Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Multilingual Machine

Partly as a result of my new job, I've begun stopping at the local Subway restaurant more often for lunch. Having also developed an appreciation for toasted sandwiches I've had ample time to notice things about the place while waiting for my sandwich to toast, including the fact that the toaster oven is apparently multi-lingual.
The LCD panel that displays things like the time helpfully informs people that the door is open whenever it is, but it does so in different languages each day. I've seen it in English, Spanish ("la puerta está abierta"), Portuguese ("a porta está aberta"), French ("la porte est ouverte") and even German ("Tür ist offen").
I'm not sure if the machine rotates of its own accord in an oddly touching attempt to facilitate communication with as linguistically diverse a group of sandwich-toasters as possible or if it's trying to teach them new languages one sentence at a time, but it's fun to notice. I wonder if the ovens in other Subways do it as well? Anyone care to confirm or deny?

2 comments:

  1. I like how none of those are even that widely spoken in Hawaii. I would love a multilingual toaster oven at work. I'd probably just toast things when I got bored...

    Are you talking about the Subway near us or the one downtown? I might have to research this...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm talking about the one at the corner of Lanikaula and Kilauea. Strangely, I've only seen it in English the last week or so. Maybe they changed it.

      Delete

Think I said something interesting or insightful? Let me know what you thought! Or even just drop in and say "hi" once in a while - I always enjoy reading comments.