Poblem Engrish

Poblem Engrish Worldwide

2007-09-12T03:28:00.000+08:00

The use of bad English is not only restricted to Singapore and East Asian countries, as evidenced in Engrish.com. From the Baltic to the Pacific, Engrish can be found worldwide, even in supposedly "English-speaking" countries:

Location: Brighton & Hove, UK
Don't join in then...

This actually causes me physical pain. It happens both times there are subtitles in 'Mean Girls'. You would have thought that with their budget, they could have got a proofreader in.

Location: Eden, North Carolina, USA
Why is that even for You're Eyes only? Shouldn't everyone be warned?

Location: Wellington, New Zealand
Holy modern Bible translations, Batman!

9 of 10 experts agree that 'crakers' sounds more "crispy" than 'crackers'.

Location: University of Nottingham, UK
For the love of Mike, this is an ENGLISH university.

Location: the former Soviet Union
The name says it all.

Location: Greenwich, SE London, UK
The line for the Barber Shop begins here.
Cool! Instructions with a stammer!

Location: Rowan College, Glassboro, New Jersey, USA
I think this note is about vodka boiler-makers...

Location: Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, USA
[insert mildly-humorous somewhat-appropriate Dan Quayle joke here]

You can't beat this.

Thanks to Emily Ash for most of the photographs.

Found: The Letter S

2007-04-04T00:02:00.000+08:00

Some months ago, the Poblem Engrish team notified the general public about the case of disappearing Ss throughout the island.

One such S has recently been located; hiding in a word that didn't need it:

Location: CHIJMES Basement

Login Fun

2007-03-21T16:45:00.000+08:00

Location: Wireless internet, Starbucks Coffee.

Note the 'You have key in an invalid User ID'. Confusion of the active and passive voices - should be 'keyed', not 'key'.

Location: Wireless internet, National University of Singapore.

Note the 'I am a visitor to NUS, how could I...' . Misuse of 'could'. It should be 'how may I', 'how might I' or even 'how do I'.

Tsk.

Plumb Job!

2007-03-14T14:58:00.000+08:00

Location: Straits Times, 14 March 2007.

'In Singapore, 25-year-old Yu Yingxi turned down a plumb offer by a British bank to work as a civil servant here.'

Indeed, entirely understandable. I wouldn't want to be a plumber for a British bank either.

Or did they mean PLUM offer?

Tsk. This really is an appalling mistake, and on the front page too.

Straits Times editors, I'd really like to know how much sleep you get during office hours!

NUS Debate Club

2007-03-11T23:28:00.000+08:00

Location: National University of Singapore, Engineering Faculty.

I think they've also just proven they don't know that starting a sentence with a conjunction is verboten.

Hello chaps... I'm not sure the country needs you, but you sure need a grammar refresher course!

NUS Debate Club. Pffft.

Not impressed!

Quite So!

2007-03-11T23:26:00.000+08:00

Location: Anglo-Chinese Junior College

Um, a WHAT occasion?

2007-03-11T23:21:00.000+08:00

Location: Macdonald's, Queensway Shopping Centre.

This is from last September. Um, a WHAT occasion? No, wait, I don't think I want to know...

Park Your Handicap Here!

2007-03-11T23:16:00.000+08:00

Location: Carpark near Arab Street

'For The Handicap'? How sweet. Park your handicap there, go for lunch, pick up your handicap when you come back...

Exit Caution

2007-03-11T23:09:00.000+08:00

EXIT CAUTION - therefore no caution required? Sounds like a stage direction... 'exit Macbeth'!

LOOK BEFORE GO - very odd use of differently-sized fonts there.

NO JUMPING QUEQUE - 'queque' is so cute. It looks almost Spanish.

Nearly an error in each line. Sigh.

Poblem Latin!

2007-03-11T22:45:00.000+08:00

Location: Monument to the former Raffles Girls' School, Stamford Road, at Singapore Management University.

Now, now, I know - this isn't strictly Poblem Engrish. It's actually Poblem Latin, but hey, it's my blog and I teach Latin and Greek to pay the bills, so I'll put it here if I want to!

Note the motto, as the picture has it:

FILIAE MELIORIS ÆVI.

