'This temple is dedicated to Little Richard?': 15+ Hilarious travel miscommunications

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Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Jun 13, 2024 11:00 AM EDT

As a tourist in a country you've never set foot in before, making a few language mistakes is inevitable. Lots of people will study up on the language before they ever set foot on a plane, but even so, it's way different in person. You can read a little translation book all you want, but when a local speaks to you, you're probably going to be stumped. These days, a lot of cell phones can instantly translate for us, but even then, there are bound to be a few mistakes along the way. 

In a lot of European countries, the locals won't even bother speaking their language if they sense you're American. If you're stumbling to order a ham and cheese sandwich while in France, instead of letting you finish your broken sentence, they'll just start talking to you in perfect English. In other countries, though, or places that aren't typical tourist areas, you might have to resort to gesturing in order to explain what you mean. One person shared that they travelled to Greece, but because the word for "yes" sounds a lot like "no," they were mixed up the whole time. Even though they confused a bunch of locals with that, it's probably a funny vacation memory to them. 

Next up, this grocery store manager was totally fine with letting another manager boss them around — until they created their own demise. 

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  • 01
    'What I meant to say was "ie - ga kirei" or "your home is beautiful." - What I said was "ie ga kirai" - "your home is disgusting."
    via Lucas Calloch on Unsplash
  • 02
    What's the funniest miscommunication you've had while traveling? I ordered an ice cream to coño ( ) instead of cono (cone) in Spain. Then I tried to say "I'm so embarrassed" in Spanish so I said "soy tan embarassada" which actually means "I'm so pregnant."
    via u/tina-marino
  • 03
    Civil_Connection... I hired a tour guide in Hanoi. At one of the stops he explained that we were at the temple of Little Richard. So I ask "Did you say Little Richard?" He nods proudly "Yes, Little Richard!" I'm like
    via u/Civil_Connection
  • 04
    "This temple is dedicated to Little Richard?" He is emphatic "Yes! This is the temple of Little Richard". I want to tell him that I'm pretty sure it is not, but just shrug "okay, whatever". Later I looked it up and discovered we had visited the temple of literature.
    via u/Civil_Connection
  • 05
    Mysterious-Metal... Tried to teach a Japanese gentleman how to make puns in English (he was an English teacher). We were in a restaurant so I picked up my glass of water and said: "Hey, water you doing now?" (bad pun but it was just for educational purposes). He laughs and says: "Oh yeah I get it! So, hey bro... potato salad!"
    via u/Mysterious-Metal-309
  • 06
    I laughed so hard that he thought he had made a great pun.
    via u/Mysterious-Metal-309
  • 07
    trivial_sublime I used to live in Japan and when I first moved there my motto was "I'm okay with making 10,000 mistakes. daily." This was my first major one. I was invited over by a very sweet couple in my apartment complex for dinner one of my first nights. They had a baby.
    via u/trivial_sublime
  • 08
    When I entered the house I wanted to show off my newfound Japanese skills from my paper dictionary. What I meant to say was "ie ga kirei" or "your home is beautiful." What I said was - "ie ga kirai" - "your home is disgusting." They kept their smiles up but I could tell they were a bit jarred. It got worse. During dinner I said the other thing I had
    via u/trivial_sublime
  • 09
    learned "akachan ga sugoi kawaii" - "your baby is very cute," but what I said was "akachan ga sugoi kowaii" or "your baby is terrifying." This time they weren't so stoic and the dad sort of choked on his food. I asked what was wrong and they told me that they weren't used to people being so -
    via u/trivial_sublime
  • 10
    direct. I told them what I was trying to say each time and they looked SO relieved and we all laughed until it hurt. I worked with the husband and everyone at work the next day thought it was absolutely hilarious. That was the first of many, many situations like that.
    via u/trivial_sublime
  • 11
    mcwobby I was in Kyrgyzstan, but both people spoke English in this situation, just not perfectly. Was more of a "misheard" rather than "mistranslation". Checked into a hotel, went to my room, realised I didn't have a wifi password so went back to reception. Asked for the password, the girl there insisted she had already given it to me and
    via u/mcwobby
  • 12
