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Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

theguardian.com

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Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#211

Post by bsd44 »

"They finally grew weary of Fucking, its current name, which some experts say dates back to the 11th century."

"Some have reportedly even stolen the signposts, leading the local authorities to use theft-resistant concrete when putting up replacements."

It's sad and a disgrace that a town has to rename itself after a thousand years, because people whose intellectual capacity is questionable won't stop with the abuse.

EDIT: I'm sure David Mitchell was right when he said that the world is calibrated for "idiots".

Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#212

Post by anonymoushn »

sdiq wrote: post #132

Kumamoto in Japan has a similarly bad name in Swahili. If you break the city's name into 2 four-letter words, you get vagina (kuma) and hot (moto) in Swahili. Thankfully, Swahili speakers are not going to harass this city's residents anytime soon.

I met an indie techno producer who called himself Kura-C which means "penis" in Serbian. He enjoyed learning this fact.

Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#214

Post by mantap »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #44

"Don’t people have any sense of humour these days?” asked one OOeN reader. Another noted: “They’re getting free publicity – they ought to have been happy to have a funny name." Free publicity that leads to sign posts being stolen. For a tiny village of 100 people, this is likely a serious hardship. If it isn't bringing in more money than it's costing them, it's an attractive nuisance , not free publicity.

Sounds like an opportunity to sell road signs to tourists.

Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#215

Post by rebuilder »

Finland has a lot of intentionally rude place names, especially in the north. Places like "cunt pond" ("vittulampi"), "cockpile" ("kullirova"), "cuntwhistle bog" ("vitunviheltämänjänkä") etc.

As to why this is, I've heard a number of theories. One is that people used to be less prudish and this kind of talk was much more commonplace back in the day. Also that the culture up north is more conducive to crude language. It's also possible that when these areas were being surveyed, the locals made some of these names up just to mess with the likely southern officials sent to talk to them.

Also I've heard that this is why there are so many lakes named "Holy lake" ("pyhäjärvi") - at some point, enough was enough and the officials just stopped accepting the local names. True or not, who knows.

Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#217

Post by ivanche »

lucideer wrote: post #195
sdiq wrote: post #132

Kumamoto in Japan has a similarly bad name in Swahili. If you break the city's name into 2 four-letter words, you get vagina (kuma) and hot (moto) in Swahili. Thankfully, Swahili speakers are not going to harass this city's residents anytime soon.

I feel like the worst has to be Bastardstown, Ireland. The main spoken language in Ireland is English and the construction of the name strongly implies it was not an etymological accident.

In a fierce competition with Scunthorpe.

Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#218

Post by cinntaile »

mantap wrote: post #214
DoreenMichele wrote: post #44

"Don’t people have any sense of humour these days?” asked one OOeN reader. Another noted: “They’re getting free publicity – they ought to have been happy to have a funny name." Free publicity that leads to sign posts being stolen. For a tiny village of 100 people, this is likely a serious hardship. If it isn't bringing in more money than it's costing them, it's an attractive nuisance , not free publicity.

Sounds like an opportunity to sell road signs to tourists.

I doubt they tried this but I agree that they should have.

Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#219

Post by ivanche »

sdiq wrote: post #132

Kumamoto in Japan has a similarly bad name in Swahili. If you break the city's name into 2 four-letter words, you get vagina (kuma) and hot (moto) in Swahili. Thankfully, Swahili speakers are not going to harass this city's residents anytime soon.

Pula in Croatia, for similar reason famous between Romanians :) (meaning "dick"). Also, Brest in France.

Re: Fucking, Austria changes name to Fugging

#220

Post by cblconfederate »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #44

"Don’t people have any sense of humour these days?” asked one OOeN reader. Another noted: “They’re getting free publicity – they ought to have been happy to have a funny name." Free publicity that leads to sign posts being stolen. For a tiny village of 100 people, this is likely a serious hardship. If it isn't bringing in more money than it's costing them, it's an attractive nuisance , not free publicity.

They could make millions from fucking tourists
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