It's Pronounced Like A Falsehood

“For me, I am driven by two main philosophies: know more today about the world than I knew yesterday and lessen the suffering of others. You'd be surprised how far that gets you.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson

[lunamonchtuna]

— Richard Siken, from Crush

[teathattast]

[goldpixy-deactivated20230510]

[liarwinlove]

Winged Lion

[luxoffux]

[alivehouse]

how dare the item of clothing i developed a weird attachment to and have worn almost every single day since i bought it start to show signs of wear

[liarwinlove]

[anexperimentallife]

[menentk]

Egyptain perfume bottles by zenboy on Flickr.

[gunvolt]

im going to have a stroke

[prideling]

Instead try… Person A: You know… the thing Person B: The “thing”? Person A: Yeah, the thing with the little-! *mutters under their breath* Como es que se llama esa mierda… THE FISHING ROD

[artykyn]

As someone with multiple bilingual friends where English is not the first language, may I present to you a list of actual incidents I have witnessed:

Forgot a word in Spanish, while speaking Spanish to me, but remembered it in English. Became weirdly quiet as they seemed to lose their entire sense of identity.

Used a literal translation of a Russian idiomatic expression while speaking English. He actually does this quite regularly, because he somehow genuinely forgets which idioms belong to which language. It usually takes a minute of everyone staring at him in confused silence before he says “….Ah….. that must be a Russian one then….”

Had to count backwards for something. Could not count backwards in English. Counted backwards in French under her breath until she got to the number she needed, and then translated it into English.

Meant to inform her (French) parents that bread in America is baked with a lot of preservatives. Her brain was still halfway in English Mode so she used the word “préservatifes.” Ended up shocking her parents with the knowledge that apparently, bread in America is full of condoms.

Defined a slang term for me……. with another slang term. In the same language. Which I do not speak.

Was talking to both me and his mother in English when his mother had to revert to Russian to ask him a question about a word. He said “I don’t know” and turned to me and asked “Is there an English equivalent for Нумизматический?” and it took him a solid minute to realize there was no way I would be able to answer that. Meanwhile his mom quietly chuckled behind his back.

Said an expression in English but with Spanish grammar, which turned “How stressful!” into “What stressing!”

Bilingual characters are great but if you’re going to use a linguistic blunder, you have to really understand what they actually blunder over. And it’s usually 10x funnier than “Ooops it’s hard to switch back.”

[cricketcat9]

I use Spanish and English daily, none is my native language. When I’m tired or did not have enough sleep I loose track of who to address in which language;  I caught myself explaining something in Spanish to my English-speaking friends more than once. When I’m REALLY tired I’ll throw some Polish words in the mix. 

[justgot1]

There is nothing more painful than bad fake Spanglish by an American writer. Bilingual people don’t just randomly drop words in nonsensical places in their sentences ffs. “I’m muy tired! I think I’ll go to my cama and go to sleep!“ Nobody does that.

From my bilingual parents:

- Only being able to do math in their original language. “Ok so that would beeeeee … *muttering* ocho por cuatro menos tres…”

- Losing words and getting mad at you about it. “Gimme the - the - UGH, ESA COSA AHI’ CARAJO. The thing, the oven mitt. Christ.”

- Making asides to you in Spanish even though you’ve told them to not do this as lots of people here speak Spanish. “Oye, mira esa, que cara fea.” “MOM FFS WE’RE IN A MEXICAN NEIGHBORHOOD.”

- Swears in English don’t count.

- Swears in Spanish mean you’d better fucking run, kid.

- Introducing you to English-only Americans using your Spanish name so that they mispronounce your name for all eternity because that’s what your mom said your name was. “Hi Dee-yanna!” “sigh, Just call me Diana.” “Yeah but your mom said your name was Dee-yanna.” 

- Your parents give you a name that only makes sense in Spanish. “Your name is Floor?” “No, my name is Flor.” “FLOOR?” “Sigh.”