    got quite heated in her insistence. So I said "if you gave it to me, I've lost it". So she demanded to come up and search my room. And I was kind of bemused, I didn't see why she couldn't just give me a copy but thought maybe there was a unique access code or something. She comes in to my room, walk around a bit, grabs my
    via u/mcwobby
  • 13
    passport from the bedside table and waves it in my face yelling "See I told you I gave it back to you" At which point I fell on the bed laughing and said "Wifi password, not passport". To which she pointed at the piece of paper on the back of the door that had the password on it.
    via u/mcwobby
  • 14
    Weirdly we got a long quite well during the time I was there and I ended up going to her cousins wedding in another city.
    via u/mcwobby
  • 15
    TheRealMrs Nesbit My sister and I both worked at Target in college. One day she called me on the walkie- talkies when we were both on shift and said: "Hey, I have some Spanish speakers and I have no idea what they're asking me, can you translate?" "Sure, what are they saying?"
    via u/TheRealMrsNesbit
  • 16
    "They're looking for (heavy Spanish accent) an 'eyes. cram ma chin'" I was laughing so and responded "they're speaking English not I hard Spanish, they want an ice cream machine!" It's been over 10 years and it still makes me laugh.
    via u/TheRealMrsNesbit
  • 17
    NJAKBSH I was in Milan recently. I speak a little Italian. It am not confident enough to hold a conversation. I was caught off guard by somebody asking me a question in Italian. I replied. with "No hablo inglese" which means I do not speak English.....but in Spanish. I'll blame it on the jet lag. I'm sure I confused that person thoroughly.
    via u/NJAKBSH
  • 18
    h... just moved to france, started new job, haven't spoken french for a long while and am quite rusty. i need to set up a meeting with a colleague. she happens to be a woman. instead of telling her 'let's meet at your room in the office', i translate from italian and say 'on se voit dans ta chambre' e.g. let's
    via u/hyp_reddit
  • 19
    meet in your bedroom. she had a good laugh. few days after, another colleague, still a woman. i need a favor (work related) and in italian one can say 'mi fai un favore' or 'mi fai un piacere'. of course i translate the second saying 'j'ai besoin d'un plaisir' which very roughly
    via u/hyp_reddit
  • 20
    translates to 'can you pleasure me'. she also had a good laugh, luckily. i am proud to report my french greatly improved. since then.
    via u/hyp_reddit
  • 21
    llamaesunquadru... My partner is allergic to peanuts and in Japan we used Google translate to communicate it. It worked well except in one cafe where the waiter came back with a Google translate screen saying there might be peanuts in the poodle.
    via u/llamaesunquadrupedo
  • 22
    SHOOTR-MCGAVIN Ive posted this before in a similar thread, but English is not my first language. We were visiting chicago. I had been to New York before so I knew of the subway there. I did not realize the term 'subway' was unique to the style of train. We couldn't find where to get on the railway in Chicago so
    via u/SHOOTR-MCGAVIN
  • 23
    stopped at a gas station and I asked how to get to the subway. The guy gave me directions. We walked about 20 minutes, turned the corner to where he said it'd be, and found the restaurant Subway. It was such a funny moment
    via u/SHOOTR-MCGAVIN
  • 24
    Toelnternational3... First time in Spain, this is 16 years ago. I didn't speak a word of Spanish when I went there, but I had to learn because not many people spoke English. You always speak about weather, right? And it was hot, end of July, beginning of August. I had this tiny English-Spanish wordbook,
    via u/Toelnternational3
  • 25
    no Google translate at that time. Just saying, it's a miles wide difference between "hace calor" and "estoy caliente". I just thought it meant that I feel hot, because it is very sunny and high temperatures.
    via u/Toelnternational3
  • 26
    Turned out, that what I was saying had a whole different meaning. A nice Spanish girl told me not to say it like that, because yeah, it means I am hot - but like in not because of the weather. I wished the ground would swallow me. I had been using that phrase for at least two weeks. I was sooo embarrassed. Nowadays, it's a funny story.
    via u/Toelnternational3
  • 27
    Aruma47 I was in an electronics shop in Mexico trying to buy a new charging cable. With myself speaking no Spanish and the young guy behind the counter speaking no English, he pulled out google translate on his phone. Into which I typed 'micro-usb' in English, which happened to come up as 'micro-usb' in Spanish.
    via u/Aruma47
  • 28
