Lost in Translation

Ugh, I seem to be getting confused with all these different languages fighting for space in my brain. Today at school, I was asked to help the university out with some publicity DVD they are doing, all I needed to do was to say "Southwest University welcomes you" in Finnish, and look foreign.

Turned out that the last part was easy, but I got the first bit completely messed up. In the Finnish language there are 8 different words for the points of the compass. That means, apart from north, south, west and east there are 4 more that go in between, ie. south-west has a proper noun of its own. Still, the 4 later ones are used less frequently, and you often see people pointing their finger to directions on an imaginary compass in the air in front of them, at the same time following the litany we've learned, just to figure out which is which.

Anyhow, to cut the story short, the university is not putting out a video where I look smilingly into the camera and warmly welcome everyone to the Northeast University.

Not that the potential Finnish audience will be big, I probably could just as well said "Remember to wear a hat" and it would have been all the same.

But still....