The Problem With Dictionaries

[tgeezer]

I have a book written for Thais to help with the English Titled"4000 words". An awful restaurant is translated with: ร้านอาหารน่ากลัว You seldom see awful used like that, "the awful awe of the angry law". I suppose it happens from Thai to English.

[Groongthep]

I have a book written for Thais to help with the English Titled"4000 words". An awful restaurant is translated with: ร้านอาหารน่ากลัว You seldom see awful used like that, "the awful awe of the angry law". I suppose it happens from Thai to English.

I haven't been to too many scary restaurants but I've met a few restaurant owners who where definitely น่ากลัว .

[meadish_sweetball]

ผมกลัวร้านผี

[5tash]

I see that if both Thai (ร้านอาหารน่ากลัว) and English (An awful restaurant) phrases are combined we end up with "a frightfully awful restaurant"!

... try translating that back into Thai!

Edited November 29, 2008 by 5tash

[Nongwahyay]

I bought a thai-engl/engl-thai dictionary about 10 years ago which has 20 pages in it, that are back to front, making it somewhat confusing, trying to find a word in that section. About 5 years ago I bought the two-tome "New Model Thai-English dictionary" compiled by So Sethaputra for 1.000 Baht. It´s actually very good - however it wasn´t until I was back home in Germany that I discovered that pages 475 - 514 were totally missing, !!!!! I wrote to the publisher, who informed me that another company had taken it over. Eventually they did actually send me the missing pages free of charge with a long apology for the inconvenience............ so all turned out well. However, I must admit that some of the examples in this dictionary make one really want to ask why on earth anyone would choose such hilarious examples to explain a word or expression.............. ""my overcoat is moth-eaten all over!.............or ""I am so hungry that my stomach is drawn in"....or "that man´s face is extremely ugly" or "he found his wife in the arms of another man" . However, I must stress that it is a very good dictionary, using many expressions relating to average thai and rural situations. I´m not really intending to knock it.......