A bad interpretation is a pain in the huevos
Yesterday an ER triage nurse asked me what is the Spanish word for testicles. " Testículos," I replied. "And the word for bones?", she continued. "Huesos," I said. "Oh, but they don't sound anything alike!!!"
She was trying to understand why an over-the-phone interpreter she contacted the other day would mistake a complaint about body aches for a case of testicular pain. I immediately suspected what the source of the problem was: the interpreter likely misheard huesos (as in dolor de huesos, a common way to refer to body aches--the patient was later diagnosed with the flu) as huevos ('eggs', a colloquial way to refer to the testicles).
She explained that the patient was befuddled when she and the PA mentioned that they'd have to take him back to exam his testicles. Seeing the patient's perplexed reaction, they tried to further clarify with the interpreter. "Balls! The patient said his balls hurt," the interpreter insisted. Noticing that something was askew, the nurse decided to let that interpreter go and call the interpretation line again. This time around, a new interpreter relayed the patient's complaint correctly, to everyone's relief.
