One of the interesting things about language is that, while we humans have lots of different ones, they all have to use pretty much the same sounds. As a result, words in one language can sound very much like (or be spelled very much like) very different words in other languages. Most of you probably know the story of the car manufacturers who couldn’t understand why a car called a Nova didn’t sell well in Latin America. Well, here’s something similar.

So, there I was, idly scanning the small print on a bottle of toner as I went through my morning facial routine. The manufacturer is obviously playing up the the “natural” and “allergy free” markets because it says on the bottle that the toner is “100% Fragrance Free”. It also says it in French, which I knew: “100% san parfum”. Then I looked at the Spanish and it said, “100% sin perfume”.

Sin perfume, eh? I kind of like the idea that my face is covered in sin.

(Of course there is always the old Sumerian moon god whose followers could legitimately call themselves worshipers of Sin, but that’s another story, and The Goddess might not like me making jokes about her pop.)

Update: silly mistake correct thanks to intervention from the world’s best proof reader whose talents I sorely miss.