Do you speak Chinglish? Or, as I prefer to call it – Mandaringlish, that strange linguistic phenomenon the Internet seems to like so much. Instagram is full of real-life examples of translations gone rogue. See for yourself!

And yes, Mandarin Chinese is a ridiculously complicated language, with thousands of characters for each and every word and a whole lot of homophones – words that sound similar but have different meanings.

You see, roughly 75% of Chinese speakers uses Mandarin more widely than any other form of Chinese – accounting for 955 million native speakers globally, or almost 15% of the world’s population in total. It is just one of several Chinese dialect groups, which can be quite confusing, considering that even some of the Mandarin dialects are not “mutually understandable”.

Mandarin dialects are spoken throughout most of northern and southwestern China. Other varieties of Chinese include Wu, Xiang, Yue, Min, Hakka, and Gan.

A good example of how complicated Mandarin is exactly would be a “The Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den” poem which is a passage composed of 92 characters, in which every syllable has the sound "shi" when read in modern Mandarin, with only the tones differing.

Speaking of Gan, funnily enough, most bizarre examples could be tracked back to only one sign – commonly known as GĀN4. And nope, it doesn’t read as “ganfor”, in fact it’s one of few words in Mandarin represented by a “gan” tone. Some of its meanings include: to do and to work – no problem here, but then we also have: to kill, and most notorious of all: to have sex (OK, maybe a more direct meaning)…

Do you see where I’m going?

Apparently, some of the proud owners of such signs and menus used free Machine Translations available, which automatically “ducked up” their intended translation – pun intended.

So why would you do such a thing to your own business, you might ask? Good question! In our times, where the speed and price level are priorities, it’s easy to get seduced by a freebie.

Alas, all that glitters is not gold. 

But if we put all that aside, MT usage without any kind of the proofreading afterwards is more common than it seems. Even outside of China. Video games, apparel, and sport equipment manufacturers – many walked that road without a clear understanding of what they were getting themselves into.

Here’s the thing though – and don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying MT is bad and produces only results like the ones above; on the contrary – it can and should be used to speed up certain aspects of the translation. But only certain, e.g. UI, technical, or glossary-specific (think video games) text could greatly benefit from the Neuro MT. But… with an actual proofreader on board to make the text shine and avoid the whole GĀN4 situation.

This is also a perfect example why:

• Direct translation is not always the best solution;
• Using a proofreader is always a good idea;
• Free or cheap translations might result in GĀN4 situations.

So, ask yourself: what’s worth more to you – saving money on a questionable solution and potentially making yourself and your brand a meme? Or working with professionals?

Make a wise choice!