THE CITY THAT ISN’T

English is international. People know English. Sometimes they think they know it too well. That's when non-native users of English can make mistakes. Big mistakes!

For example, there were the people hired by the Jerusalem city administration to give the city a much needed publicity boost. In 2006 the city hosted a music and culture show. The administration decided this was a good opportunity to put the city back on the international tourist map. Not an easy job.

Jerusalem is an important city for three of the world's major religions- Christians, Muslims and of course, Jews. It has been the focus of conflict for eons.

To overcome the city's poor reputation the city administration hired a public relations company to design and write a brochure advertising the cultural event. But more importantly, the PR company was set the task of promoting Jerusalem as a tourist destination to an international audience.

The PR company was asked to come up with a snappy, catchy slogan for the brochure. They did, but not in the way they intended.

Idiom is difficult to master in any language and English is trickier than most. If you want to say that something or somebody is very special, unique, you can say 'there is none better' i.e. it is the best. Or you can say 'one of a kind', or 'There is no city like it'. This was the idiomatic phrase the PR company writers were probably thinking about when they came up with their memorable slogan: 'Jerusalem: There is no such city!' Thousands of glossy brochures had to be recalled and angry Jews, Christians and Muslims placated.

The city could, of course, have saved much embarrassment and cost if they had given the brochure to a native user of English to proofread before it was published!

READING BLUES

You've spent hours getting the words right. Then editing. Suddenly the words begin to sparkle. The words say it all clearly and concisely. Web users quickly scanning the website page will pick up the message effortlessly Your blog is just about ready for publication. And then some designer techie guy suggests putting a blue, wavy wash over the whole website. "Then it'll stand out!" Which it does. But the readers feel as if they are drowning in wavy, blue water!

When readers have to struggle to read text they usually give up. Sometimes looking good and readability are not compatible. In which case, the look has to give way to the text. Our eyes are used to reading black text against a white background. Of course we can also read the reverse combination, but white text against black soon tires the eyes. Any other combination of text and colour has to be thought about carefully. A light pastel shaded background can work well as long as there is no interference from background patterns. Again eyes tire quickly when having to quickly distinguish coded symbols (letters and words) from meaningless patterns. How many times is a good children's illustrated book spoiled by having text wandering into pictures? The children can't read it and adults reading aloud struggle to disentangle the letters from the roots of trees, or swirling smoke. The same applies to magazine articles where the text crawls into illustrations and the reader's eyes have to switch from reading black on white to reading white on black, or even worse some other colours such as red on green!

The words come first; looks second. Enhance the look of pages by whatever means designers and illustrators can create, but never sacrifice the word for the look. And never, never write anything in yellow!