The label was made as a prop for the popular science fiction television show Serenity/Firefly. It was never used in the show, which is probably would be a good thing, since some of the printed Chinese characters are mirrored.
"A peach tin label made for the sci-fi adventure Serenity. This prop made label has “Peach Halves” printed on it in English and Chinese and a picture of peaches. It was made to be used on the tins in the store room but was never actually used. The label can be stuck onto a tin by peeling the backing off. It measures 33cm x 15cm (13" x 6")."
有营养的食品 just above “Peach Halves” means “[has/have] nutritious food”. Below “Delicious, Sweet Ripe Taste”, the mirrored phrase is supposed to be “小精灵的酒吧”, which means “little goblin’s bar”, and 善服务团 which is a machine translated meaning for “good service group”.
"Little demon's bar"? Does this have any meaning? Or is it just words?
ReplyDeleteThey just picked out some characters from on hand on "Firefly." The backwards characters are the last four of the six characters of a "fighting/militant/combat elves" (zhan4dou4 de5 xiao3jing1ling2) T-shirt (including a now-floating grammatical particle de5); "bar" (jiu3ba1) from signs; and the middle four of the six characters from a "philanthropic service organization" (ci2shan4 fu2wu4 tuan2ti3) T-shirt.
ReplyDeleteThe labels weren't meant to seen up close. A deranged girl quickly ripped them off the cans in an episode.
More at:
Firefly-Serenity Chinese Pinyinary (my site): http://fireflychinese.kevinsullivansite.net/.
Ying
I thought I'd add the missing characters mentioned in my post above, with the missing ones in bold.
ReplyDelete战斗的小精灵
(zhan4dou4 de5 xiao3jing1ling2)
[ Traditional: 戰鬥的小精靈 ]
"fighting/militant/combat elves"
酒吧
(jiu3ba1)
"bar"
慈善服务团体
(ci2shan4 fu2wu4 tuan2ti3)
[ Traditional: 慈善服務團體 ]
"philanthropic service organization"
It still doesn't make sense on a peach label, but it's just decorative hanzi for a prop you're not meant to see closely.
Ying
Incidentally,I believe 小精靈 is what The Smurfs were translated as when they appeared in Taiwan for the first time. The theme song is classic..."小精靈, 小精靈, lalalalalalalala...小精靈!".
ReplyDelete