I heard a story that back in the 1980’s an inventor designed a handheld language translator. At the launch of his invention a group of journalists were present. One journalist typed a sentence in English: “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.” The button for translation into the Russian Language was pressed and another journalist who spoke the language confirmed the translation was accurate. However, when the button for translation back into the English Language was pressed the statement read: “There is plenty of booze but the meat is rotten.”
We have come a long way. I really like Google Translate, enabled me to have a conversation with a person who spoke no English. A little awkward at first and some misses like the one your inventor had, but very few. We spoke for over an hour, it was fantastic. I was also able to read menus it has a viewing function, which again take a little effort but works.