“Bite the wax tadpole.”
– Coca-Cola as originally translated into Chinese

“Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave.”
– ad slogan “Pepsi Comes Alive” as originally translated into
Chinese

“I am a jelly doughnut”
–English translation of John F. Kennedy
speaking at the Berlin Wall

“We pray for MacArthur's erection.”
–sign erected by Japanese citizens in Tokyo, when MacArthur was
considering a run for President

“You are invited to take advantage of the chambermaid.”
–from a guest directory at a Japanese hotel, 1991

“It takes a virile man to make a chicken pregnant.”
–Perdue chicken ad, as mistranslated abroad


More mistranslations:
These are actual signs from around the world:

In a Tokyo Hotel:
Is forbidden to steal hotel towels please. If you are not a person
to do such thing is please not to read notis.

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 a Leipzig elevator:
Do not enter the lift backwards, and only when lit up.

In a Belgrade hotel elevator:
To move the cabin, push button for wishing floor. If the cabin
should enter more persons, each one should press a number of
wishing floor. Driving is then going alphabetically by national
order.

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.

In a Yugoslavian hotel:
The flattening of underwear with pleasure is the job of the
chambermaid.

In a Japanese hotel:
You are invited to take advantage of the chambermaid.

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 perambulate the corridors in the hours of repose in the
boots of ascension.

On the menu of a Swiss restaurant:
Our wines leave you nothing to hope for.

On the menu of a Polish hotel:
Salad a firm's own make; limpid red beet soup with cheesy dumplings
in the form of a finger; roasted duck let loose; beef rashers
beaten up in the country people's fashion.

Outside a Hong Kong tailor shop:
Ladies may have a fit upstairs.

In a Bangkok dry cleaner's:
Drop your trousers here for best results.

Outside a Paris dress shop:
Dresses for street walking.

In a Rhodes tailor shop:
Order your summers suit. Because is big rush we will execute
customers in strict rotation.

Similarly, from the Soviet Weekly:
There will be a Moscow Exhibition of Arts by 15,000 Soviet Republic
painters and sculptors. These were executed over the past two
years.

A sign posted in Germany's Black forest:
It is strictly forbidden on our black forest camping site that
people of different sex, for instance, men and women, live together
in one tent unless they are married with each other for that
purpose.

In a Zurich hotel:
Because of the impropriety of entertaining guests of the opposite
sex in the bedroom, it is suggested that the lobby be used for this
purpose.

In an advertisement by a Hong Kong dentist:
Teeth extracted by the latest Methodists.

In a Rome laundry:
Ladies, leave your clothes here and spend the afternoon having a
good time.

In a Czechoslovakian tourist agency:
Take one of our horse-driven city tours - we guarantee no
miscarriages.

Advertisement for donkey rides in Thailand:
Would you like to ride on your own ass?

In a Swiss mountain inn:
Special today – no ice cream.

In a Bangkok temple:
It is forbidden to enter a woman even a foreigner if dressed as a
man.

In a Tokyo bar:
Special cocktails for the ladies with nuts.

In a Copenhagen airline ticket office:
We take your bags and send them in all directions.

On the door of a Moscow hotel room:
If this is your first visit to the USSR, you are welcome to it.

In a Norwegian cocktail lounge:
Ladies are requested not to have children in the bar.

In a Budapest zoo:
Please do not feed the animals. If you have any suitable food,
give it to the guard on duty.

In the office of a Roman doctor:
Specialist in women and other diseases.

In an Acapulco hotel:
The manager has personally passed all the water served here.

In a Tokyo shop:
Our nylons cost more than common, but you'll find they are best in
the long run.

From a Japanese information booklet about using a hotel air
conditioner:
Cooles and Heates: If you want just condition of warm in your
room, please control yourself.

From a brochure of a car rental firm in Tokyo:
When passenger of foot heave in sight, tootle the horn. Trumpet
him melodiously at first, but if he still obstacles your passage
then tootle him with vigor.

Two signs from a Majorcan shop entrance:
- English well talking.
- Here speeching American