Funny machine translations!

We all know that machine translation cannot compete with human powered translations. Machine translation can be helpful for a rough assessment of what the content is all about, but the human element cannot be eliminated for perfect understanding of the source language.

There is literally no end to the disasters that could arise from Google Translation. When elections took place in Singapore, they chose google translation, National Solidarity Party’s slogan — “Singaporeans Deserve Better’ was translated as சிங்கப்பூரர்கள் சிறந்த தகுதியில்லை! in Tamil language. The result virtually says “Singaporeans are not qualified enough” !

Malayalam translation also is highly misleading. When I tried to get the exact word for ‘Immolation’ it gave me a place name ‘Cheruvannoor’. I have lived in Cheruvannoor, Kozhikkode for an year and never knew the meaning of the place name refers to ‘Immolation’.

Just search with “Immolation in Malayalam” and you will get the translation ‘ചെറുവണ്ണൂർ’. The amniotic sac is a bag of fluid inside a woman’s womb (uterus) where the unborn baby develops and grows. When I searched “Amniotic Sac in Malayalam” I got the result ‘പ്രിഥ്വീരാജിനോട്’ It says Prithivi RajinOdu.. which literally means .. ask Prithviraj ! Finally, I tried to get the meaning of Caramel.. and typed “Caramel in Malayalam”.. the result was… വളി (Malayalam word vaLi means Fart ).

Let us assume you are about to export Caramel Chocolate to Kerala. Needless to say just how embarrassed be your client if you prefer to convince him with words and phrases resulted from online translation tools. The best way is to learn it yourself to the maximum possible extent.

We must, at the same time help the translation services to improve by notifying them of incorrect usages that prevail. You can rate, or validate words, phrases or sentences in your languages by joining their community.