Laura uses an online translator to ring people across Europe and ask about their World Cup songs — but the translation software has given her some spectacularly inappropriate phrases to say instead.
The show sets up a feature where Laura, armed with an internet translator, attempts to call people in different countries to find out what their official World Cup songs are. Danny Howard explains that the translations aren’t reliable, and Laura’s attempts to speak French, Dutch, and Portuguese quickly descend into comedy.
In France, Laura tries to ask about the World Cup song but the phrasing is so mangled that the person on the other end barely engages. In Holland, things go similarly awkward. But it’s the Portuguese call that becomes the real highlight: Laura thinks she’s asking polite questions about World Cup songs, but she’s actually saying things like “Hello, my name is Laura. How are you, fat boy?” and, most mortifyingly, “I’d really like a bit of tongue action. Maybe with you. Fancy it?”
The victim of these calls takes it all in good humour, but the payoff comes when the show reveals what the translator actually told Laura to say versus what she thought she was saying. It’s a perfect example of why automated translation in 2006 was still wildly unreliable, and why asking someone if they fancy a bit of tongue action is probably not the best way to start a professional research call. Laura’s earnest delivery of these garbled phrases — and her apparent obliviousness to what she’s actually saying — makes it one of the funniest moments the show has pulled off in a while.
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