Sandy Wood
Brain Game: Papa!
by Sandy Wood - October 2, 2009 - 7:30 AM

THE ANSWER:

They are “false Spanish-English cognates”: words that are spelled the same in both languages, but mean different things. In English, for instance, “papa” means “father.” But in Spanish, “papa” can mean either “Pope” or “potato.”

English word = Spanish meaning

arena = sand
cargo = charge
mayor = main
once = eleven
pan = bread
sensible = sensitive
tuna = a type of cactus

Do you know any others (comparing English to Spanish or other languages)? Feel free to share them in the comments by clicking below. Thanks, and have a great weekend!

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Comments (19)

  1. YES! I got it! That’s how i like ending my week.

    reCaptcha: loveman anticorruption (this one makes me smile for some reason)

    posted by Steven on 10-2-2009 at 8:15 am

  2. Yeah. Got it. I heard a pastor in Honduras say that “Jesus walked up on the disciples” meaning he walked up to where they were. The translator said “What” and it took about 20 minutes for them to get the point across to each other.
    Gave me a good appreciation for translators.

    posted by KevinGA on 10-2-2009 at 9:30 am

  3. In Spanish “atender” means to assist someone and “asistir” means to attend something, like a meeting. I work with a lot of native Spanish speakers from various backgrounds and they all have difficulty sorting those two out. There are so many more but I hear that one daily!

    posted by ab on 10-2-2009 at 10:27 am

  4. I don’t speak Spanish, but I was able to guess the answer. There are plenty of false cognates between English and French, as well. My professor called them “faux amies,” or false friends.

    posted by Kelsey on 10-2-2009 at 10:41 am

  5. Don’t forget about embarasada…. not embarassed, PREGNANT!

    posted by Josh on 10-2-2009 at 10:47 am

  6. When I lived in Spain I found out that there are groups of male singers, usually college age, called “tunas”

    posted by Kelly on 10-2-2009 at 11:04 am

  7. Yep, Kelly – one of the alternate definitions I saw for the Spanish “tuna” was “glee club.”

    posted by Sandy Wood on 10-2-2009 at 11:24 am

  8. I have a triple false-cognate. “Fort” has completely different meanings in English, French and German. In English it is a military stronghold, in French it means “strong”, and in German it means “away.”

    posted by Jon. on 10-2-2009 at 12:13 pm

  9. @KevinGA – on a mission trip?

    posted by Hyacinth on 10-2-2009 at 12:22 pm

  10. In German:

    Fast = Almost
    Art = Type
    Rat = Advice
    Bad = Bath
    Roman = Novel
    Gift = Poison
    Mist = Crap
    Wand = Wall

    posted by JT on 10-2-2009 at 12:43 pm

  11. pan also means bread in Japanese, and has multiple meanings in English – give a bad review, rotate a camera.

    The biggest problems for translators are figures of speech. I heard Billy Kim, the translator who worked with Billy Graham in Korea, speak one time. He said that once Graham opened by saying, “I’m just tickled to death to be here.” Kim stopped and asked him to clarify, and Graham just repeated it. Kim finally just said (in Korean) “He scratched, he scratched, he died.”

    posted by PartiallyDeflected on 10-2-2009 at 1:17 pm

  12. Other Germanisms that will mislead an uninformed Anglo:
    man hat = somebody has
    bald = soon
    elf = eleven
    Boot = boat
    wo & wer = who & where, but not in that order

    posted by cybergoober on 10-2-2009 at 1:35 pm

  13. Norwegian:
    gift – married

    posted by Barbara on 10-2-2009 at 3:22 pm

  14. My finace told me that Emo means potato in japanese… maybe that’s why those kids are so sad :)

    posted by Alli on 10-2-2009 at 3:56 pm

  15. I once had a boyfriend from Paris. While apart, I wrote him letters… he finally had to ask me why the heck I kept ending my letters with ‘beouf, beouf, beouf’ (beef, beef, beef in English). Had to laugh because I ended each one with:

    OXOXOX

    ;)

    posted by @jodie_nodes on 10-2-2009 at 8:25 pm

  16. Being a Spanish speaker, this was obviously pretty easy for me. I actually learned at some point, either in a Spanish class or when I visited Rome, that the English word “arena” comes from the Latin word for sand, from which the Spanish word “sand” is derived (the Latin itself may have been “arena,” I’m not sure and am too tired to look it up). The English word “arena” was rooted in the fact that Roman coliseums were covered in sand (Gladiator, anyone?).

    Pretty effective at soaking up blood!

    On a side note, for all the comments about Spanish, French, etc., I like that my reCaptcha is “Cordero loire”

    posted by John on 10-2-2009 at 11:48 pm

  17. I believe “tako” (sounds like taco) is ell, and of course, “constipado” is Spanish for “congested.” My students also like, “molestar” = “to bother.

    posted by Erin on 10-3-2009 at 7:17 pm

  18. camera= room
    in italian

    posted by Alex on 10-3-2009 at 7:43 pm

  19. In seagullese

    SQUAWK= you gonna’ eat all those fries?

    posted by emaneff on 10-3-2009 at 9:19 pm

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