November 10, 2020 – Despite the 330 million euro investment in the new Zagreb Airport terminal, it seems there was only a tiny budget for translation – and for correcting the legendary ‘Toilet Disabled’ signs.
It opened with great fanfare in the middle of June, 2017 – the pride of Croatia. Its capital FINALLY had a high quality, modern airport as an impressive entry point to Zagreb.
Everyone smiled, and everyone was happy, especially those involved in its construction. The cost of the new Split Airport terminal was approximately 60 million euro, slightly less than Zagreb’s reported 330 million.
And then the media started taking a closer look, highlighting some embarrassing language fails, the most hilarious (embarrassing, depending on your point of view) – toilets disabled. Meant of course to point out the toilet facilities for disabled passengers, ‘toilet disabled’ actually means toilet out of use.
A hard thing to get wrong, and an easy thing to correct, one might think
And the Zagreb Airport authorities were quick react, as you can see from the same sign above. No more embarrassing ‘Toilet Disabled’ anymore. In fact, nothing at all in English. The English translation was simply erased, with disabled passengers left to work things out via the picture of the Croatian version. Presumably the decision-makers were worried about the cost of an accurate translation. If a bad translator had contributed to the 330 million euro cost, how much would an accurate translation of a toilet sign cost? Much easier just to erase the whole thing.
I don’t fly often these days, but I passed through Zagreb Airport last December on a business trip to Berlin. I was curious to see the toilet signs, to see if there were any gems still remaining. There were.
Toilet Women.
They are presumably related to Toilet Men, who exist today in English, next to the now erased Toilet Disabled. I don’t know what is worse, erasing Toilet Disabled because a correct translation is too difficult, or assessing the sign to see if there were any more language fails in the only two English words which remain (there are).
Perhaps Zagreb Airport was trying to prepare its passengers for the world of Balkan brilliance and epic language fails, for this region certainly specialises in them,
Here are some of the best in Lauren Simmonds’ excellent piece – Smallpox, Diarrhoea and Free Hand Jobs: Lost in Translation in Croatia.