Note the inconsistency between use of 'AE' and the ligature 'Æ'. They should both be 'AE' or 'Æ', not a mix of the two. Now, a little bit of background. In Latin, the combination 'AE' may be written as 'AE', and likewise 'OE' may be written as 'Œ'. Both classical and present practice is to write the letters separately, but the ligatures were used in mediæval and early modern writings, in part because æ was reduced to a simple long vowel (IPA [eː]) in late Latin, and the same for œ.

Yet, what's really odd is the space between the 'Æ' ligature and the next two letters 'VI'. It looks as if the sign had 'AEVI' at first (the spacing looks right for that), and then afterwards, the 'AE' in 'AEVI' was replaced with 'Æ'. Whoever replaced 'AE' with 'Æ' was pedantic, but not pedantic enough to replace both.

Very, very odd.

Sushi Tei

2007-03-11T22:42:00.000+08:00

Location: Sushi Tei, Raffles City

Two Howlers

2007-03-10T12:20:00.000+08:00

from Bottle Beer

I agree, building good tiles is very important :)

also from Bottle Beer!

Admire the Door?

2007-03-10T12:17:00.000+08:00

Location: Tampines MRT control station

Credits to: Fredrik Yeo HangZhi

Mighty Hunter #1

2007-03-10T12:13:00.000+08:00

Location: Seen on a van at Grace Assembly of God Church in Tanglin.

Thanks to Joel Pan!

We're Back

2007-03-09T05:16:00.000+08:00

For half a year, Poblem Engrish has been dormant; updates have been few and lacking in quality. No more - for I promise you, our loyal readers, that from today, Poblem Engrish has thrown off the lethargy that has strangled production of posts in the past months.

Without further ado, I give you this month's photographs:

Location: Tanjong Pagar MRT station
Beware of glass. Get too close and it'll eat you.

Location: Robinsons, Raffles City
We're speaking English now, so modify your adjectives.

Location: Random multistoried car park near Chinatown
Likewise, your nouns/verbs.

Location: Jurong West Fried Chicken, near Jurong West Avenue 1
Would you like a serving of frost to go with your fries?

Location: Coffeeshop in Clementi
This drink comes with a large dose of lemon juice. Submitted by Sean.

Keep your submissions coming!

Season Greeting

2007-01-07T17:41:00.000+08:00

Location: N/A
Beard Papa Takeaway Box
Season greeting? Is it similar to season parking?

Foreign film at Carrefour sale

2006-12-13T14:51:00.000+08:00

Alfred Hitchcock presents... Sabotag. Carrefour was selling cheap DVDs of vintage films imported from Taiwan, apparently. From DVD distributors with names like "Happy Buddha".

Foreign Film in the DVD Section

2006-12-12T19:09:00.000+08:00

Location: Borders, Wheelock Place
The sign is wrong. There's more than one film here.

Old Chang Kee

2006-11-28T08:47:00.000+08:00

Old Chang Kee is a chain of outdoor stalls that sell traditional snacks. We couldn't figure out if this is bad English (grammatical and spelling errors) or bad Japlish (too coherent).

One Parent At A Time!

2006-09-23T01:32:00.000+08:00

Location: Causeway Point (similar signs are located near the washrooms at every level)

Crazy Sale!

2006-09-23T01:21:00.000+08:00

Location: Jurong West Avenue 1

Only 1 mattress left! Hurry!

Somoking Only

2006-09-23T01:14:00.000+08:00

Location: Behind Cuppage Plaza

For somoking only (whatever that is). Smokers have to find their space elsewhere.

Submission by Sean Hong Wei Jian

Judea Capta Est?

2006-09-23T01:07:00.000+08:00

Something always gets lost in translation, but usually not an entire city.

"Jerusalem. There is no such city!" the Jerusalem municipality said in the English-language version of a sightseeing brochure it had published originally in Hebrew.

The correct translation: "Jerusalem. There is no city like it!"

Carrying a photograph of the brochure, Israel's Maariv newspaper said on Wednesday tens of thousands of flyers had been distributed before city hall realised its mistake.

- Yahoo News, September 20th 2006

It sounds like it was translated by Titus.

