Dial-An-Interpreter. When you find you're not speaking the same language.

English Broken Here
A collection of signs and notices written in English that were discovered throughout the world.
In a Paris Hotel Elevator:
 Please leave your values at the front desk 		In a Hotel in Athens:
 Visitors are expected to complain at the office between the hours of 9 and 11 a.m. daily.
Outside a Hong Kong Tailor shop:
 Ladies may have a fit upstairs. 		In a Zurich Hotel
 Because of the impropriety of entertaining guest of the opposite sex in the bedroom, it is suggested that the lobby be used for this purpose.
In the lobby of a Moscow hotel across from a Russian Orthodox Monastery:
 You are welcome to visit the cemetery where famous Russian and Soviet composers, artists and writers are buried daily except Thursday. 		In an Austrian Hotel catering to skiers:
 Not to perambulte the corridors in the hours of repose in the boots of ascension.
On the menu of a Swiss restaurant:
 Our wines leave you with nothing to hope for. 		In a Bangkok dry cleaners:
 Drop your trousers here for best results.
In a Rhodes tailor shop:
 Order your summers suit. Because in a big rush we will execute customers in strict rotation. 		In a Bucharest hotel lobby:
 The lift is being fixed for the next day. During that time we regret that you will be unbearable.
In an advertisement by a Hong Kong dentist:
 Teeth extracted by the latest Methodists. 		In a Yugoslavian hotel:
 The flattening of underwear with pleasure is the job of the chambermaid.
In a Rome laundry:
 Ladies, leave your clothes here and spend the afternoon having a good time. 		Advertisement for donkey rides in Thailand:
 Would you like to ride your own ass?
On the door of a Moscow hotel:
 If this is your first visit to the USSR, you are welcome to it. 		In an Acapulco hotel:
 The manager has personally passed all the water served here.
From a brochure of a car rental firm in Tokyo:
 When passenger of foot heave in sigh, tootie the horn. Trumpet him melodiously at first, but if he still obstacles your passenge then tootie him with vigor. 		In a Copenhagen airport:
 We take your bags and send them in all directions.
In a Budapest zoo:
 Please do not feed the animals. If you have any suitable food, give it to the guard on duty.
Did you know that...

  • ...while nothing approaching solid knowledge about the development and evolution of language is available to contemporary scholarship, there is some evidence that humans have been speaking for at least 40 of the roughly estimated 100 millennia since our species (Homo Sapiens) emerged. Diversification over the millennia has led to somewhere between 3000 and 8000 languages being spoken in the world at present.


  • ...there are more than 3000 natural languages in the world. The exact figure is impossible to determine, partly because linguists tend to disagree on exactly what constitutes a language. Generally when dialects are no longer mutually intelligible, they are considered to be a language. A dialect may also be considered a language if it is used in books and newspapers.


  • ...the ten most widely spoken languages worldwide are:

  1. Mandarin
  2. English
  3. Russian
  4. Spanish
  5. Hindi
  6. Arabic
  7. Portuguese
  8. Bengali
  9. German
  10. Japanese

  • ...the State of California certifies only the following languages:
    Spanish
    Arabic
    Korean
    Portuguese
    Cantonese
    Tagalog
    Vietnamese
    Japanese

  • ...artificial languages, that is, languages deliberately invented, are used in such diverse fields as mathematics, formal logic, and computer science. However, less limited artificial languages have been proposed to create a more logical vehicle of thought than can be found in any natural language and to overcome the barriers to communication resulting from the multiplicity of languages spoken in the world today.

  • ...Rene Descartes suggested an artificial language in the 17th century.

  • ...Jean Francois Sudre developed an artificial language called SOLRESOL in 1817. All of its words were formed by combinations of syllables designating notes in the musical scale.

  • ...Hans Fruedenthal created a language called LINCOS or LINGUA COSMICA that was intended to establish communications with extraterrestrial.

  • ...the first major movement for an international language, called VOLAPUK, was initiated by Johann Martin Schleyer in 1880.

  • ...ESPERANTO, created in 1887 by Ludwik Zamenhof, is the most widely used artificial language today.

  • ...of the various artificial language systems that have been proposed for international adoption in the 20th century, the most successful has been Alexander Gode's INTERLINGUA, inspired by the Latin-based "interlingua" proposed in 1903 by the Italian mathematician Giuseppe Peano. INTERLINGUA is based largely on the international vocabulary of science and technology, and can be understood with little difficulty by those familiar with English or a romance language. It has been widely employed at medical conferences and in scientific journals.



Final Facts

  • The complete English Vocabulary consists of almost one million words, yet 3000 words make up almost 95% of all utterances.


  • Mandarin is spoken by over 675 million people worldwide, more than any other language in the world.


  • The oldest known written language is Sumeriam which originated in Mesopotamia around 3500 BC and was written in Cuneiform script whose symbols stand for the sounds made by syllables.


  • The longest word in the English language consists of 3,600 letters. It is a chemical name describing bovine NADP-specific glutamate dehydrogenate, which contains 500 amino acids.


  • Coca-Cola has become a word in almost every language in the world.



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