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Coca-Cola Vending Machine Blunder Greets New Zealanders With Grim Message

The disturbing message reads: Greetings, death. Picture: Twitter Source:Supplied AUKLAND, New Zealand -- Coca Cola Co. inadvertently greeted customers at a New Zealand vending machine with the grim message: "hello death." The American beverage giant simply wanted to give travelers at Auckland Airport a friendly greeting with the message "Kia ora, mate" on one of its vending machines. "Kia ora" is a common Māori greeting. The confusion came, however, from mixing the c...

October 15, 2018

	The disturbing message reads: "Greetings, death". Picture: TwitterSource:Supplied

AUKLAND, New Zealand -- Coca Cola Co. inadvertently greeted customers at a New Zealand vending machine with the grim message: "hello death."
 
The American beverage giant simply wanted to give travelers at Auckland Airport a friendly greeting with the message "Kia ora, mate" on one of its vending machines. "Kia ora" is a common Māori greeting. The confusion came, however, from mixing the common phrase up with the English word, "mate," which translates to the far more sinister "death" in the Pacific nation's indigenous tongue.
 
Surprised, amused and shocked Māori speakers who saw the machine posted the blunder on social media. Many suggested that Coke would have been safer going for New Zealand's most widely used term of endearment "bro," instead of "mate" which is more common in Australia.