The Legal Janitor

2006-07-30T22:27:00.000+08:00

Shianux or Han of The Legal Janitor is one of the sharpest bloggers in Singapore today. His areas of writing cover politics and economic theory, as well as the general frisking of very stupid beliefs of the Establishment and their spokesmen.

This is a very rare case of the undergraduate law student slipping up, though.

"Anyone of my generation would recall the copious amounts of indoctrination being applied upon us in school" is very frightening, very woolly, and very unwieldy. We humbly suggest "Anyone from my generation would recall being forcefed copious amounts of indoctrination in school".

Full disclosure: Shianux is on my blogroll at Illusio, and I read his blog on a daily basis.

ST Forum letter

2006-07-28T08:12:00.000+08:00

As the Straits Times operates behind a subscription firewall for articles more than 3 days old, we have to do a cut-and-paste, line-by-line frisking.

26 July 2006, Straits Times Interactive forum

Is Singapore's level of English internationally recognised?, by Stephanie Yeo Sing Ling (Ms)

An error, even in the title! "Recognised internationally" more appropriate. Visa is accepted worldwide, Web2.0 is a buzzword everywhere, we are contactable anytime at poblemengrish@gmail.com.

You can have a high level of English or a high standard of English. However, only your standard of English can be recognised internationally...

I AM a Singaporean currently pursuing higher education in Australia. If there was one word that I could describe the experience thus far, that would be 'humbled'.

"If there is one word I can use to describe the experience thus far". If you still hold the opinion of the experience even now, then you should use "is" instead of "was".

Having grown up in Singapore and nurtured by the excellent Singapore education system up to the level of a diploma, I have always felt comfortable with my ability to communicate in English. If fact, it is my main medium of communication when I am with my friends and family. Not to mention that I am really proud of our bilingual policy and to be part of a vibrant multi-racial community.

"In fact, it is..."
"... and family, not to mention that..."
Your main mediums of communication are speech, writing, or body movements. But if you're Stephanie Yeo Sing Ling (Ms), your main medium of communication is the English language. Suggestion: medium -> language

English is our first language, and according to a poll on the Channelnewsasia online forum section, we are quite confident of our English language skills.

Unhelpful. Either:
"according to a poll conducted by Channelnewsasia"
"according to a poll conducted by XYZ and cited at Channelnewsasia's online forums"
According to the poll, those who responded were confident of their skills. The poll doesn't say if their skills merit such confidence, though.

I have only been here in Sydney for a short period of five months. Understanding what the people say and getting my message across in English was all right.

"I have been here in Sydney for just five months, but..."

When I attended a seminar about the issues of Australian permanent residence application for students, I was quite surprised to know that despite English being our first language, we still require to be assessed by the International English Language Testing System (IELTS).

"When I attended a seminar on Australian permanent residence applications for students"
"we are still required"

Currently, there is no such requirement for Singaporeans applying for student visas. The applicant need not take the IELTS if his first language is English and his passport is from the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, United States or the Republic of Ireland.

Personally, I am most willing to be assessed to have an idea of my level of competency in the language internationally because my highest level of English assessment is the Cambridge O levels.

Competence in English is competence in English. Whether you speak or write it in Singapore or in Australia, your competence is still the same everywhere. Perhaps you mean to say you wish to have your competence in English tested by a more credibile body?

Your highest assessed level of English competence is the GCSE O Levels, administered by OCR, the Oxford Cambridge and RSA examinations board.

However, it set me into thinking if it means that we are still not on parity with at least the Australian standard; or recognised internationally?

"we are still not on par".

The English language is of economic importance and I would want my children in future to learn it well.

"I would want my child to learn it well in the future"

Stephanie Yeo Sing Ling (Ms), you fail the test of English competence, as administered by the Poblemengrish Board of Examiners. Similarly, the editor and sub-editors of the ST forum page fail to meet the basic requirements of their job.

D- to all parties!

Nothing wrong with the English...

2006-07-26T00:29:00.000+08:00

...just a little strange.

Location: Kopitiam, Plaza by the Park

Same Writer, Same Page

2006-07-25T20:19:00.000+08:00

Location: Karen Tee, in Digital Life, 25 July 2006. On the same page as her error in "Broadcast Blues". TWO ERRORS BY THE SAME WRITER ON THE SAME PAGE?

