Embarrass Jokes / Recent Jokes

One morning I was called to pick up my son at the school nurse's office. When I walked through the main entrance, I noticed a woman, curlers in her hair, wearing pajamas. "Why are you dressed like that?" I asked her."I told my son," she explained, "that if he ever did anything to embarrass me, I would embarrass him back. He was caught cutting school. So now I've come to spend the day with him!"

Below are fine examples of what happens when marketing translations fail to reach a foreign country in an understandable way. Coors put its slogan, "Turn it loose," into Spanish, where it was read as "Suffer from diarrhea." Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick," a curling iron, into German only to find out that "mist" is slang for manure. Not too many people had use for the "manure stick". Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: Nothing sucks like an Electrolux. The American slogan for Salem cigarettes, "Salem-Feeling Free", was translated into the Japanese market as "When smoking Salem, you will feel so refreshed that your mind seems to be free and empty." When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same packaging as in the US, with the beautiful baby on the label. Later they learned that in Africa, companies routinely put pictures on the label of more...

Cracking an international market is a goal of most growing corporations. It shouldn't be that hard, yet even the big multi-nationals run into trouble because of language and cultural differences. For example... The name Coca-Cola in China was first rendered as Ke-kou-ke-la. Unfortunately, the Coke company did not discover until after thousands of signs had been printed that the phrase means "bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax" depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40, 000 Chinese characters and found a close phonetic equivalent, "ko-kou-ko-le," which can be loosely translated as "happiness in the mouth." In Taiwan, the translation of the Pepsi slogan "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" came out as "Pepsi will bring your ancestors back from the dead." Also in Chinese, the Kentucky Fried Chicken slogan "finger-lickin' good" came out as "eat your fingers off." The American more...

Two girls board a crowded bus and one of them whispers to the other, "Watch me embarrass a man into giving me his seat."
Pushing her way through the crowd, she turned all of her charms upon a gentleman who looked like he might embarrass easily. "My dear Mr. Wilson," she gushed, "fancy meeting you here on the bus. Am I glad to see you! Why, you're almost a stranger. My, but I'm tired!"
The sedate gent looked up at the girl. He had never seen her before but he rose and said pleasantly, "Sit down, Mary, my girl. It isn't often I see you on washday. No wonder you're tired. Being pregnant isn't easy. By the way, don't deliver the wash until Thursday. My wife is going to the District Attorney's office to see if she can get your husband out of jail."

Two girls board a crowded bus and one of them whispers to the other, "Watch me embarrass a man into giving me his seat."
Pushing her way through the crowd, she turned all of her charms upon a gentleman who looked like he might embarrass easily.
"My dear Mr. Smith," she gushed, "fancy meeting you here on the bus. Am I glad to see you! Why you're almost a stranger. My, but I'm tired!"
The sedate gent looked up at the girl. He had never seen her before but he rose and said pleasantly, "Sit down, Monica, my girl. It isn't often I see you on washday. No wonder you're tired. Being pregnant isn't easy. By the way, don't deliver the wash until Thursday. My wife is going to the District Attorney's office to see whether or not she can get your husband out of jail."

Two girls boarded a crowded bus and one of them whispered to the other, "Watch me embarrass a man into giving me his seat."
Pushing her way through the crowd, she turned all her charms upon a gentleman who looked like he might embarrass easily.
"My dear Mr. Wilson," she gushed, "fancy meeting you on the bus. Am I glad to see you. Why, you're almost a stranger. My, but I'm tired."
The sedate gentleman looked up at the girl. He had never seen her before, but he rose and said pleasantly, "Sit down, Mary my girl. It isn't often I see you on washday. No wonder you're tired. Being pregnant isn't easy. By the way, don't deliver the wash until Thursday. My wife is going to the District Attorney's office to see whether she can get your husband out of jail."

Cracking an international market is a goal of most growing corporations. It shouldn`t be that hard, yet even the big multi-nationals run into trouble because of language and cultural differences. For example, observe the following examples below.
The name Coca-Cola in China was first rendered as Ke-kou-ke-la. Unfortunately, the Coke company did not discover until after thousands of signs had been printed that the phrase means "bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax" depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40, 000 Chinese characters and found a close phonetic equivalent, "ko-kou-ko-le," which can be loosely translated as "happiness in the mouth."
In Taiwan, the translation of the Pepsi slogan "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" came out as "Pepsi will bring your ancestors back from the dead."
Also in Chinese, the Kentucky Fried Chicken slogan "finger-lickin` good" came out as more...