she replied. Then it dawned on us. In German, your forehead is the 'Stern' therefore the stern of the boat must be the pointy bit.

 

[Fr J Hackett]

In a car with my ex boss (Austrailian) and his PA when he suddenly exclaimed that he felt like a shag on a rock, it took some explaining.

 

[Lakesailor]

All you had to do was say "like a cormorant........" and she would have understood straight away.

 

[Bodach na mara]

I was told that the difference between a cormorant and a shag is that a cormorant is a bird on a buoy and a shag is the other way round.

 

[hylass]

Most « single language » speaking people can’t realize how it is sometime difficult to know all subtleties of foreign languages, mostly when you speak several of them.

When you start learning, people are very friendly and help you, correcting your mistakes.. but as your knowledge improve, most of them feel impolite to correct you.. and up to a certain level, it is more difficult to improve your skills..
/forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif

 

[Heigaro]

A friend was moored in the rain next to another boat with a Yorkshire skipper and his French wife. He overheard her asking him,"What are zese steroids you keep talkin' about?"
"Wot on earth dost tha mean, lass?"
"You say zat ziss rain is coming down in steroids!"
"Stair-rods, yer daft bat, stair-rods!"

I can't go out in heavy rain without thinking about that now.
/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[Heckler]

was on a sailing holidays flotilla with new zealand hostess, she wanted to scrub my deek!! swmbo was well impressed!