'Bloggers desire to express themselves than to give their opinions on politics'.

Are we missing a 'more' or a 'rather' there somewhere?

Karen Tee, O Karen Tee - TWO such mistakes on the same page? I think we should tell your primary school English teacher. Either that or your editor doesn't like you one bit.

The Straits Times could used an editor right now!

2006-07-25T08:06:00.000+08:00

Karen Tee. "Broadcast Blues", in Digital Life, 25 July 2006.
Bertha Hanson's definitely sleeping on the job.
The RIAA of Singapore doesn't understand "blogers" either.

Tomorrow!

2006-07-24T21:30:00.000+08:00

We got mentioned in Tomorrow!

Cigarettes

2006-07-24T20:44:00.000+08:00

From Mr Paul Tolton, who says: Where's the punctuation when you need it? According to this, I think shops are forced to sell cigarettes to under 18s.'

Working On Height!

2006-07-24T20:41:00.000+08:00

Asians are short?

Sent in by Mr Paul Tolton, who says: Marvelous Singapore is so pro-active. Recently, a casual comment was made by Indonesian Army Chief, General Ryamizard Ryacudu , inferring that the Singapore Army were rather short. The Government immediately whipped into action with a campaign. Magic!

Chockage!

2006-07-24T20:37:00.000+08:00

Location: an office toilet somewhere.

Sent in by Mr Paul Tolton, who says 'An excellent word. Somehow grossly descriptive and polite at the same time.'

Raw

2006-07-24T20:11:00.000+08:00

Location: RAW, a sauna and 'health club' along Ann Siang Hill, for gentlemen who are of... erm... the like-minded persuasion, shall we say.

This one's hilarious, not so much for the quality (or lack thereof) of its English, but more for the amazing mental images it conjures up.

[credit to Buay Tah Han]

A Palpable Hit!

2006-07-24T19:43:00.000+08:00

Location: http://weekeegeepee.blogspot.com/2006/07/hit-palpable-hit.html

CP, the GP teacher who runs weekeegeepee, has our respect. We took several swipes at his GP blog for his students, and he good naturedly acknowledged our potshots before his students. CP - would that more teachers had your integrity!

There was a comment on his blog which we feel requires a response:

yamies said...

ahh -.- they seem too caught up with hammering in perfect english into a nation who doesn't even speak the language at home. Many (i would say most) singaporeans don't speak english that much, except when they have to use it professionally. it's going to take a while for singapore to even reach a stage where english is spoken by the average person on the street more than his mother tongue.

Unfortunately, the blog only allows blog members to comment, so we are thus moved to reply here.

===

yamies - you're quite right about Singaporeans generally speaking a mother tongue more than English, and we don't hold it against them. This blog exists not to correct the average man's English. We know that to be a futile and unfair exercise. Poking fun at the efforts of those who have not had the benefit of a thorough schooling in the English language is not only unfair, it is mean-spirited and nasty. That's why we consider signs in kopitiams written by the mee rebus makcik and the char kway teow uncle to be naturally exempt. Also exempt are private blogs and materials not intended for the general public. Handwritten makeshift signs are not posted as examples of poblem engrish here, except where the mangling leads to exceptionally hilarious unintended new meanings.

What we *do* object to is bad English in print and public places, where legions of copywriters and proofreaders have been unable to notice simple errors of logic and grammar. Errors from those who ought to know better is the point of this blog. Such errors abound even in the Straits Times and are inexcusable. Any sign in a public place, professionally printed, mounted or produced to last and be a semi-permanent feature, falls within the purview of this blog. Commercials, advertisements, flyers, and other materials made for public perusal, are ergo fair game for us.

We're not at all concerned about 'hammering in perfect english' into a nation - we're cynics who point and laugh sardonically. This is an important point. We're not crusaders or fighting a cause.

Ticket required...

2006-07-24T19:09:00.000+08:00

Location: Golden Village Cinema, Plaza Singapura.

Do not adjust your screen, spectacles or contact lenses - you *are* seeing double!

Then there's the infelictous use of 'kids from the height'. Does that mean children being suspended a certain distance off the ground? If so, children levitating less than 90 cm off the ground don't need a ticket...

