Google forces a translation to Japanese

[Shachar Shemesh]

Hi all,

One of my clients is having a weird problem, and I'm pretty much at my 
wit's end as for what to do about it.

The site is called "Tzofit" (at tzofit.co.il), and is an index and 
publisher for Zimmers. When you search Google for "צימרים" the site 
appears on the second page, and when you search Google for "צופית" it is 
the first result. In both cases, you cannot miss it - Google displays 
the site's title and summary as Japanese!

Now here's where it gets really strange. While the main site is 
proclaimed to be in Japanese, all the deep links are in Hebrew. If you 
ask to see the Google cache, the site appears in Hebrew. If you search 
for its address directly (tzofit.co.il), the site appears with correct 
title and summary. The only explanation I have is that this is a Google 
index bug.

The problem is that even if that is the case, I cannot see what I can do 
about it. I tried to ask about it on the Google forums 
(http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Web+Search/thread?tid=08c423ea40d5c1ab&hl=en), 
but, as expected, got not replies. On the other hand, I did not manage 
to find anything wrong with the actual page.

Trying to translate the Japanese text, using Google Translate, back to 
English seems to show that the text translates, but is not coherent 
sentences. Then again, looking at the raw encoding, this does not appear 
to be Hebrew interpreted with the wrong encoding (or am I missing 
something?)

If anyone has any clue, it would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Shachar

-- 
Shachar Shemesh
Lingnu Open Source Consulting Ltd.
http://www.lingnu.com

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