RacerX
-
[profile]
|
Thu Oct 21st 13:27 2004 / #1 |
|
"I'm completely very hungry" and "Let's go slowly" or just "slowly" as a nice way of saying let's go |
|
d?d??ej
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 13:33 2004 / #2 |
putting the verb before both subject and object.
Consider:
English = A is B
Czenglish = is A B
using the passive when the stress should be active
Consider:
English = You contacted us....
Czenglish = We were contacted by you
(one of my personal favourites)
confusion with the verbs ask, wish, request, require, please, beg.
Consider:
English = We wish to inform you...
Czenglish = We beg to inform you... (!)
One of my Czech friends was working in a pub in the UK when the landlord asked her if she could possibly continue the shift to later. she replied, "Only if you get down on your knees and please me". |
|
d?d??ej
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 13:53 2004 / #3 |
|
oh, and also making sentences as long as paragraphs. |
jeff
|
Thu Oct 21st 15:28 2004 / #4 |
The old Lend vs Borrow debacle.
For example:
Can you borrow me some money? |
|
RacerX
-
[profile]
|
Thu Oct 21st 15:33 2004 / #5 |
and learn vs. teach
can you learn it to me? |
|
??alek
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 15:39 2004 / #6 |
And tense changes mid sentence.
How does one deal with that? |
|
??alek
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 16:11 2004 / #7 |
|
d?d??ej, yeah. The long sentences as paragraphs are easy to change by substituting commas for periods. |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 16:35 2004 / #8 |
I was went.
'stead of I went. |
|
man??estr
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 16:38 2004 / #9 |
|
Overuse of the word already, as a direct translation of u??. |
|
d?d??ej
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 17:11 2004 / #10 |
i wish it were that easy with the long sentences, ??alek.
another moot point is where to put the word 'also'. |
|
d?d??ej
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 17:39 2004 / #11 |
also - the use of nouns where a gerund would suffice, e.g.
Czenglish = The criteria for the determination of the price of.....
English = The criteria for determining the price of... |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 17:43 2004 / #12 |
|
This is castle dkfrjeir. There were my parents married. |
|
parker
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 17:50 2004 / #13 |
|
how about behind instead of around the corner |
|
??alek
-
[anon]
|
Thu Oct 21st 21:05 2004 / #14 |
|
Another one that undermines my ability to think in English is a JEDNAK sentence that is translated "on the one hand..." and therefore requires to replace the second JEDNAK an "on the other hand." Okay, that is an English construction, but can't the JEDNAK twins be better presented with a "yet" or a linking "however"? |
|
luuca
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 09:57 2004 / #15 |
|
I´m Czech and everytime I have to think about the difference between almost and mostly. It sounds bloody similar :-)) |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 10:00 2004 / #16 |
I lived there before two years.
How long are you here? (for how long have you been there)
Use of here, and this, when there and that is meant. |
|
SW
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 10:09 2004 / #17 |
|
The nature |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 10:25 2004 / #18 |
The use of the words "from", "till", "by" and "since"
eg
My project must be finished till next Tuesday
Since next week I will be working in Prague |
|
??alek
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 11:16 2004 / #19 |
|
??non 12, when you went to the nature and visited castle dkfrjeir, where were were your parents married, did the guide tell you about some strange room called the "economic quarters"? I always thought it was a place for economists, then I learned that it is for horses! |
|
d?d??ej
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 14:01 2004 / #20 |
SW: heh heh, the nature.
next weekend i go on cottage in the nature on my grandmother |
|
Rabbit
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 17:08 2004 / #21 |
Some more in the same vein:
- The doors are open, please close them. (i.e., there is one door).
- Me: Seen my watch? Her: They are on the table.
- Not that I would want... (Ne ze bych...)
- "Thoroffly" for "thoroughly"
- "Substract" for "subtract"
- "Behind Prague" for "outside of Prague"
- "I work for 'company' CKD Praha"
- Overuse of "it was perfect"
- Voice on the telephone: "Hi, here is Marek."
