Olympic Tattoo Spelling Mistake: Make Sure Your Artist Consults A Dictionary

Getting an Olympic tattoo to celebrate her role in the 2012 Olympic torch relay is all the Jerri Peterson wanted. Little did she know that she should have asked her tattoo artist to consult a dictionary before permanently decorating her body with a misspelled Olympic tattoo.

Peterson, 54, was selected to participate in the 2012 Olympic Torch Relay for her years of charity fundraising. She was 1 of 70 international employees selected by the hotel chain for which she works to take part in the relay as a thank you for charity work.

To commemorate the honor, Peterson decided to get an Olympic tattoo on her ankle. As she told the BBC News:

“I always wanted to have a tattoo but I never quite felt passionate about any one thing to have it put on my body permanently.

So when I was selected for this wonderful honour, I thought ‘that’s it – I’m ready to have my tattoo’.”

Unfortunately, her tattoo artist misspelled “Olympic” as “Oylmpic.”

Peterson did not notice the mistake on her Olympic tattoo until a friend pointed out the error:

“I looked at it and I was so disappointed. I called my husband and he giggled a little bit.

Then I started laughing about it and I’ve laughed ever since.”

After discovering the mistake in her Olympic tattoo, Peterson contacted the artist. He offered to fix the mistake, but Peterson ultimately decided to keep her Olympic tattoo as is:

“He felt so bad when he found out.

He wanted to fix it but I decided I want to keep it. It’s fine.

It’s the Oy-limpics – it’s as unique as I am.”

And the lesson of the story is: Always confirm with spell check before committing to any permanent ink on your body.

Would you have been as understanding had your tattoo artist messed up your Olympic tattoo?