5 Words That Don't Mean What You Think

False friends — words that look like an obvious cognate but actually mean something else — are one of the more embarrassing ways to get tripped up in a language you're otherwise doing fine in. Here are five worth knowing, across the languages LingoPuzz teaches.

1 "Menu" (French, German, Portuguese)

In French, German, and Portuguese alike, the word that looks like "menu" — menu, Menü — doesn't mean the document listing what a restaurant serves. It means a fixed-price set meal. The actual word for "the menu" is la carte in French, die Speisekarte in German, and o cardápio in Portuguese. Ask for "the menu" using the false-friend word and you may get handed today's set meal instead of the full list of options.

2 Dutch "hemd"

This one looks like it should mean "shirt" — and it's close, but not quite. In Dutch, hemd actually means undershirt. The word for an actual (button-up) shirt is overhemd. Order a "hemd" expecting outerwear and you'll be asking for underwear instead.

3 Italian "camera"

In Italian, camera doesn't mean a photo or video camera — it means room (specifically, often a bedroom). The device you'd photograph something with is a fotocamera. This one's a genuine trap for English speakers, since "camera" is spelled and pronounced almost identically in both languages while meaning something completely different.

4 Portuguese "camisola"

This one depends entirely on which side of the Atlantic you're on. In European Portuguese, camisola means sweater. In Brazilian Portuguese, the same word means nightgown. Same spelling, same pronunciation, genuinely different garment — worth knowing if you're learning one variant and traveling somewhere the other is spoken. (More on the Brazilian/European split in general is worth a read if this catches your interest.)

5 German "Gift"

This one didn't come up while building LingoPuzz's own word lists, but it's too well-known (and too good) to leave off a list like this. In German, Gift doesn't mean a present — it means poison. The German word for a present is Geschenk. It's one of the most commonly cited English-German false friends for good reason: the spelling is identical, and the meanings couldn't be further apart.