Halal Certified

2006-07-24T19:05:00.000+08:00

Location: Delifrance, Bukit Panjang Plaza.

We speak often of this or that premise, but now you know what one looks like in the flesh. Halal Certified too!

Be A....?

2006-07-24T19:03:00.000+08:00

Location: Isetan supermarket, Lido.

While I enjoy being the centre of attention, I'm not sure being a main dish is one of my talents. Can I be dessert instead? *cheeky grin*

Passenger Cum Goods Lift

2006-07-24T19:01:00.000+08:00

Location: Church of the Holy Family, Katong, Singapore.

If you don't find this funny, I'm very glad for you.

Wanted: S - Dead or Alive

2006-07-18T12:29:00.000+08:00

Location: Causeway Point
They're open for only one hour?

Location: Somewhere in Woodlands
Parking lot for lorries and bues

Location: Outram Park MRT station entrance
Push-chairs and a wheelchair.

Oh dear, what will our foreign talent think?

2006-07-18T12:20:00.000+08:00

Location: Overhead Bridge at Buona Vista MRT Station

Let's procefd this way to bord the shuttle bus to Bio Polis

This reminds me of Salvatore (played by Ron Perlman) from the 1986 film, "The Name of the Rose".

Paging for Pubert from the Addams Family!

2006-07-17T07:53:00.000+08:00

Short tenor of 3 years? Surely they meant tenure, in the sense of "A period during which something is held."

Multi-whaaaa?

2006-07-04T20:08:00.001+08:00

(thanks Morgan!)

Unveiling A ...

2006-06-16T11:20:00.000+08:00

Location: Old National Library, Stamford Road

I Believe You Mean Longest

2006-06-14T23:35:00.000+08:00

Watching the news (News 5 at 9) on the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the Thai king's ascension last night, this blogger heard the newsreader (I can't remember her name) refer to His Majesty Rama IX as "the largest reigning head of state".

I think that honour goes to Tonga or Swaziland...

A New Disability...

2006-06-11T01:10:00.000+08:00

Location: St Joseph's Church - 143 Victoria Street

...where victims share a symbiotic relationship with a wheel

We Are Many

2006-06-09T14:21:00.000+08:00

Location: Underpass between Lido and Wheelock Place

And he asked him, What is thy name?
And he answered, saying, My name is Women: for we are many.

Shopping!

2006-06-09T14:05:00.000+08:00

While shopping some months ago, your intrepid blogger found rather curious products on sale...

Location: Cold Storage, UE Square

Look what the alchemists concocted today!

Guaranteed to spice up any boring date - found beside the apples juice.

Look Familiar?

2006-06-09T13:54:00.000+08:00

Location: Singapore Art Museum

We've seen it somewhere before.

The Affliction of Lousy Tenses

2006-06-09T13:37:00.000+08:00

Location: Cold Storage, Holland Village

Location: Pepper Lunch, Lido

weekeegeepee.blogspot.com

2006-06-08T10:51:00.000+08:00

Location: http://weekeegeepee.blogspot.com/

This is a blog run by some General Paper teacher from Singapore, ostensibly for the benefit of his/her students. It's quite a scream.

First, the teacher is unable to maintain any sort of consistency between proper English spelling, and American misspellings.

Note 'analyse' above. The correct English spelling. Next, note the use of 'well-organized' in the next extract:

Tsk. Either stay with correct spelling, or go American. Be consistent!

Next:

FREE OF GRAMMATICAL AND SPELLING ERROR? Just the one? Sweetie darling, surely you mean 'errorS'! Next, it should be 'free from', not 'free of'. 'understand your scrawl'? Not strictly an error, but I imagine very few students write with essays with a single continuous line in an unbroken cursive hand. For stylistic reasons, it ought to be 'understand your scrawls' or 'understand your scrawling(s)', unless one is being poetic (which this teacher most assuredly is far from).

