The L again

A little while ago I posted about the letters L and R and how there is no difference in the sounds in the Japanese language in this post.
Tonight we ate at a restaurant called the Glill Restaurant. Thought it was kind of funny when we pulled up.
And just to clarify Glill was supposed to be Grill. This was a restaurant where they had the grills in the center of the table where you could cook your food if you ordered that.
 
 I am thinking maybe I can make a little extra money by becoming an English proofreader here in Japan and help when something needs to be or someone wants something in English.
There are many examples of English gone wrong or English that doesn't quite sound right and I will try to put together a post of some of them in the near future.

L or R (the letters not left or right)

Here in Japan the language is obviously different than it is in the States, Australia or Europe. One of the the ways it is different is the sounds that are made. In the Japanese language there is no distinction between the sounds that the letter L and the letter R make.
This sometimes can lead to some funny translations and a word could be translated with either an L or an R.
Ill show you what I mean.
In my last post I talked about us going to Biwako Valley - a ski area (Biwako Valley Sledding) where we could take Myla sledding. When we got to the ski hill we picked up some of the information they had there, one flyer in particular was written in English. This showed us where we were, where the cable car lift went, where the ski runs and restaurants were. And, where the half pipe was. Only it wasn't the half pipe, it was the harf pipe. We both got a pretty good laugh out of this and wondered how a mistake like that could be made.


But then I got to thinking and it made it made me remember back to last year when we had the ability to watch Japanese TV in our apartment. In the mornings there was one channel that had some kids shows on that Myla liked. One of these TV shows was called "Happy Clappy." They had a nice little jingle they sang at the beginning and end and they seemed very happy.
 
 Only the little jingle didnt really sound like clappy, it sounded more like the L of clappy was replaced with an R. It sounded like crappy......Happy Crappy. The first time I heard it I had to stop and listen again as I thought I was making it up but sure enough.....Happy Crappy was streaming into our living room from some Japanese TV studio.
I happened to put this in the internet and see what would come up. Other people said the same thing, but not only did they hear it - they saw it. One viewer posted that in his TV guide the show was listed as Happy Crappy (Happy Crappy). Not bad for a show aimed at 1-3 year olds :)


So, the lesson here is:
If you are ever around a Japanese person and they say something to the effect of:
I love crapping
Lets crap together
You are a good crapper
There is a lot of crapping going on here
Please crap louder
That is a good golf crap

You will now know to substitute an L for the R and make an awkward sentence perfectly normal.
Happy Crapping :)