Some amusing Engrish I discovered when I was in Japan.

From a confectionery company’s advertising:

Akismet is an essential plugin if you’re using WordPress.   It’s a plugin that filters out spam comments.  Every now and then I like to have a look what has ended up in the spam folder.

Recently I’ve been getting a few messages where someone promoting martial arts schools has been leaving comments about the recent conflict on the Korean peninsula.  The comments are along the lines that the US shouldn’t waste any money protecting the South Koreans and the South Koreans should be able to fight for themselves.  I’m not sure exactly why someone would think this would be a good advertisement (other than the obvious reason of simply attracting controversy) for a martial arts school.

Last year I did a summary of some of the search terms that people had used to reach my web site.

http://www.aidandoyle.net/2009/11/26/what-do-you-think-youre-looking-at/

Searching for information about Eastern Europe (especially maps) seems to be one of the most common ways people reach my web site.  Here are a few of the more interesting search terms people used:

I ended up corresponding with White Moon, the Chinese woman that did the translation of Hokkaido Green.

And now there is an authorised Mandarin translation of my story, Reading By Numbers.

Given the structure and formatting of the story, it wouldn’t have been the easiest story to translate, but she has managed to translate it and still preserve the story’s hidden message.

http://article.yeeyan.org/view/134824/153390

Another interesting comment about my story, Hokkaido Green:

You’ll sorta understand this feeling when you get older. But it’d be really good if you understood it now so that you never have to.

http://www.vgf.com/forums/mindless-link-propagation/76026-hokkaido-green-short-story.html