Apparently McDonald’s Thinks the Hmong Language Reads Like a Keysmash – ASDSAKDLJSADKJASJK
Betcha the brains behind this linguistic snafu just collectively ragequit, after the two new billboards posted by the Golden Arches in St. Paul, Minn. were called out by Hmong members of the community for not actually making a lick of sense.
Meant to translate to “Coffee Gets You Up, Breakfast Gets You Going” and cater especially to the Twin City’s Hmong population (the highest concentration in the US), the billboards in question got their translations mangled by sounding too literal and leaving out “key breaks.” The result? “Yuavtxhawbpabraukojsawv yuavntxivzograukoj mus,” which local doctor Thai Lee explained to the St. Paul Pioneer Press “doesn’t make sense at all.”
On Wednesday, McDonald’s issued an apology for the billboards, which have been up since last week, promising to correct and re-post them by next week.
Still, you’d think the world’s biggest fast food chain would have, at some point, thought to verify their translation with any one of the Twin City’s more than 64,000 Hmong residents; so either one Hmong-speaking individual has just declared himself the troll of all fast food trolls, or McDonald’s Corporate would do well to share at least one collective facepalm (though I’m sure certain webizens would be happy to do it for them).
*Facepalm*
