A Tennis Star’s Twitter Conversation with an Argentinian President Parody Account

Presidenta argentina Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. Foto en Twitter (CC BY-SA 2.0).

Argentinian President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. Photo by Flickr, CC 2.0.

A famous tennis player thought she was talking to Argentina's president on Twitter last week, but she actually engaged a popular parody account. Martina Navratilova, a retired Czech and American tennis player and coach, got into it with someone pretending to be Argentinian President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner.

Imagen en Flickr del usuario  Andrew Campbell  (CC BY 2.0).

Martina Navratilova. Image on Flickr by user Andrew Campbell, (CC 2.0.

Unaware of the parody Twitter handle, which uses in its name the word “Gelatina” (“jelly” in Spanish), Martina replied with two tweets:

The Cristina Fernández parody account tweeted back:

President Cristina Fernadez's real Twitter handle, it so happens, is @CFKCristina. Some Twitter users rushed to draw Navratilova's attention to her mistake, hoping to spare her any more embarrassment:

Don't be silly, Martina, @CFKGelatina is fake. Get out for your protection.

The whole incident prompted mockery and reactions by other users:

Poor thing! Martina believed this was serious, but who can blame her, if @CFKGelatina is indistinguishable from the other…

The account @CFKGelatina is more serious that the original, go figure.

I was considering it odd to read the PLESIDENT [sic] writing English, she only speaks “Chinese” and veeerry badly!!

This last tweet refers to the uproar caused by a recent tweet—considered by many to be racist—that Fernández published during a visit to China, where she seemed to mock of the way Chinese people mistake the letter “R” for “L.”

Laura Schneider contributed with this post.

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