For a while I was convinced that the Brazilian-Portuguese way of saying that one was hungover directly translated to “having the taste of an umbrella handle in one’s mouth.” I vaguely remember hearing it in a hostel in São Paulo, probably from another backpacker and those people’ll say anything.

Yesterday someone who was actually from Brazil and was actually hungover said, “estou numa ressaca lascada.” When I entered that phrase into babelfish it translated as, “I am in a splintery undertow.” Now, babelfish, like backpackers, will say anything [1] too but, whatever, it’s still rad.

[1] For example, let’s say you wanted to find out what the song “Sexy Boy” is about in English, you’ll find that babelfish thinks that the “French” phrase “sexy boy” translates to the English phrase “sexy servant boy“.