~LOST in TRANSLATION . . .

Chingle bells, chingle bells . . .

FILE UNDER: DESIGN . . . CHINGLISH, or what ?!!

you know, ‘Chinglish’ – a kind of mangled English – most commonly encountered when reading a how-to-manual accompanying a cheap made-in-China product.

SO: just to show how ‘locked-in’ accurate – those centuries-old ‘celestial’ astronomer/astrologer ‘brandings’ were, across once greatly separated and very diverse patches of culture, and . . . how well their [very complicated] information . . . traveled through the ages . . .

consider this 2012 Christmas ornament, found in a local 99 cent store !!

ok. so it’s a great color – scarlet red, even though it’s made of thin, but hard plastic, and it’s nicely reflective, too. and, YES !! the white glittery ornamentation – is hand-painted !! the whole deal, 2 for 1 dollar – !! – approximates ‘real’ vintage Xmas ornaments – pretty nicely. but, there’s something mighty weird about it, no ?
something is definitely – OFF.

what the hell . . is that FERN-LIKE ‘flower’ or tropical tree-like shape – ablowin’ . . . in the snowy wind ?

I guess this is what – they were really, or originally going after . . . snow-covered Christmas tress !!
. . . rising out of the snow-covered ground, but having never experienced the reality, or just somebody dropped the ball design-wise ? the Chinese factory-worker artisans switched, as in inverted – the organic orientation, and put them – upside-down !!
Chingle bells, or what !!
yep, something got lost in the translation.


PHOTO: antique Christmas ornaments c/o Vintage Christmas Ornaments

these are the exact type of antique Christmas ball ornaments – that the Chinese 99 cent marketers were hoping to emulate. Made of shiny glass, they have hand-painted snowy glittery white scenes, greetings & details. I think I even have one or two with that exact snowy Christmas tree scene, but not exactly on hand. they are pretty common, or were. too bad there aren’t any in the collection pictured, above.
what an interesting graphic mix-up.
the implications re the transmission of ‘garbled’ multi-cultural info – in today’s global/babel world is apparently wide-open, you can only respect the ancients – for the strength and accuracy of their art, ‘branding’ & informational graphics.

PHOTOS & ARTWORK: NANCY SMITH, unless otherwise noted.