Next, one may detect an annoying random omission and insertion of hyphens and commas in odd places. Gently turn your studied eye over the following extract:

First, we get 'Post mortem', then 'post-mortem'. Ai yai yai. Then, 'General notes on what GP essay should be' - please, either 'General notes on what A GP essay should be', or 'General notes on what GP essays should be'. Omission of the article, whether definite or indefinite, is a common error with those whose first languages do not have articles, such as Chinese, Malay, most Slavic languages (Bulgarian is a notable exception), and Latin (I highly doubt Latin is this GP teacher's first language).

Contextualize - there's that horrid American misspelling again. This teacher has an irritating habit of using caps to emphasise things. He/she has already put them in a different colour for emphasis (an inelegant thing to do), so to then shout, as capitalising entire words is called, is unnecessary. A far better solution is to rephrase and set paragraph breaks for emphasis.

There's an obvious contradiction between the question asking 'for your opinion, or give arguments from your experience' and the teacher recommending that it is 'NEVER about your personal opinion or experience'. Then again, most Singaporeans haven't an opinion or mind about anything, so perhaps to express that blank would be detrimental to the essay.

Aside from that, there appears to be a superfluous comma between 'your opinion' and 'or give arguments' - it makes no sense to have one there, and actually confuses the sense of the sentence. Next, a double hyphen? Tsk.

'Please note, even if the question does not explicit require it...' - OY VEH! Have you never heard of an adverb? Hint - adverbs often end with '-ly'.

With such crap English coming from A-Level General Paper teachers, is it any wonder that this blog finds frequent justification for its existence?

We'r Here

2006-06-06T16:04:00.000+08:00

Location: Carnaval, basement, CHIJmes

Perhaps a confusion between 'We Are Here', 'We're Here' and 'We R Here'?

Perhaps we can blame Toys R Us...

Aromatic Rashes?

2006-06-06T15:58:00.000+08:00

Location: BreadTalk, Capitol Cinema.
Date: sometime last week...

Sorry chaps, I'm not biting into rashes, aromatic or otherwise...

Count The Number Of Balloon!

2006-06-06T15:53:00.000+08:00

Location: Osram 100th Anniversary Fair, Bukit Panjang Plaza
Date: Sat, 03 June 2006

Apologies for the quality of the picture! There are a number of balloons tied in a large bunch, with a banner hanging from them, saying 'Count the number of Balloon!'.

Just the one?

Indian restaurant at Tampines Mall

2006-05-28T16:16:00.000+08:00

An Indian restaurant stuck a huge poster in a passenger lift in Tampines Mall.

Some Basic Comparative & Superlative Adjectives

2006-04-30T10:23:00.000+08:00

This sign was found at one of the checkout counters at Giant IMM.

This is somewhat tricky for most Singaporeans.

Consider the following

Positive Comparative Superlative
A Less Lesser Least
B Little Less Least

Our example above should have been 'Use Less Bags' since the intention was to use the it as an adjective (A). It modifies Bags (How many bags? 1, 2, 3...Less).

'Lesser' only appears as a comparative adjectve (A) when you need to compare across two things such as 'lesser of the two evils', a common phrase.

In situation B when we are refering to something very little and few (POSITIVE), its comparative would be 'less/fewer'. E.g. We don't say 'You exercise less' unless it is a comparative 'You exercise less than [someone]' where the object is obliterated.
This is known as null-comparision.

For more discussion on 'less' and 'lesser', you can refer to http://englishplus.com/news/news0701.htm/

Most Singaporeans need more practice in the Engllish language, so that we make less of these mistakes and least of all, support the 'Speak Good English' campaign ( or 'write' for that matter).

Conjugate Pairs

2006-04-29T15:34:00.000+08:00

STARHUB REDEMPTION CENTRE

BUS STOP OUTSIDE CENTENNIAL TOWER
Typically Singaporean. To -ED or not to -ED. The former used to have even more mistakes. I think this is version 2.0 - still wrong.

CineNow flyer

2006-04-25T01:57:00.000+08:00

CineNow operates a chain of automated DVD rental outlets. This is the flyer where they attempt to persuade customers to register with them.

Sign-up, signup, sign up today!

Let's Play a Game

2006-04-18T23:59:00.000+08:00

Location: Republic Polytechnic
Let's see here - how many mistakes can you spot in this notice?

I saw this the other day while walking past the toilets of a partially completed building - moments later, this chap came walking along, eating some bread rolls... all of sudden, he became an administrative charge.