There is a very regrettable tendency of younger people especially to season their speech with vulgarity. A fellow who worked for me: "the customer fucked us out." "He is real asshole, yes?" "It was real fucking mess there." "We had great fucking time" etc. IMHO this should be discouraged. People only make themselves look low-rent and foolish. It's actually quite hard to use profanity effectively and "appropriately" if you are not truly fluent. Personally, I never swear in Czech unless I feel like appearing, well, low rent and foolish.
There used to be a book out in shops in the early to mid 90s called "Do you speak Czenglish?" which catalogued quite a good number of examples. Don't know if it's still around.
And finally, this one is incurable, so take care it never takes root lest you condemn your student to a lifetime of puzzled interlocuters: Saying "hi" when leaving. |
Genkiepie
-
[profile]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 17:21 2004 / #22 |
My favourites:
I like when men say they are going to put on their dress (meaning clothes), and refer to hair as "they".
makes me giggle. |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Fri Oct 22nd 17:43 2004 / #23 |
I was by my mother in village Hovezi on weekend because she had birthday.
NOw has she fifty one years.
Can you tell me what is it?
You have true (for you are right) |
|
Stavros
-
[anon]
|
Sat Oct 23rd 00:15 2004 / #24 |
|
Hello everybody peeps, innit? |
|
Bobbo
-
[anon]
|
Sat Oct 23rd 15:23 2004 / #25 |
How does she look like?
Please translate this til Friday (that's five days away, and I really did want to attend to some other matters, eating and sleeping included, in the interim)
Do you have everything what you need?
Did the doctor examinate you?
On and on it goes... |
todd
-
[profile]
|
Sat Oct 23rd 15:36 2004 / #26 |
|
Usage of the word "we" is an annoying little screw up, for example someone might say to you: I washed my, cleaned my teeth went to the bar and there we met with John, it forces you to ask who, and they say with john silly...a minor problem but can maked for some misunderstandings |
|
Bobbo
-
[anon]
|
Sun Oct 24th 11:56 2004 / #27 |
How could I have forgotten?
I am very interesting about that...
Years ago I had a meeting with the Rector of Chas U. After we shook hands he said, "Please to remove your dress." It was winter, and after the initial thunder-struckness, I realized he was talking abbout my coat! |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Sun Oct 24th 13:58 2004 / #28 |
|
A woman, a real sweetie, once called me on the¨phone because she was boring. |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Sun Oct 24th 15:15 2004 / #29 |
Take on your clothes, instead of put on your clothes
SHe had such an apartment, meaning she had a very nice apartment.
I can't imagine what my czech sentences I try to formulate must really mean, maybe that's why I get so many blank stares. I remember I screwed up Devfka and Divka, saying I had a bitch instead of a girlfriend. |
Speedbeater
-
[profile]
|
Wed Oct 12th 14:20 2005 / #30 |
I would also recommending reading Wikipedia's article on Runglish which, as a Slavic language, shares many of the typical mistakes made by Czechs.
It talks in particular about
- misuse/omission of articles ("Do you know man/a man/the man standing there?");
- misuse of perfect tenses (have you seen, did you see);
- problems with expressing modality (must, have to, would, should, ought to);
- confusion with negation ("yes, I don't"/"no, I do").
Vocabulary problems are also similar, although some of the "translator's false friends" don't quite apply to Czech.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runglish |
|
kr??ska
-
[profile]
|
Wed Oct 26th 14:21 2005 / #31 |
1. "Please, can you send it to me until Friday?"
They mean to say: "Please, can you send it to me by Friday?"
2. "Don't think about this." or "Don't care about this."
They mean to say: "Don't worry."
3. "I don't know, I must ask my chef."
They are saying Chief, and mispronouncing it. But obviously, boss would be better. |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Wed Oct 26th 15:11 2005 / #32 |
-"I will like to come in the pub with you."
-"Hello!" when leaving a room
-"I very enjoy the nature and relax".
-"Weg-uh-tuh-bulls must to be ordered specially". |
|
kr??ska
-
[profile]
|
Wed Oct 26th 16:50 2005 / #33 |
"Please" - when they actually mean "You're welcome"
This is a big one and really screws with the heads of tourists, lol. |
|
jeff
|
Thu Oct 27th 10:48 2005 / #34 |
|
Actually kraska - ??ef is the Czech for boss.. aren't trying to say Chief.. |
|
kr??ska
-
[profile]
|
Thu Oct 27th 11:06 2005 / #35 |
Actually Jeff, many Czechs use chief (correctly) to describe their boss (including EVERYONE I work with) and all three that I asked to write down what they were saying (when they were saying chef) spelled chief.
