Very important one

Here is a nice drink I fixed up for myself. Vodka, tonic water, and lime. There must be a name for this, and considering I once took a bartending course you'd think I'd know. But I don't. Lime fizz?

But wait, there's something on the bottle- English! Living surrounded by kanji and hiragana and cutesy graphics as I do, I'm always happy for the chance to read my native language. Let's get a closer look and see what it says.

Umm, yes. Couldn't have my lime fizz or lime soda or lime ricky or lime tonic or whatever the hell it is without soda water. So yes, I'd have to agree- soda water is important.

Grammar? Proofreading? Making sense? Apparently not.

Tags: engrish

Comments

[Chaz Curry]

It's called a VODKA TONIC!

... one of my favorite drinks :)

[kat]

ahh..proofreading...non-existent here...I can't believe they pay for advertisements with mis-spelled words and phrases that don't really make much sense.

have a great week!

[Josh]

English here functions in purely a decorative sense. It has ceased being language.

[Amy]

Vodka tonic! Yes! Once upon a time I spoke regular English and actually used that term. Thanks for jogging my memory.
By the way, can it still be called a vodka tonic if it's made with club soda?

Yes, the decorative English is really sad. I admire those who study English and other languages here, and I think the average person's competence in foreign languages is quite good (at least compared to North America). But all these nonsense English slogans really bother me. Not just the nonsence English phrases themselves, but the fact that a person or people actually sat down and went to some effort to think up those phrases.
If companies don't want to bother with a proofreader because they only want the look of English, than why don't they save themselves some effort and just use a random sentance generator...

[Jean]

If I read just the words, and not know you were in Japan - I would have thought you're in Singapore or Malaysia because that line sounded pretty Singlish :)

[Amy]

I guess Singlish is very similar to Engrish!