Steen Pierre Rock

Cantersteen 3, 1000 Brussels

This warning sign that surrounds a construction site just behind the central station in Brussels, warns in French for falling stones. The dutch translation ‘Risico van Rock vallen’ is of an interesting out of this world delirious level of surreal badness … How does one come up with this crazy stuff ?

An obvious and depressing potential answer dawned on me … Google translate … ? Gave it a go, and yes … it is the exact result given for converting ‘Risque de chute de pierres’ to Dutch. Ok, attempt to translate appreciated, but why use that stupefying tool instead of once common sense, Fingerspitzengefühl, intuition, advise of colleagues, dutch speaking passersby or another available dictionary ? I mean .. it doesn’t get worse then this … Two effects emerge: on the one hand, including this easily obtained ‘result’ shows that the effort to inform bilingually is taken, and on the other hand using Gougol Trenslait outsources the responsibility, nobody but the absent distant online tool is to blame for potential mistakes .. nobody burns their fingers .. but fun it is not :-/

Someone has bravely started a correction attempt, but ballpoint on a plastic sheet is a hopeless undertaking any time of day 🙂

The street name ‘Kantersteen’ or ‘Cantersteen’ might mean something like ‘Tilting stone’, or ‘Turning stone’ (kenter / kantel) in old dutch. Its etymology is a bit obscure to me, no idea what Kantersteen means in relation to this part of the city ? Or does it derive from the English ‘canter’ or german ‘Kanter’ as in: an easy horse gallop towards victory ?