Tepelena is a small town south of Durrës which produces bottled water. This water has been approved for distribution into the European Union marketplace and is a good product of Albania. But we not writing to tell you Albania can bottle water to EU standards. No, if you look at the label below, circled in yellow is an interesting bit of English.

‘Suffled how it gush from the source of the woods of Tepelena’. Why does my spell checker have a problem with ‘suffled’? Now this is not a new product, it has been around for many years, at least 4 years and probably more. If you do a web search on this term, you will find there is actually a book by this title, and many blogs discussing this quaint phrase.

I know you are probably very curious about the original Albanian. OK… here is the Albanian side of the label.

Now that should clear everything up. But in case you need a bit of help….

‘I mbushur siç del nga burimi I pyllit te Tepelenes’. To break this down, we will translate the words we know first. Now with that step out of the way, drag out you Albania-English dictionary or go to your favorite online language dictionary and it literally translates as ‘full it goes out from a source in the woods of Tepelena’. Makes you appreciate suffled.

We have asked for a Peace Corps volunteer to be placed at the plant with the sole purpose of getting them to use real English words.