Lost in translation, or when does five = four?
Last night after shopping for couch pillows and a drying rack for wet outerwear we came home and watched Jennifer Garner in "13 going on 30," a cute and amusing little movie that we both enjoyed. We had the Norwegian subtitles on and were very amused to see that when Jennifer was at work and asked if someone would have a project ready "by five," "five" was translated as "four." First we thought that was an odd mistake for a translator to make. Then we realized that it wasn't a mistake since four is quitting time over here. It wouldn't make any sense to have said "five," since everybody in Norway is already home eating dinner by then....
posted by PartTimeNorwegian @ 1:03 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
You are quite right. If "five" means "by the end of the working day", "four", or even "half past three" is correct translation. - That reminds me of another possible four-to-five translation: when counting floors in Norway, the ground floor is number one, and what would in England be the first floor, is the second in Norwegian.
Not to menion our funny way of counting time. Write 17.22 and you read "8 minutes to half six" ...
this post makes me want to work in Norway.
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