I know the Czech word for boss and there are a number of others. "Bos" being one of them. But the point is, the one I mentioned is used because it's easy to remember, because it's similar in a way to something they use in Czech.
Same reason they use 'must' so often. |
|
lub
-
[profile]
|
Tue Apr 25th 21:47 2006 / #36 |
|
I used to say "good appetite" before the meal to people when I was in the States when instead I meant to say "bon appetite" (with French prenounciation). I couldn't understand why they were rather annoyed. Some would even reply with an irritated voice: "Yes, as a matter of fact I do have a good appetite." Only later I realized how rude it must have been especially to people with weight problems. Here is my belated appology. |
|
[ anonymous ]
-
[anon]
|
Wed Apr 26th 13:24 2006 / #37 |
|
That is funny! |
|
Vickey
-
[profile]
|
Thu Sep 21st 16:46 2006 / #38 |
A DREAM, PART 1
Hi ??alek, RacerX, d?d??ej, Rabbit, Genkiepie, Bobo, Speedbeater, lub and others.
I had a scary dream… I arrived to Nowy Jork with my polish friend. We were talking in polish. Poles have became the world‘s leader in the dream. A leader in the meaning of language and economy. Well, there had been a polish man called Bartosz Gateski. The internet and stuff like that we have is thanks to him. And thanks to whom, polish became world‘s number one language instead of esperanto. My friend had a strong silesian accent of polish, so it was very tiring concentrate to listen to him and to talk with, because I am not very good in polish, but yeah, he was cool and funny.
He got surprised of the „New York“ sign at the airport, because he thought it was Nowy Jork. The strange New York is how locals call it. The first feeling was like: Aaargh, this is not in polish any more! When we arrived to our hotel, some problems began. They didn‘t accept the Polish express credit card, believe that? We had to go change to cash, what was a pretty scary deal. It took us 10 minutes to get out of the hotel because it was on 79th stock of a skyscraper. Quite a lot of time lost. They are crazy here, sooo many skyscrapers all around! You can‘t imagine! Most of a day you walk in a shaddow! When looking for an ATM we got a bit angry. Although there are many polish signs around (the city seems to be comfortably polishised), almost nobody could speak polish on the streets!
Walking half a day, finaly a nice guy told us where to find it. It was called „Bankomat“. We had passed the place before, but didn‘t know, it means ATM. Money are crazy here. The 1 of local is as sized as the 20 one note. They are all almost the same colour, so you have to look at the note twice every time you pay. They call them „tuller“ or something like that. I am not sure about correct spelling. UST or USD as an international code. When arrived to our hotel, we needed to fill our cell phone battery. This was another shock! They have mad plug-ins here! Our phones were dead and we couldn‘t do anything. And I very needed to call Jadwiga, because I was missing her sooo much. At the reception we were told to buy an adapter. But the clerk was not sure where to buy it. He knew some store, but very far from where we were. So we were pushed to help ourselves! But we decided to try it tomorrow, because we were sooo exhausted. |
|
Vickey
-
[profile]
|
Thu Sep 21st 17:17 2006 / #39 |
A DREAM, PART 2
Next morning I woke pretty early, looked from a window to those crazy skyscrapes and was like: Yeah, so this is Nowy Jork. Two years ago I didn‘t know such a city exist and now I am here. Strange feeling. As first we headed off to find the store with adapters, we were told yesterday. We were trying to find a metro station. Eh, they have almost no public transport here! Oooph. It took us 40 minutes to find the closest metro stop. Because all the signs are in american language! And people on the streets had just very poor polish. Some locals smiled to us and some even said something like „Huy“ (means like „Czesc“). We were a bit scared. It isn‘t very sincere to greet unknown people on a sidewalk. The metro is called a „subway“ or a „tube“ here, pretty confusing. And it is more dark and dirty than in Prague. And seems more dangerous on a first sight too. I found young people not offering their seats to elderlies here at all. Hm, Americans seem to be pretty rude.
