As an exercise to demonstrate the fragility of the Altavista babelfish language translator , I took an English sentence, translated it into German, fed the translated sentence back into the program to get English, then fed that back in to get German... you get the idea. Here we go:
E: It's as if you didn't know I am from space.
G: Es ist, als ob Sie nicht wußten, daß ich vom Platz bin.
E: It is, as if you did not know that I am from the workstation.
E: Too many times have I had to remove this rotton hat.This is the first verse of the US Anthem, The Star Spangled Banner, translated once into German and then back into English.
G: Zu viele Male haben mich mußten diesen rottonhut löschen.
E: Too many marks have me had this red..tone hat to delete.
G: Zu viele Markierungen haben mich hatten diesen zu löschenden red..tone-Hut.
E: Too many markings have me had this talking..tone hat which can be deleted.
G: Zu viele Markierungen haben mich hatten diesen talking..tone-Hut, der gelöscht werden kann.
E: Too many markings have me had this talc engineer..tone hat, which can be deleted.
G: Zu viele Markierungen haben mich hatten diesen Hut des Talkums engineer..tone, der gelöscht werden kann.
E: Too many markings have me had this hat of the talcum powder engine he..tone, which can be deleted.
OH -, legends can do you, by the early light of the dawn,And one additional time, to German and back to English (the verse is now sufficiently non-singable, so I'm going to leave it prose-like).
Which see so proudly we hailed at last shining of the Twilights?
Who expanded strips and brightens asterisks, by which perilous fight,
O'er the RAM parts, which we flowed, in such a way gallantly monitored?
And the red sharp gloss of the rockets,
The bombs, which burst in an air,
Gave proof by the night that our marking sign was still there.
This moves o-legends asterisk star spangled flag already
O'er the country of the free and the house of the courageous wavelike?
OH -, legends can do you, by which it does early light of the dawn which see that so proudly we finally hailed a shining of the Twilights? To whom does extended strips and asterisk illuminate, by which perilous fight, O'er divides RAM, which we flowed, in such one gallantly monitored way? And the red sharp gloss of the rockets, the bombs, which burst in an air, gave proof by the night that our marking shifts character still there this spangled marking sign already O'er o-legends of asterisk asterisk the country from the free was and the house courageous wavelike?
s. zimmers, 1998