Offbeat

Malaysia’s Google translations

Malaysia’s defence ministry yesterday blamed the use of Google Translate for the mangled English that appeared on its website sparking online ridicule.
The translations from the Malay language into English included dress guidelines for ministry staff that prohibited “clothes that poke eye” – a reference to revealing attire.
Instead, the dress code recommended women wear “appropriate clothing and worn neatly and politely in line with the practice of noble character”, according to blog postings.
Users of Google and other free online translation services can see their words and sentences instantly converted from one language into another when they type into a text box. But the results can be varied.
Another section of the ministry’s website said that after 1957 independence from Britain, the new Malaysian government took “drastic measures to increase the level of any national security threat”.
Snickering Malaysian’s passed the bungled translations around via social networking sites. The passages have since been removed from the ministry’s website.
“We have corrected the mistakes and translations are no longer done that way. It is now done manually,” Defence Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi told The Star daily.

NY subway rats get photo contest

Rats scurrying through New York’s subway system better clean their sharp teeth: they’re in a beauty contest!
Fed-up subway workers trying to draw attention to what they say is an infestation have offered a free monthly transport pass to whoever snaps the best picture of one of the furry menaces.
Pictures can be sent to ratfreesubways.com where they will appear on the Rate My Rat section.
The site currently shows six entries, as well as videos of the infamously determined and hardy subterranean residents making off with pizza and other food dumped by untidy passengers.
“Rats are proliferating in the New York City subways,” said the Transport Workers Union, which represents subway workers. “Aggressive rats are bolder about coming onto the platforms, and have even been known to bite riders. They infest the refuse rooms where garbage is stored.”
The Metropolitan Transport Authority has declared rat war in 20 stations, but that is less than four percent of the total and “it’s not enough. More must be done!” the TWU said on the site.