Steve causes yet another international incident

Back in June, I published a story about a boat trip I took with a bunch of folks who don't speak much English. Everything was nice and quiet until recently, when I called Sergey's attention to a picture I'd posted of his family. When he looked around my Picasa web albums, he found my pictures of that trip and showed them to his coworkers who were on the trip.

Unable to read the related blog post in English, they ran it through Google Translate. The robotic translator amplified something that might have been taken as suggestive and offered text that could only be taken as suggestive. Since this amplified translation appeared next to a picture of me with a couple of women in bathing suits who hardly knew me, they felt appropriately scandalized.

Not wishing to exacerbate any tensions between countries already looking warily at each other, I have removed the offending photo and substituted a nice scenic photo which Irina recently gave to me.

Here's a picture of Sergey at the time he told us the story. I think I am safe here, since these people really are my friends and everybody is properly covered.

From 2011-01 Minsk