Heath Robinson screws/Sonderschrauben

DIN 878: für schräg gebohrte Löcher/for diagonally drilled holes

Unusual screws – for more see Luftpiraten.de

Note also the Ingenieurterminologie with translation:

Wir verfolgen eine Anzahl verschiedener Lösungsansätze. Wir stochern immer noch im Dunkeln.

Wir bereiten einen ausführlichen Bericht über einen neuartigen Ansatz zur Problemlösung vor. Wir haben gerade drei Frischlinge von der Uni eingestellt.

Wir haben eine geschlossene Projektkoordination. Wir wissen, wer daran schuld ist.

Viennese football terms/Fußball Glossar Wienerisch-Deutsch-Englisch

1. Henkel Fan Guide für Wien auf Weanerisch/Deutsch/English
1st German/English Henkel Fan Guide for Vienna in “Weanerisch“

You can download a PDF file and listen to an audio file of Viennese expressions (followed by High German and English) for the European Football Championships.

Football fans will be accompanied through Vienna in 21 different scenes – from their arrival, searching for a hotel and cheering on their favourite team at the stadium to eating at the hot dog stand, flirting and departing the city. Each scene contains ten suitable expressions in Viennese, German and English, as well as a caricature drawn by the artist Hans Gramm.

Judging from the audio file, I would advise against using the English expressions to encourage a team. They are correct translations of the original, but they lack a certain elan.

Now, can we find something for Switzerland too? Reader’s Edition has a bit – here’s the beginning:

Die Vokabeln

Stadion – Stadion
Stadionkasse – Kassä
Stadioneingang – Stadioniigang
Tribüne – Tribünä
Sitzplatz – Sitzplatz
Fußballrasen – Fuässballrasä
Anstoß – Astoss
Viererkette – Viererchetti

(Via Übersetzerportal)

8-year-old boy passes Brazil law-school entrance exams/8jähriger Brasilianer darf Jura studieren

It may be easier to become a lawyer than a translator in Brazil, judging from this Guardian article:

Brazil’s lawyers have been shocked to find that a boy aged eight has managed to pass the entrance exam to law school.

The Bar Association said the achievement of Joao Victor Portellinha should be taken as a warning about the low standards of some of Brazil’s law schools.

Since he hasn’t completed high school yet, he can’t actually study.

“My dream is to be a federal judge,” the boy said, according to Globo TV’s Web site. “So I decided to take the test to see how I would do … it was easy. I studied a week before the test.”

I don’t know whether this test is the only criterion used.

Apparently the Guardian had some space left, so the article concludes as follows:

As a former colony, Brazilian civil law is largely based on that of Portugal with statutes derived from the Romano-Germanic legal tradition, but has been amended to include some precedent-based common law.

Exactly what the oddly-express last clause means I have no idea. Presumably, like most civil-law systems, Brazil now takes account of case law.

Trevor asks: Why do we hear so much about the civil/French tradition, and rarely anything about the Romano-German? Readers, this is a question for a future entry. Watch this space.