You are correct Marc, that should be “Welcome to the Netherlands”

You’re right, Marc. It’s a mistake and they should change it. Why not change it directly to Dutch? I would appreciate that.

we have many guests from Europe and here is an interesting question i was wondering with – which countries in mainland Europe are “naturally good at” speaking at speaking English.

i find that sometimes i can’t understand people from south europe speaking English, however, geographic proximity doesn’t imply better English either, for example, Swiss people seem to speak better English than Dutch people.

“better English”,to me, means easy to understand and without too much accent. my sample of one particular country is limited so i might be wrong.

It’s not necessarily a mistake. It could be a play on words.

Lost in Translation.

I might put my Facebook status as “Bored in Beijing”.

Hey, I’m a native Chinese, I think when they translate this line from Chinese, they were thinking that people have to actually get indoor, so they put ‘welcome in’ instead of ‘welcome to’. But ‘welcome to’ is a fixed phrase in English.

Maybe it’s a joke, Chinglish on the Dutch pavillion. Kind of fits with the humoristic pavillion design.

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Mike Zhu. Mike Zhu said: Grammar mistake at Dutch Expo pavilion? http://bit.ly/9JkUpV [...]

Haha… Ofcourse it is a language joke.
Look at “DAMES & ZONEN” at the toilets…

Just come and visit us!
You’re very WELKOM!

This has nothing to do with Chinglish. This is pure and classic Denglish = Dutch/English.

In fact, it’s probably the most common signage mistake in the Netherlands. And, as Marc observes, a direct (mis-)translation of “Welkom in Nederland.”

It would be nice to mix more languages in one sentence. I would change it to “Welkom yn die Netherlands (Dutch/Frisian/Afrikaans or German/English).

@Leo Salazar
I think you mean pure and classic Dunglish. Surely you don’t want to lose the reference to manure.

make it ‘into the Netherlands’: everybody happy!

Leo Salazar is right: classic Denglish.

Waarom mag het er niet in het Nederlands staan?

In sociolinguistics it has already been recognized that the Netherlands is one of the countries in which people develop their own English, which may be called Dunglish if you want to. Moreover, in the Netherlands it is not common to consult anyone in linguistic matters. They might think your not selfconfident in English (or, for that matter, Dutch). One rather makes a stupid impression anonymously.

Like “you’re not selfconfident”, Peter?

Why not write it in Dutch? Everybody will understand!
“Welkom in Nederland”

The error is much greater… Doesn’t anybody get annoyed at the fact that the Netherlands is not, and never will be!, in China? It’s a Dutch stand, not the country, puhlease!

“Welkom in Nederland” – dat zou het mooiste zijn geweest.

“Welcome to the Netherlands” – als het dan toch overdrachtelijk moet.

“Welcome to the Dutch pavillion” – lekker re

To be completely correct the English translation should read ‘Welcome to The Netherlands.’ and I gree in Dutch \it should be ‘Welkom in Nederland’

“Welkom in Nederland” is een oplossing!
Omzeil je de engelse grammatica en is duidelijk voor iedereen!

[...] No change in the welcome text of the Dutch pavilion Image by Marc van der Chijs Still "Welcome in" instead of "Welcome to". There was a whole discussion on my blog about this: http://www.marc.cn/2010/04/grammar-mistake-at-dutch-expo-pavilio…; [...]