From our Nobody-is-Perfect series.
A dog-eared* page of the German Zeit Online website has an interesting article on the plethora of official languages of the European Union and an anecdote of a translation error that made sour cherries sweet and caused legal trouble for a German firm.
According to the article, in 1993, a German translator wrote "sweet cherries" instead of "sour cherries", causing sour faces at a canned fruit company.
The error was eventually fixed, and we do not have details on any repercussions for the translator. What happened to the unlucky man? We have to assume it was a man, with an all cherries are the same kind of attitude.
If this error from the dawn of the information age is all there is, we are in good hands.
Moving on the the Nobody in Nobody-is-Perfect.
If your last name is Keiner in Germany, Austria, or Switzerland, you will be teased in school.
Teacher: Wer war das? (Who did this?)
Teacher's pet: Keiner.
Nobody, or none, or N/A. Kids being kids, they will include variants with interchangeable pronunciation, such as "Kainer".
When it comes to filling out forms, Herr or Frau Keiner encounter the occasional problem in new situations.
Computerized sign-in stations at modern factories are a challenge as a truck driver can tell you. Security guards are easily flustered when the equivalent of "Last Name: None" pops up on their screen.
Becoming a translator at the EU might be a safer job.
* We know dog-eared is not how you are supposed to say it, but face it, bookmarked isn't any better, is it?
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