Saturday, April 3, 2010

Lost in translation

Context: My cell phone provider here has the glamorous name of "Movistar." I went to buy a recharge card yesterday:

Me: Tiene tarjetas de recarga Movistar? // Do you have Movistar recharge cards?
Store-owner: Claro, nada mas. // Literally: Of course, nothing else.

So I wait for her to hand me a card. Which she doesnt. We repeat the whole interaction again. And then I understand: Movistar's rival is called "Claro"-- the vendor had "Claro" cards, nothing else. Fail.

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