Signs of the Times - Living in Lotus Land.

Man I love living in the Pacific Rim. Bubble Tea, Pho and imports galore from the Asian market. I'm totally impressed by the bizzare, funny and sometimes profound translations on cheap import products. I'm thinking about starting a series of photo collections of the mysterious translations I run across - starting this week with a brief visit to the dollar store down the street.

Lets start with that all time classic, Hello Kitty. Check out this poetry. It's almost like pop-music lyrics, but somehow more sinister. Specifically "You took my heart and tore it a part". Thats pretty visceral- and why pray tell is "you still in my haert"? Good lord get it out!

Next up we've got a toy VW bug with monkey stickers all over it. What I really liked about this was the slogan over the windshield: "The monkeys is very alacrity". How true that is! Though I did have to look the word up to find out that Alacrity means "A cheerful readiness, willingness, or promptitude; joyous activity; briskness; sprightliness; as, the soldiers advanced with alacrity to meet the enemy". Whoa! Brisk cheerful monkey soldiers! scary.

And of course we can't have a look at funny translations without Pokemon. Here we have a Pokemon / Pikachu pencil case, I think this is a Chinese bootleg of the Japanese cultural tsunami. I didn't even know that there was a cute puppy in the Pokemon religion. Here's what I can't figure out though, is cute puppy a guest on this fishing trip, or do they intend to use the cute puppy as bait?

And to wrap it up for now: Monster Balloon! Bon! I have no idea what this is supposed to be.. But it does beg the question: if its non-toxic, why can't I swallow it? or better yet, why would I want to? Would anyone that can read actually think about trying to swallow this product unless they saw that statement as a personal challenge? And after all, it is non-toxic, so what's the harm?

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