A bright orange fixture of the cityscape, the MA48 is Vienna’s loud and proud department of sanitation. Their numerous trashcans around the city are plastered with irreverent slogans and puns that sometimes need translation – cultural, linguistic or otherwise. After all, what does haglich mean, anyway?
Photos: Mark T. Hooker
Yes, we clean.
Yes we can. – Obama 2012. Those were the days.
Hasta La Mista, Baby?
A play on Hasta la vista, baby, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s catchphrase in the film Terminator 2: Judgement Day, which roughly translates to: You got any trash, baby?
Brauche mehr input.
A catchphrase from the movie Short Circuit: Need more input.
Das Publikum gibt mir alles!
The audience gives me everything!
A play on a famous quote from Friedrich Schiller: Das Publikum ist mir jetzt Alles. Mein Studium, mein Souverain, mein Vertrauer. The Audience is everything to me. My education, my sovereign, my confidant.
Mist für mich, Lob für dich.
Trash for me, praise for you.
Bin ned haglich.
Viennese dialect for “I’m not picky (haglich).”
Eine von 18.000 Filialen.
One of 18,000 branches.
Für Sie rund um die Uhr geöffnet.
Open for you around the clock.
At least something is open on Sunday!
Ihre Papiere, bitte!
Papers please!
Schwarzes Loch sucht Restmaterie.
Black hole seeks left-over matter.
Host an Tschick?
Got a cigarette?
Tschick is a cigarette, and ‘host’ is the Viennese way of saying ‘Hast du?’
Gib meinem Hängen einen Sinn.
Give me a reason to hang.
Existential trashcan wants your trash. Otherwise, what’s the point of hanging here?
Bitte füttern!
Feed me!
Unlike the pigeons, you are actually allowed to feed this thing.
Schau net weg, hau eine dein’ Dreck!
Don’t look away, throw your trash in!
Gebaut nach dem Reinheitsgebot von 2013.
Built according to the Purity Law of 2013.
Cleanliness doesn’t just apply to the “German Beer Purity Law” of 1516 anymore.
