Lost in Translation

This story reminded me of a funny incident I had once ordering a pizza in Sweden. Sweden is a beautiful country full of beautiful people who speak lovely English. It is also the country in which I had a memorable "Lost in Translation" (like the movie) conversation with a troubled young man named Juhan (I think? It was pronounced Yoo-ahn.) who gave me a light and chatted about American movie actors (he liked Philip Seymour Hoffman best--good taste!) and his multiple-girlfriend problems (multiple girlfriends and multiple problems) as I sat accidentally locked out of my hotel with no jacket, no identification, and no money--only a pack of cigarettes to keep me warm and a kindly, but drunken, over-sharing stranger to keep me company.

Juhan: In Sweden, we call this "Chain Smoking."
A-Dub: Yeah, that's what we call it in America, too.

Aaaanyway, back to pizza. After we left Stockholm, we spent a night in a smaller town called Malmo. It was a gorgeous little city--quintessentially European, if that means anything. (When searching for an appropriate link just now I learned that Malmo's population is now a quarter Muslim and they have lately been experiencing some civil unrest--sad.) Anyway, two friends and I--starving and searching for anything other than pickled herring to eat--decided to order pizza. You can't go wrong with pizza! It was a bit difficult finding the number for a pizza place, but we managed, and got someone on the phone. Unfortunately, we got the one person in the entire country who was not at least conversant in English. We settled on the most ordinary thing we could think of and finally managed to convey that we wanted one. large. pepperoni. pizza. We were a little bit disheartened by the fact that he seemed never to have heard of pepperoni before. "Pepper--pepper...oni?" he kept repeating. That should have been our first clue.

(But then, "skinka pizza" doesn't have the same ring to it.)

When the deliveryman arrived at our hotel, we got quite a surprise. Here is what we got:

One smallish pizza topped with four largeish peppers. And, as a bonus, two large plastic tubs of sauerkraut.

Genuine Swedish pepper-on-i(t) pizza

We did feel like idiot Americans, but we got over it...