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Your say - False friends 2q556j

Bad hotels and schools for nutters (English/German) 1i4q2

In the 1980's I was working with American teachers in Holland. They were quite confused about signs saying Bad Hotel on Hotels in Scheveningen, a beach resort.They also wondered about signs on schools saying Nutsschool. They couldn't understand this form of 'bad' advertising!Actually, Bad means 'sea-bathing' or 'bath' in Dutch.Nuts is a possessive form of the adjective nuttig, meaning useful, beneficial.

Sent by: Nancy

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Christine Sas 2005-06-10

Further to the this: An Englishman on a trip to Belgium got all excited seeing the sign Lagere School on a school building. In Dutch, this means lower/primary school.

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