History Main / ElNinoIsSpanishForTheNino

* Most English-speakers in Southern California refer to the famous road ''El Camino Real''[[note]]The Royal Road[[/note]] as "El Camino"[[note]]The Road[[/note]], leaving off the important part.[[note]] It is more loosely translated "The King's Highway", and it roughly corresponds to U.S. Highway 101. [[/note]]

** Berkeley, California has a street called "The Alameda," meaning "the tree-lined avenue."

* A few place names have come into English this way: the easy part is translated (typically a SpellMyNameWithAThe), the hard part is just borrowed. Examples include The Hague (Dutch ''Den Haag'', "the hedge"), Netherlands; The Dalles (French ''les dalles,'' either "the sluices" or "the flagstones"), Oregon; or The Pas (French ''Le Pas,'' itself a shortening of Cree ''opâskwêyâhk'' "at the wooded narrows"), Manitoba. Similarly for certain cases of countries that take or used to take a "the," such as "the Sudan" (Arabic ''(bilād) as-Sūdān'', "(country of) the black people.")

* A similar gag occurs in an early ''ComicBook/{{Deadpool}}'' story, where the captions helpfully translate a Spanish-speaking {{mook}}'s pleas of "No" into English as..."No".
* Inverted in a ''[[ComicBook/TheSimpsons Simpsons]]'' story in which Ned Flanders invited the Simpson family to a Mexican fiesta complete with tacos, burritos, sombreros, and a pinata. Homer angrily shot back with "No - and that's [[{{Spexico}} Mexican]] for 'No!'"

* ''Film/{{Deadpool}}'' has a variant, where Wade notes "You know how they say 'cancer' in Spanish? El cáncer." (the only difference is that instead of CAN-cer, it's pronounced CAHN-cer, hence the accent)

->''"I am El Niño! All other tropical storms must bow before El Niño! ''¡Yo soy El Niño!'' For those of you who don't ''habla español'', 'El Niño' is Spanish for ... ''({{beat}})'' '[[TropeNamers the Niño]]'!"''

Please note that as far as translation theory goes, this is entirely correct. While many words do often have one-for-one equivalents, words in general have so much linguistic and cultural baggage that no translation, no matter how equivalent in meaning, means exactly the same thing. Ironically, this is particularly true for the "El Niño" of the title. Whilst it literally translates as "the child", it refers to the Central American weather system that is called El Niño even in English; the name was given in reference to this phenomenon peaking around Christmas, which in many Hispanic countries is known as "Día del Niño Dios" (Christ Child day).

* This is a bit of a RunningGag in ''Series/TheDailyShow'' regarding Arabic phrases with the article "Al." For example, in one episode featuring an interview with an Creator/AlJazeera reporter, Jon [[SarcasmMode helpfully]] informs us that "Al Jazeera" means "The Jazeera" and that hopefully their guest will explain what a "Jazeera" is (he doesn't).[[note]]It means "the island," referring to the Arabian Peninsula.[[/note]]

* A few place names have come into English this way: the easy part is translated (typically a SpellMyNameWithAThe), the hard part is just borrowed. Examples include The Hague (Dutch ''Den Haag'', "the hedge"), Netherlands; The Dalles (French ''les dalles,'' either "the sluices" or "the flagstones"), Oregon; or The Pas (French ''Le Pas,'' itself a shortening of Cree ''opâskwêyâhk'' "at the wooded narrows"), Manitoba. Similarly for certain cases of countries that take or used to take a "the," such as "the Sudan" (Arabic ''(bilād) as-Sūdān'', "(country of) the black people."