But we were lucky! We met a cool american guy out off the metro and he told us where is the store and how is the right kind of an adapter called. Greaaat! Finaly we found the store and bought an adapter, oooph. We headed to the centre. We found many polish signs, so it became more comfortable. In shops and restaurants people could speak polish, though they had very funny accent. They were making many mistakes as well. In a polish restaurant we almost couldn‘t understand the waiter. His polish was very very basic. I was trying to explain him a right using of polish past tense, problems with expressing modality, using words in a wrong way, puting them in wrong order in a sentence, what are the translator's false friends and his big confusion with negations. He was like getting less polite and more rude to us. I was like: „He? We are trying to help you!“ I heard, someone is trying to set up Ami-polish rules. Very funny! My friend went to a friseur, beacuse it was very hot and his hairs were uncomfortable to him. They don‘t count hairs in their language! No matter you are a long-hairs rock-fan or an old guy with few hairs only above your ears, it is always a „hair“. It made me giggle.
In the afternoon we wanted to eat something typical american. It was difficult, because there were many polish fast foods offering pirohs, bureks etc. along the Broadway avenue and surround. We were told to try so called hamburger. I was like: Yummm, this is sooo tasty! Actualy we have doubt about it‘s american origin, because Hamburg is a city in Germany, isn‘t it? But we didn‘t mind that much, because we were sooo hungry. We arrived to our hotel as early as at 5 p.m., because we were sooo tired of walking. |
|
Vickey
-
[profile]
|
Thu Sep 21st 17:18 2006 / #40 |
A DREAM, PART 3
Luckily, we met two nice couples in our hotel early evening. Everything seemed to be an enjoyable evening. We made a lunch together and talked a lot. One of the guys was from Scotland. He looked almost like my friend Krzysztof. Oh, Krzysztof, I miss you sooo much! Wish you be here in Nowy Jork with us! He got us known, the language in America is english. We didn‘t know that. They have something in common with England, probably. What a language! If your house collaps because of a fire, you can say it burned up as well as it burned down. Stupid, isn‘t it? And they have a copy-attempt of our Budvar beer! They call it as in it‘s german equivalent, pronounced in english way. Hehe. And, they don’t count sheep and fish either! Protectors of animals won’t be very happy about a country where they don’t consider a sheep as an individual being. That was my favourite one! One of our companions, an American, was working in Poland asome years ago. He was making funny mistakes when talking to us. He cannot pronounce “Swietokrzyzska“ street, though he was living there for half a year. What is so difficult about Swietokrzyzska? Tsss!
Then a terrifying thing happened, a police came, cought us and put us to police cars. I was like „Whaaat“? They were speaking only (!) english. By our new american friend, we got explained, the limit of dcb-noise was 55 in our hotel and surrounds, while our party was 57 dcb! This country is not as free as Poland. It is more than obvious we are the freest country in the world, anyway. In the police car I was like: Mummm, where are you? I love you! The american guys, who was with us, wanted to smash one of those policemen, but got beaten and his wrist got broken. He was supposed to go to a doctor. But he is going to a jail instead. He won‘t go anyway, because he don‘t have money and, many people don‘t have any health insurance here, can you believe it? We came to a dark police station, I heard some dogs barking, I was like „Nooo“ and then I…
woke up. It was just a dream… Yeeeaaah!
PS: Don’t take this story too seriously, guys. |
|
David S.
-
[profile]
|
Wed Nov 29th 20:46 2006 / #41 |
|
The "best" CzEnglish you can hear is when czech teenagers use slang and vulgarities from american teenage serial stories :). |
restone
-
[profile]
|
Thu Nov 30th 10:22 2006 / #42 |
|
A WHOLE BOOK has been dedicated to Czenglish. It was published about 10 years ago. You can find it in libraries. Google for Don Sparling: English or Czenglish. |
|
lub
-
[profile]
|
Thu Nov 30th 21:25 2006 / #43 |
hey Vickey, great post!
