Yet another blooper has appeared in the Singapore Tourism Board’s (STB) promotional material.

Omy’s tech blogger Lin De Yi wrote yesterday that he had discovered Singapore’s Chinese New Year being called “China’s New Year” on STB’s Chinese language website.

Lin noted that STB had made a similar blooper a few years ago, when it translated the Hungry Ghost Festival to “Hungary Ghost Festival”.

And he goes on to lament that Singaporeans are thus celebrating festivals from Hungary and China, instead of our own.

Many netizens agreed with Lin, and are questioning STB’s processes.

Adding to the mis-written festival, another netizen also pointed out that “Chinatown” on the STB website was wrongly translated to “Tang Ren Jie” (Chinese Street), a commonly used name for the Chinatowns in other countries.

Singapore’s Chinatown is named “Niu Che Shui” (Buffalo Street).

On the most recent blooper, veteran DJ Huang Wen Hong feels that it reflects STB’s attitude.

He said, “Singapore has no lack of bilingual talent. This reflects STB’s attitude. Maybe they feel that the translations are targeted towards foreigners and not Singaporeans, so they didn’t take it seriously.”

Local businessman Mr Hong Ding Liang feels that the translation was probably done by new immigrants.

“Locals will respect our sovereignty and not translate Chinese New Year to China’s New Year”, he said.

On the translation of “Chinatown”, both say that they are not satisfied with the translation but it is acceptable as the article was written with foreigners in mind.

But both feel that Chinatown’s actual name “Niu Che Shui” should still be noted in the article.

The STB website has since corrected “China’s New Year” to “Chinese New Year”. As of press time, no changes were made to the name of “Chinatown”.

Article Reference Source from Lianhe Wanbao