Funny English Signs from Around the World

YALT

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 10:42 am

Here are some signs and notices written in English that were discovered throughout the world. You have to give the writers an 'E' for Effort. We hope you enjoy them.

In a Tokyo Hotel:
Is forbidden to steal hotel towels please. If you are not a person to do such thing is please not to read notis.

In a Bucharest hotel lobby:
The lift is being fixed for the next day. During that time we regret that you will be unbearable.

In a Leipzig elevator:
Do not enter the lift backwards, and only when lit up.

In a Belgrade hotel elevator:
To move the cabin, push button for wishing floor. If the cabin should enter more persons, each one should press a number of wishing floor. Driving is then going alphabetically by national order.

In a Paris hotel elevator:
Please leave your values at the front desk.

In a hotel in Athens:
Visitors are expected to complain at the office between the hours of 9 and 11 A.M. daily.

In a Yugoslavian hotel:
The flattening of underwear with pleasure is the job of the chambermaid.

In a Japanese hotel:
You are invited to take advantage of the chambermaid.

In the lobby of a Moscow hotel across from a Russian Orthodox monastery:
You are welcome to visit the cemetery where famous Russian and Soviet composers, artists, and writers are buried daily except Thursday.

In an Austrian hotel catering to skiers:
Not to perambulate the corridors in the hours of repose in the boots of ascension.

On the menu of a Swiss restaurant:
Our wines leave you nothing to hope for.

On the menu of a Polish hotel:
Salad a firm's own make; limpid red beet soup with cheesy dumplings in the form of a finger; roasted duck let loose; beef rashers beaten up in the country people's fashion.

Outside a Hong Kong tailor shop:
Ladies may have a fit upstairs.

In a Bangkok dry cleaner's:
Drop your trousers here for best results.

Outside a Paris dress shop:
Dresses for street walking.

In a Rhodes tailor shop:
Order your summers suit. Because is big rush we will execute
customers in strict rotation.

In a Zurich hotel:
Because of the impropriety of entertaining guests of the
opposite s*x in the bedroom, it is suggested that the lobby
be used for this purpose.

In an advertisement by a Hong Kong dentist:
Teeth extracted by the latest Methodists.

In a Rome laundry:
Ladies, leave your clothes here and spend the afternoon
having a good time.

In a Czechoslovakian tourist agency:
Take one of our horse-driven city tours - we guarantee no
miscarriages.

Advertisement for donkey rides in Thailand:
Would you like to ride on your own ***?

In a Swiss mountain inn:
Special today -- no ice cream.

In a Bangkok temple:
It is forbidden to enter a woman even a foreigner if dressed
as a man.

In a Tokyo bar:
Special cocktails for the ladies with nuts.

In a Copenhagen airline ticket office:
We take your bags and send them in all directions.

On the door of a Moscow hotel room:
If this is your first visit to the USSR, you are welcome to
it.

In a Norwegian cocktail lounge:
Ladies are requested not to have children in the bar.

In a Budapest zoo:
Please do not feed the animals. If you have any suitable
food, give it to the guard on duty.

In the office of a Roman doctor:
Specialist in women and other diseases.

In a Tokyo shop:
Our nylons cost more than common, but you'll find they are
best in the long run.

From a Japanese information booklet about using a hotel air
conditioner:
Cooles and Heates: If you want just condition of warm in your
room, please control yourself.

From a brochure of a car rental firm in Tokyo:
When passenger of foot heave in sight, tootle the horn.
Trumpet him melodiously at first, but if he still obstacles
your passage then tootle him with vigor.

Two signs from a Majorcan shop entrance:
- English well talking.
- Here speeching American.

gryp

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 11:37 am

Are these for real? Some of them are so funny.

I can't figure out one of them for the life of me:

Quote:

In an Austrian hotel catering to skiers:
Not to perambulate the corridors in the hours of repose in the boots of ascension.

What is "boots of ascension???"

I'll never forget that "tootle" one. LOL

Seraph

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 11:55 am

ski boots?

Seraph

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 11:56 am

These are so funny that when I was reading them out loud to husband, so many of them I had to say over 10 or more times because each time I started reading them, my husband and I cracked up so much that I couldnt continue reading and had to start over when I calmed down.

ShakleeMom

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 12:35 pm

hadasa

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 3:06 pm

Oy, I need an emoticon for "crying with laughter".

Fox

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 4:09 pm

There's a great series of books called "Anguished English" that includes signs as well as hilarious excerpts from instruction manuals, term papers, etc. I have several books in the series, and I often read one of them for a few minutes before going to bed -- it always puts a smile on my face.

girliesmommy

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 4:17 pm

Living in a non-English speaking country, I unfortunately see these all the time, but these are classics!!

What I find hysterical is the t-shirts they wear. I mean, if it's in English, it must be cool, no? I'll never forget how hard I had to work to control myself when a 19 year old boy walked in wearing a t-shirt that said "Life begins at 40!"

sarahnurit

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 4:32 pm

These are great! I wouldn't be surprised if they were all real, because I also live in a non English speaking country and I hear all kinds of stuff...

doodlesmom

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 6:33 pm

talk about funny t-shirts I once had a relative from Israel walking around with the size sticker tag on her top (assuming its the fancy company name)

ShakleeMom

Thu, Jun 11 2009, 11:33 pm

My cleaning lady showed up erev pesach late with 45 minutes. She moved like a turtle and was getting on my nerves. Finally, I figured it out. Her t-shirt said FASTER THAN YOU THINK. can't you cry.

Seraph

Fri, Jun 12 2009, 12:45 am

Yea, I also get these all the time...
I just bought something in the store, and this is the first two lines of the instructions:

"In order to play this product safely, pls pay special attention on the details as follow:
1. It must assemble by adults, all the screws of spare part should put in the place where children can't touch."

Not AS funny as these, but still bad english.

Oh, and how can I miss what it says on the cover?

"Safety but again comfortable toilet. Every styles fully wonderful. Abreast of the times."

Purple Hug Bunny

Sun, Jun 14 2009, 6:05 pm

They gave me a good laugh. Love the one with the air conditioner.

shopaholic

Mon, Jun 15 2009, 11:46 am

I was in Amsterdam about 12 years ago & saw a sign in a barber shop:

"We cut heads" I took a picture of it, but with those old film cameras, the picture never came out!

Twoisacharm

Tue, Jun 16 2009, 12:43 pm

oh wow these are hysterical!!!!!!!!!!

lovmyboys

Tue, Jun 16 2009, 1:39 pm

I got this in an email once:

Every year, English teachers from across the country can submit their collections of actual analogies and metaphors found in high school essays. These excerpts are published each year to the amusement of
teachers across the country. Here are last year's winners.....

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

2. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country
speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

3. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

4. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

5. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

6. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.

7. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.

8. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.

9. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

10. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

11. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

12. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

13. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

14. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.

15. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

16. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.

17. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.

18. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.

19. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

20. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

21. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

22. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

23. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.

24. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.

farmom

Tue, Jun 16 2009, 8:33 pm

Now that is funny, lovmyboys

YALT

Tue, Jun 16 2009, 9:19 pm

yes, that one was really funny!

Twoisacharm

Wed, Jun 17 2009, 1:34 pm

omg im sitting here at my desk...shaking with laughter LOL

cant breathe