Jim Squires posted this at fjetsam 🙂
Every morning I take a little walk over to the block of stores not fifteen minutes from my house. In this little plaza is a dollar store, Dollarama. They’re quite the big chain around here — anyone from Southern Ontario will know what I’m talking about. And yet despite my visiting this store on a near daily basis, every morning I’m still confounded by this sign.
What did I collaborate on, and why are they thanking me? Was it the sign? Did I make it? I don’t remember making it. Maybe I was drugged and forced to work in their Taiwanese factory where everything in this store gets made. Or maybe I have a split personality and I’m the mastermind behind their devious schemes. Whatever it is, my collaboration with Dollarama remains a mystery just waiting to be exposed.
This sign wouldn’t bother me so much if the store was run by ESL students, but these people are born anglophones, so there’s no excuse.
So that’s your little look into my local wackiness for the day. What have you got?
My apartment manager, who only knows English, writes the the worst notices and annoucements. The one at the sauna room reads, “Sprinkle Only Excessive Water Will Damage Heater”(missing fullstops). The notice at the elevator today is “Hot and Cold Water Interruption”.
She also uses “what” for all questions. e.g. “What is the apartment with the leak?” (“Which”!) “What is the best use paint for hallways?” (she meant, “Which is the most popular type of paint used for hallways?”)
I found that a large percentage of “born anglophones” don’t take English language advice from Asians, so I had stopped correcting people. Nice to know that some people do notice these things! Sometimes I doubt if I were wrong myself.
I’ll send you guys photos the next time I see a good one.
haha!
It seems to be Chinglish, which means “cooperation”.:)
lol noodles 🙂 That’s very interesting 🙂
Please send photos and I’ll post it here lol 🙂
if you guys are interested to see more of this, take a look at http://www.engrish.com/
hehe funny stuff … nice link
I am quite offended that all forms of ‘bad English’ are referred to be ‘Chinglish’. Is the main source of bad English from the Chinese community? I beg to differ.
People who have French accent and use some English words in the wrong context are regarded as ‘cultured’ and even sexy sometimes, but individuals from an ethnicity that has ‘less of a prestigious political bloodline’ are regarded to be ill educated when their language use is challenged.
I know these posts are ment to be light hearted and nobody wants to offened others, but I thought it was important to point this out.
Hey, Stephanie, you have a point to a degree, but really… lighten up. I could say the same thing about blonde jokes, but I don’t because it’s not meant to be mean.
Just my two cents worth.
hello,
dollarama is owned by 2 brothers in quebec (rossy brothers)
all the paperwork and signs appear to not be written in english, but rather written in french and then translated to english.
i used to manage a couple in nova scotia and alot of the signs and paperwork are just a bit ‘off’
Bobby
I also see that sign all the time. It drives me crazy!
Before you eat, pay for the food.
Thank you for your co-operation (listening to them and their rules).
Have the English people sunk this low? This is such an easy sign to understand.. but noooo, you gotta laugh at everyoe who’s not perfect..
i like to collaborate with my wfie soemtimes
its funny, be happy
chinglish? well it’s true chinese english is reallllly bad, even professionals have the worst written/spoken english.
I have a boss, Born in England, of totally and utterly Brrrrritish parents. His english is soooo bad, he makes the worst grammatical errors, it’s painful just to lllisten to him and hear him write. funny thing is he thinks he’s very eloquent.
He’s a nice guy, but man, it hurts to hear him talk.
Dear Sir:
We write to introduce ourselves as one of supplier from China, specializing in various types of plastic products, household products.
We enclose a catalogue of products covering the details of all the items and trust some of these items you will be interested in. or you could know more about our products by our website:
http://www.peace-plastic.com.
We could have pleasure to receive your inquires for any of the items and we will send you our lowest quotations,
We are looking forward to your favorable and prompt reply.
Yours sincerely,
Andy Liang
Sales manager
Please add my sky: andy_liang214
Msn: [email protected]
E-mail: [email protected]
Dear Sir:
Upon perusing this page of your site, http://www.peace-plastic.com/en/Intro.asp, I see that you sell “pet bowels”.
you have to take off the comma or you get the Chinese page
Jaquan…
once again you outdid myself…
This sign is up in all of the dollarama’s. We are in Saskatoon and we have them.
Pet Bowels? Eeeek!!!
I think it’s funny how everyone says, “Everything at Dollarama is made in China.” No kidding. So is everything in every other retail store.
Dollarama’s head office is in Montreal, and all it’s stores get sent it signs etc, from there. The sign has been translated badly from French to English.