Hit-and-run Accident Notice

2006-04-16T16:35:00.000+08:00

Location: Jurong West Avenue 1
Will the one and only witness to this tragic/despicable act please call the police right away?

A Day at the Expo

2006-04-16T16:29:00.000+08:00

Location: Singapore Expo

Children wear what?

Indonesian Spelling

In need of replies

2006-04-12T23:51:00.000+08:00

".... Please revert as soon as possible."

Sounds familiar to you? Many Singaporeans (including well-educated ones) fail to grasp the definition of REVERT.

REVERT means ‘To return to a former condition, practice, subject, or belief.’

When indicating that you will ‘get back’ to someone with an answer, use ‘REPLY’ or ‘WRITE BACK (to you).

So please refrain from reverting to the use of 'revert' when you actually mean to say 'reply'.

Another highly common REcurring shocker is IRREGARDLESS, which I found in a letter to parents written by one of NTU's senior faculty staff, when the user meant to say REGARDLESS.

As the Chinese saying goes, 上梁不正下梁歪...but let's not even go there....

Doublebill: bad taste and engrish at the same time

2006-04-11T00:58:00.000+08:00

Where ever, in deed.

Promote OpenOffice

2006-04-11T00:33:00.000+08:00

Software evangelism has never been so good with these people around.

"Have you considered sharing some OpenOffice.org CD-Roms with your colleagues and friends? Burn them yourself!"

Uh, Which Way?

2006-04-10T00:29:00.000+08:00

Location: Jurong West Avenue 1
Now, this doesn't exactly qualify as an example of bad English, but the errors on the signboard are so glaring that it's worth a mention.

First, the signboard would make sense only if one person walks past. Next, which way does it refer to when it says this way?

"Monkey see, monkey do" as they say; one may find identical signs at construction sites throughout the island.

Cathay Presents!

2006-04-10T00:12:00.000+08:00

Yes, a movie set in the southern continent.

AXS Machine

2006-04-09T23:48:00.000+08:00

Trying to pay a bill at an AXS Machine, I saw this. For those not in the know, these are various automated payment terminals scattered around the island, enabling to pay one's bills & fines, buy tickets and so on, electronically with the use of a debit card.

'can be process'? A typical example of how Singaporeans make a mess of the Passive Voice. That should read 'can be processed' - not 'can be process'. Similar mistakes abound everywhere - just last night, a menu I was reading described a dish as 'serve with chips on the side'. Then there are all those twits who describe themselves as having 'a fit and tone body'.

I'd remind readers that this is a payment terminal for paying, among other bodies, the Government. Use of bad English at this level is inexcusable.

CD contents include...

2006-04-09T23:31:00.000+08:00

Publicity material is a non-count indefinite noun.
Use better punctuation.
Really, you included compliments in the CD itself? Oh my.

Talk More Pay Lesser

2006-04-08T14:57:00.000+08:00

This came from a Singtel ad in the Post Office at Teck Whye.

Talk More, Pay Lesser? Dear Gods. Don't they have ANYBODY to proof-read for them?

Unique Seafood Market

2006-04-08T14:54:00.000+08:00

This doesn't strictly count as an example of Bad English - 'Unique Seafood Market' is a bit odd but not really Bad English. It's the translation into Chinese that's the screamer - the two characters above 'UNIQUE' actually translate to 'Weird' or 'Strange'.

Monster Prawns (a la Alien Baltan from Ultraman)... or three-headed Fish, perhaps?

It must've been made in China

2006-04-08T03:06:00.000+08:00

Straw dispenser in a Toa Payoh Herbal Tea Shop

[via Jonathan John Paul Sim]

Anti-Shoplifting Campaign Ad

2006-04-08T02:54:00.000+08:00

The National Crime Prevention Council could use a lesson or two in English grammar.

Watch Your Steps

2006-04-08T00:28:00.000+08:00

That's on the two floormats at McCafe at Lido, Singapore.

2006-04-08T00:17:00.000+08:00

Welcome to Poblem Engrish!

We're here to show you examples of BAD ENGLISH in Singapore (and around the world in places that really should know better).

Watch out as we post soon...