Japanese English (sometimes called Japlish) is not new anymore, but it can still be surprising. Sometimes it is merely delightfully naive, but often it over-reaches, yearning for grandiosity and ending up bewilderingly senseless. And it is simply maddening when basic mistakes slip past a “proofreader” and end up on a billboard or all over a line of products.
Why there is a never-ending stream of it (and where it comes from) is a constant source of fascination for native English speakers in Japan. Here are two recent examples that caught us by surprise and made us laugh.