So true. Lots of people speak good czech as well on the east cost of the US. I find they do better in Washington DC where they sa 'metro' whereas in New York they say 'subway' instead... One thing I recommend avoiding is referring to hours following 12 as 13, 14 etc. It works much better when you say 1pm, 2pm... Some people with military background will actually understand you, although they will tend to multiply the hour by 100 – they will rather say 13 hundred hours than just 13 hours... but still more commonly 1pm.
As you said, strange people I pass by walking on the street will say 'hi' or 'wusup' often adding 'wusup buddy' or if it is a woman, such as waitress, she will even go really sweet calling you 'honey' while making sure there's enough ketchup in the bottle on the table for your french fries or basically for every dish from the menu.
People often throw parties at their homes and love to dance simultaneously. This puts some extra stress on the floor structure. I remember once watching a group of people dancing simultaneously while the floor planks where bowing to the limit of breaking especially when everybody made that one jump step at the same time. I mentioned my concern about the floor capacity to somebody but my comment was not accepted favorably which was I guess due to my previous 'good appetite' remarks... |
|
Igor
-
[profile]
|
Fri Dec 1st 14:07 2006 / #44 |
abut ze english
http://ezinearticles.com/?Writing-Articles-Using-The-New-Eur o-Englisch&id=181353 |
|
Bobbo
-
[profile]
|
Fri Dec 1st 17:04 2006 / #45 |
|
Write on, Vickey an Lub!!! |
|
popolushka
-
[profile]
|
Sun Dec 3rd 23:40 2006 / #46 |
Also, the use of "in case" or "in case of" instead of "if"
e.g. In case you do not pay, membership will be terminated |
|
MarianneHilly
-
[profile]
|
Sat Dec 8th 12:57 2007 / #47 |
|
Hi people,I'm czech student searching for somebody to help me...I'm studying at Charles University and I need to write an essay for a class I attend. It should be about differences between Czechs and Americans, so I must interview someone who's lived in US and now lives here for more than 6 months. If you know somebody, please, let me know...It wont take more than one hour, we can just catch up for drink (I'll pay it of course:) and have a nice chat :) If you know anybody, please, let me know (my email adress is Mariana.Kopecka@seznam.cz) |
|
mattycore
-
[profile]
|
Tue Aug 5th 10:55 2008 / #48 |
|
Incorrect grammar transfer:I have hungry now. Overuse of words and false friends: He is very sympathetic, last night was perfect, he is just normal (instead of regular or an ordinary guy), I go to the nature this weekend, please say me good time for you (say/tell), I go on weekend to my the cottage (prepositions), I come from the Prague (articles), I go to the Brno at Friday, the list is endless, modal verbs, incorrect use of phrasal verbs (if used at all), oh so endless...see wikipedia on CzEnglish, the main reason seems to be years in secondary and grammar education system with Czech teachers who can't speak English teaching it using the native tongue creating 1st Language Interference...seems to be the most common factor... |
|
mattycore
-
[profile]
|
Tue Aug 5th 10:57 2008 / #49 |
|
oh yeah another...'I take care about my children' (see phrasal verbs ref) when they prob only have one child... |
|
Mulaco
-
[profile]
|
Thu Feb 12th 12:58 2009 / #50 |
Hi Everybody.
I have been reading through the posts and decided to include these.
They are all from emails I've received in the past from a Czech native.
I thought it would also give some insight on how Cz would construct a sentence and write it down on paper.
English Ambasy
Busnisse center
make a plane for the next day (plan)
STUPID WINTER...IF THERE WILL BE A SUMMER ALL THE TIME WE WOULDNT HAVE THISE PROBLEMS
the Buddha seds
u mine get mad (might)
perants
we should sutt up
i never lisen untill i got my own experience anyway...
....geting drank......
i have a dreems u too (about)
we cant have a head in the space and feed not on the grand...now no...
I hope u think deep about.
will see what she thing about the leaflats...(thinks)
as soon u will get the leaflets
please i call u latter... |
|
mbartizmo
-
[profile]
|
Fri Apr 1st 01:47 2011 / #51 |
I've written an article called "19 Common English Mistakes Made by Czech People". You can find it here: http://www.englishcurrent.com/19-common-english-mistakes-cze ch-people/
Good luck with your studies! |
Prague Youth Theatre
Meridian Internat...
Duhovka Preschool...
Feedback Form
