The Ancient Art of Chinglish

By John Kim | May 8th, 2010

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About 8 or 7 years ago, I remember buying the game called Samba de Amigo for the Dreamcast. Being a poor college student, I opted not to buy the official Maracas. Instead I searched online for an off market brand from China. When they finally came in the mail I quickly ripped open the packaging in anticipation. I then read the instructions on the box which went like this:

Attention
1. Don’t Place “Samba Fans” into hot, dank or under straight of the sunshine.
2. Keep out of the static electricity and outside force strongly.
3. Don’t dismantle.
4. Don’t touch it by hand mixed the mess.
5. Keep surface cleaned, Don’t clean it with organic substance.

I had never had so much fun reading instructions in my life. It was not only a good laugh, but my first experience with an ancient Chinese Language called Chinglish. Chinglish in its essence is basically just mangled up English words that has surprisingly humorous results. The culprit to the rampant use of bad English is probably due to a flawed translation software called ‘Jin Shan Ciba’. But I feel that Chinglish represents more than just funny phrases, but China’s acceptance of cutting corners, and never double checking their work. In other words, laziness. No wonder everything made in China is synonymous to crap, but unfortunately they have become our worlds factory thus we are stuck with shoddy consumer goods. Can you just imagine how crappy the world would be if China ever becomes the global super power?

Scroll down to see some of the more humorous uses of Chinglish. More can be viewed from the Chinglish Flickr Pool. Enjoy.