Trousse pour Sains Personnels

This is an older picture I took on 2 October 2005. I don't know anymore where I saw this, but I clearly thought it was worth taking a picture of.

This was for a Thanksgiving sale. I am not sure that les Garçons (French for the Boys) would be all that happy to receive a set with toothpaste and related items for Thanksgiving but that may be a matter of personal preference.

The most interesting thing for me was the text in the picture: Trousse pour Sains Personnels. Whether one likes capitalisation of words in a title/name is a matter of taste, but that is not my point either.

What I find interesting here, is the description Sains Personnels, which is meaningless but could perhaps be construed to mean Healthy Personals in English. I have no idea what these could be.

In a religious context, it could be a typo of Saints Personnels (Personal Saints). It could also be a typo of Seins Personnels (Personal Breasts) and since sain can also mean animal fat it could possibly be read as Personal Fats, but my best guess is that it is a typo of Soins Personnels (Personal Care), which would at least make some type of sense. 

I am sure that francophones appreciate the effort that the vendor made to address them in French, but they would probably have appreciated it even more – and felt less insulted – if he/she had splurged on an extra fifty dollar flat fee to have the text checked by a proofreader who actually knows French instead of some semi-literate individual who doesn't know how to use a dictionary.

[last updated on 2 October 2016]