Mokusatsu: The Word That Launched 41 Kilotons
Suzuki Kantarō, Hiroshima, and the Rick and Morty school of intercultural communication
Mistranslations are funny. They make us laugh. We laughed when KFC’s botched one of its earliest forays into China with its erroneous translation of its classic slogan “Finger Lickin’ Good” as “eat your fingers off,” and when the Parker pen company assured the Mexican public that its writing implements would not “leak in your pocket and impregnate you.” (Apparently nobody told them that the Spanish verb embarazar doesn’t mean the same thing as it does in English.)
Sometimes mistranslations and cross-cultural misunderstandings even lift spirits. In 2007 the Croatian national football team rose to the occasion in a crucial Euro 2008 victory against England inspired, in no small part, by a hilarious gaffe by English opera singer Tony Henry. During his delivery of the Croatian national anthem, Lijepa naša domovino (“Our Beautiful Homeland”), Henry botched the crucial line “Mila kuda si planina” (roughly translated as “You know, my dear, how we love your mountains”), instead pronouncing it “Mila kura si planina” (literally “You know, my dear, my penis is a mountain”). Far from offended, the Croats loved it — and Henry was subsequently invited to sing the anthem again.
