‘Pretty shoddy’: Welsh language sign tells shoppers that ‘businesses are closed as usual’
A mistranslated bilingual sign in a valleys town has been criticised as “pretty shoddy” after telling shoppers that businesses in a town are going to be “closed as usual”.
The sign on the corner of Lower Vaynor Road and Cefn High Street in Cefn-coed-y-cymmer says “businesses open as usual” in English but the opposite, “Busnesa ar gau fel arfer” (‘Businesses closed as usual’) in Welsh.
Ironically the town has recently been at the centre of recent criticism around the number of roadworks on the A465 that goes through the village, with business owners saying that they had seen a big reduction in passing trade.
The Welsh Government sponsored roadworks began in 2021 and are expected to be in place for at least another year before normality is returned.
The attempt was criticised as “pretty shoddy” on social media.
“No wonder footfall is down on High St – all the Welsh-speakers are at home!” Winifred Davies said.
Others pointed out that ‘busnesa’ translated literally as ‘being nosey’ and so the Welsh translation said that ‘being nosey is closed as usual’.
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Oh dear. independent tropical Merthyr is closed.
Probably initially translated correctly then not proof checked. Proof checking key and need more Welsh speakers working for Council’s
They do everything they can to duck that obligation. Most Labour authorities treat the language like some sort of taboo subject, “hate” is not a strong enough word to describe their condition. Thus some low level worker is delegated the task of drawing down a Google translation or similar and we end up with this garbage.
would be good if nation wales replicated this suggestion
Not even Google-translate could have messed up badly.
What is sadder is than nobody noticed before the sign was deployed.
“petty shoddy” is it ffs get an editor that can read
If the editor had used Google Translate the sign would have found to obviously be wrong. How difficult is that?
Can you use “agored” to mean (shop) open? Because Wrexham Tesco does, on a big electronic sign. I thought it meant “candid”.
Yes, you can. ‘Agored’ means ‘Open’.
Do’n i erioed gwybod hynny! Diolch.
it has multiple meanings including both you have sited
To be open about this is to be candid about it
At least they got the first word in the Wenhwyseg🤣🤣🤣🤣..very authentic. Seriously how do they still get these so wrong?
Pathetic. They show themselves up, Nobody else, just themselves.
If you visit Merthyr Town, Church Street is translated as Heol Y Reglwys, Merthyr Council are hopeless
They should employ translators, other authorities do.
Sure they could all speak English so no big deal
Thanks for your suggestion, but that wouldn’t be of much help in increasing the use of Welsh, you see.
That is the all-to-common British attitude applied to people from mainland Europe, i.e. “They all speak English, so no need for us to learn their languages.” This is a typically British socio-linguistic disorder with colonial and imperial overtones.
I don’t see where it mentions a business at all in Welsh, it appears to say ‘nosieness is closed’ to me. Busnesa means nosieness or interfering, a letter ‘u’ would change the meaning of course.
Siomedig iawn
No good using unqualified people to translate. Translation is a post-graduate level profession, so you get what you pay for if you ask a monoglot junior clerk to use a dictionary. Maybe this wasn’t the case in this instance. Not easy to tell what happened here, because even a monoglot using a dictionary probably wouldn’t have confused ‘ar gau’ with ‘ar agor’. He or she may have just had a list of standard terms, with ‘ar agor’ and ‘ar gau’ on adjacent lines, but as has already been said, there couldn’t have been a proof check. There have been so… Read more »