Lost in Translation - This menu at a mall restaurant in Jeddah just had too many weird translations on it that I couldn't understand what most of the items were. Like, what is a "Chicken Knot"? Or "Node Thickness"? Or what kind of dish is a "Vegetable Problem"? How about "Precarious Chicken"? And what is a "Complaisant" dish?
And all these "Blindfolded" dishes? Does one need to be blindfolded in order to eat them, or what? I think Google translate was used for this menu ... I'd be mad if I paid someone to translate it into English and the result was this!
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It must have been an automatic translation of some kind.
ReplyDeleteI used to see funny translations on Chinese menus in NYC, but nothing as weird as this.
Wow - this one's an impressive set of mistranslations. I love the blindfolded ones - is the second one anything like a blind date? I always love seeing your everyday shots of Jeddah - I'm still surprised how many signs are translated to English.
ReplyDeleteBlindfolded?
ReplyDeleteSaudi here..
ReplyDeleteVery very funny, I laughed so hard
This is actually literally translation but it is completely different meaning, actually for the first time I took notice of the literal meaning of arabic "blindfolded" in this dish!!! :D
Ma'soob (literally mean: blind-folded, but it has other *subtle eloquence* meaning: blended food together <<< ok, does blind & blend connected in its origin somehow?
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Anyway..
Ma'soob: Bread crumbs + mashed banana blended together. very very delicious, but its look will make foreigners run way!
My favorite is mixing it with white cream+honey.
Okda: It is the word "knot" but it is has many other meaning depending on the situation, I actually didn't know its other meaning until searching for it while writing this comment, here it is my best result: Okda can be used to describe the land rich in trees & grass [i.e. Let your animal eat from this "okda"]
So.. Chicken okda: chicken pieces with many plant ingredients (spicy & non spicy)
Mixed Vegetable: wrongly translated to Vegetable Problem
Moshkila, >> problem
Moshakkal >> mixed/miscellaneous
Moshkil/Moshakkal have the same arabic letters.
More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_diacritics
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Mogalgal Chicken: transltated to "precarious" which is a wrong translation. The correct mean is: "shaken/moved" very similar. it is just a name for the plate.
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Node Thickness: Wrongly translated from "Fish okda"
Node: okda (wrong), see okda information above.
Thickness: Fish (wrong):
Fish in arabic letters: Samak (we write it smk)
Thickness in arabic: Somk (we write it smk)
More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_diacritics
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Complaisant: Didn't saw the arabic word in the menu but I guessed it: Areeka
Areeka: Has many meaning I'm really tired of searching lol, but you can say the actual meaning here is "overlap/mixed"
It is exactly a Ma'soob but without banana! and I like it.
The latest addition ingredients to areeka (after cheddar) is: cereal!!
Overlapping: butterly bread crumbs + dates + white cream + honey + cheddar + cereal.
How many calories???!!, I don't want to know!!!!!!
I remember a restaurant in jeddah have good one, if you want to know where it is, let me know! but I think you already tried the "areeka" anyway.
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Notes: Almost all these foods are traditional "Yemen" food, which they considered one of the best culture to use arabic words in its purist!
.. sorry for any poor english.
Sameer - Thank you for all your trouble in clarifying and explaining where these translations went wrong. My husband had tried making sense out of some of them, but he gave up! He is an English professor so he was horrified seeing this menu!
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