    Matija Maverick The Greek word for 'yes' is 'nai,' which sounds negative. The situation we experienced was: Me: Excuse me, could you tell me if this is the way to the Acropolis? Elderly locals in Greece: Nai. Me: Ah, I see. Well, thank you anyway. I'll try to find another route. (As it was
    via u/Matija Maverick
  • 29
    clear that they do not understand English very well) As we turn around, the locals are left bewildered, even though they just confirmed that we are on the right path.
    via u/Matija Maverick
  • 30
    Later on, we realized that in the Greek language, 'nai' means 'yes,' even though it sounds negative. We've been going in the right direction! We made fun of this until the end of our vacation. :D
    via u/Matija Maverick
  • 31
    mabelh89 When me and my family were in France, a woman. asked my dad something and he tried to say in French, "Sorry, I don't speak French", but he actually said, "Do you speak no French." He walked away feeling very proud of himself, and then realised that something wasn't right there.
    via u/mabelh89
  • 32
    He walked up the stairs to our apartment with his head hung and told us. The woman was really nice though, at first she was confused, and then went, oh, and spoke in English.
    via u/mabelh89
  • 33
    TomMFive In Boquete, Panama whilst attempting to buy jeans I spent five minutes telling a store order about my desire to buy pants for horses (caballos) instead of men (caballeros) in my broken. Spanish.
    via u/TomMFive
  • 34
    Missmoneysterling We were in Rome in an old hotel by the Colosseum. It was very loud in our rooms. My friend went to the front desk and kept explaining to the receptionist dude that it was too loud in his room. The guy was not helpful and my friend was 1. He then got out his Italian book and realized he spent 15 minutes telling the guy "I don't like my ears!"
    via u/Missmoneysterling
  • 35
    WeatherWest6896 I was traveling. Stopped at a small diner in Virginia and asked for coffee. The waitress put her hands on her hips and said "codfish, we don't sell codfish here."
    via u/WeatherWest6896
  • 36
    smom In February 2002 my husband and I were checking in to a hotel in Paris (from US). My best friend since childhood was 4 months pregnant and left a message for me. Due to a language barrier the message read "your wife has delivered a baby boy."
    via u/smom
  • 37
    What she meant was she had a sonogram and would be having a boy in several months. We were getting some serious looks from staff.
    via u/smom
  • 38
    bjb13 My wife and I were on a long trip around Europe. We were in a large German city and saw an Indian restaurant. Since we hadn't had any Indian food in a while we decided to eat there.
    via u/bjb13
  • 39
    We decided we wanted some papadom to start. I meant to order 4 papadoms but instead I ordered 4 orders. The guy looked at us a little funny but brought us 16 papadoms. We had a good laugh and ate them all.
    via u/bjb13
  • 40
    dave_gregory42 I ordered a Diet Coke in Tegernsee in Bavaria and got delivered a vegetarian Thai red curry. Still ate it.
    via u/dave_gregory42
  • 41
    jessemck I was 16 and working in a kitchen, trying to explain to my coworkers that my dad was a lawyer. I said he was an "albóndiga" (meatball) instead of an "abogado" (lawyer). It took them a solid few minutes to keep it together long enough to explain my mistake to me.
    via u/jessemck
  • 42
    Oddly enough, my dad is on the heavier side, so once I was shown the error of my ways, I told them my original response still held.
    via u/jessemck
  • 43
    gonzojeff I was living and working in Italy for a few years, and I really tried to learn the language. My Italian isn't too bad now, but initially, it was pretty rough at times. During that early period, I once stopped in at a cafe' to get a sandwich and a drink. I saw that they had peach tea in bottles in the cooler, so I asked for "tè alla pesce".
    via u/gonzojeff
  • 44
    The woman at the counter gave me the strangest look. I figured that I'd pronounced it poorly, so I again said, speaking as distinctly as i could, "Vorrei un tè alla pesce, per favore." She then burst out laughing. I was ordering fish tea. I should have asked for "tè alla pesca". That's a mistake I definitely never made again!
    via u/gonzojeff
  • 45
    whittlingcanbefatal I was on a boat from Chonqing down the Yangste river. A Chinese uncle sat down next to me and talked nonstop for an hour. His accent was so unusual I couldn't even place it. I didn't understand a word he said. When he finished and walked away, my friend came over and asked what we talked about for so long. I had to admit I had no idea.
    via u/whittlingcanbefatal

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