[silentwalrus1]

 - conjugating English words with Russian grammar and vice versa. Sometimes both at once, which is extra fun.  самолет ->  самолетас ->  самолетасы

- when vice versa, dropping English articles entirely. The, a, an: all gone. e.g. “I go to store and buy thing, I fix car and go to place.” This also happens when i am very tired 

- speaking English with heavy accent you don’t actually have - when my family and I are switching over fast, we say the English words in a very heavy Russian accent that mostly doesn’t show up otherwise 

bonus: 

- keysmashing in the wrong language when your keyboard is still switched over

- using ))))) instead of :))) or other culture-specific emoji/typing quirks

[cobaltmoony]

all of the above

[lourdesdeath]

I don’t actually speak Tagalog, but my mom’s Filipino. One of my favorite things is when she forgets how to preposition, so something is ‘in the table’. 

[theleakypen]

SOMEHOW I NEVER REBLOGGED THIS?!?!?!?!? this is one of my absolute favorite posts on all of tumblr also, to add to the pile of fun things bilinguals do: cackling over bilingual puns that nobody else in the room will get and then being completely unable to explain why this is funny

[theboywhocan11]

Interesting. Reblogging this for future reference.

[eg515]

my favourite is that feeling when you have the perfect response to something but halfway through saying it you realised it’s in a language the other person doesn’t speak so you either just kind of… fade out, or try desperately to make it make sense in the other language

[riskpig]

I lose my place all the time when I’m counting in English, but never when I count in German.

[araku-validrava]

I’m swedish but at this point I’m so fluent in english that I can switch between languages on a dime.

[yum-cy]

i hate forgetting a word in english and having to describe but realizing that i cant describe it in english. so im just stuttering between russian and english and none of my english speaking friends can help

[kiripimarules-deactivated202305]

Same

[mango-pickle]

Let’s not forget speaking in a mixture of the two languages all the time, especially when you’re around people who also speak both languages. Also, making puns in their mother tongue.

[weird-u-deactivated20210917]

Quickly switching to your mother tongue while insulting your friends.

[a-poeticallychaotic-bee-deactiv]

God, the typing quirks…almost always need to reprimand myself for doing them 🤦‍♀️

[politenuclearbomb]

im only like. barely conversational in german but in english i STILL end up tagging ‘ge-’ onto the beginning of verbs and ’-en’ onto the end

‘i have. up gefucken’ is absolutely stupid and doesn’t mean anything and yet i say it constantly

[liarwinlove]

Me constantly:

“Where did you put the...the thing. *tries to find second word for the thing, can’t remember it either* You know, the thing that...it thats. THe thing. It’s black. MY ENGLISH IS NOT ENGLIGH TONIGHT. Flat. Hand tray. For the hot things. *burst of realization*

OVEN MITT!”

I also can almost never count properly in English, especially if I’m in a hurry. And the worst thing is that my boyfriend is also German so if I ask him, he will instantly also forget the word I am asking the other person which is not helpful.

[mrgulogulo]

Photographs of dancers taken with long exposure 

[karmanistic]

[ourladyinshadow-deactivated2023]

i love when you hear a song and you're like “oh id absolutely stumble through the snow bleeding from a knife stuck in my gut to this”

[carnetimaginaire]

Jacob Janerka,  Hello, this is crab…

[prokopetz]

They say science fiction never really predicts the future, and yet Captain Picard says “tea, earl grey, hot” in that meticulous way observed only in someone with a slightly unusual accent who’s finally figured out the exact cadence and phrasing their voice activated smart-whatever actually understands and suspects if they allow their tone to vary even one iota it’s going to interpret their drink order as a request for a live ocelot.

[valuspina-deactivated20251027]

the best relationship is when u can act like lovers and best friends at the same time

[jaubaius]

[magpie-69]

Dogs: There’s a hole in the floor. Leap. Leap. No way! I waits here for you guys to come back.

Cat: Hmmm, a portal. It bothers me not. For I can levitate & I’m unaffected by such trivial things.