World Expo
I've been a busy little bee at ChinaSMACK, I've translated part of a guide to the World Expo in Shanghai.
Read it here!
I have to say that reading about all those places in Shanghai I know so well makes me nostalgic for the place and all the friends I made there. Miss you guys!
Dr Karl on Triple J
There's nothing I like better than going for a walk while listening to an interesting podcast. If you didn't know, a podcast is like a radio show except on mp3.
One of my favourites is Dr Karl on Triple J. Every week on Thursday morning, Dr Karl has a show where he answers scientific questions from ordinary Australians. It's available for download every week here: http://www.abc.net.au/science/drkarl/default.htm . They have simple but interesting questions: "Why do my ears ring after listening to loud music?" "How can you know the sex of a baby before it's born"... etc.
It's a great educational resource for people learning English, learning about science, or people learning about English and science, or just curious people like me. The language is pretty hard though. Conversation is about science (so sometimes some difficult words come up), is at natural speed (quite fast) and is in conversational Australian English (so people with thick country accents often call). But if you're up for a challenge and find EAP or Upper Intermediate too easy you should definitely have a listen.
And as always feel free to ask me questions in real life, Facebook, Twitter or wherever you find me if you have any problems.
Max on Danwei
My first post at Danwei has been published!
The recent internet crackdown has resulted in not only hundreds and thousands of small and medium sized sites being closed down, but has also given some Internet heavyweights something to say...
It's the first time I've done a translation that wasn't a straight 'literal' translation. I've abbreviated things, left things out and moved bits about so that you get the info in a more fluent way. - Sometimes if you translate things too literally they sound a bit stilted.
Read the post here! It's about internet censorship, and it has just occured to me that almost everything serious that I translate is.
Crazy Stuff on Chinese Streets
One of the things I miss about Shanghai is the craziness on the streets. There would always be someone approaching you trying to sell you something, trying to rip off someone, a traffic jam, accident, or just two grubby old guys playing chess with a crowd of a thousand migrant workers forming a huddle around them watching.
Here's something crazy that happened to a Chinese guy on his way home. Now let me point out that this is the absolute height of craziness that you'll ever see, but still, it's indicative of how lively the place is.
Intruiged? Read on at ChinaSMACK!
Shanghai Radio
John Pasden from Sinosplice did a post yesterday about a great website. It broadcasts Shanghai radio on the internet. I don't have anything to add really. Here's his post, and here's the site!
Hearing old Shanghainese people calling into talkback radio shows makes me miss the place!
What Is A 坪?
In Taiwan, instead of using square feet or meters to measure area, they use 坪. This character is alternatively pronounced 평/pyeong in Korea, tsubo in Japan and ping in Taiwan. I mention this because it came up in a translation that I was doing today. No dictionary I had mentioned what a 坪 was; I ended up calling a Taiwanese friend who set me straight.
I mention this to bring up slight differences between mainland and Taiwanese Chinese.
One translation company I talked to asked me which variety of Chinese I specialised in; Traditional or Simplified. (In case you didn't know, Simplified is used on the mainland, Traditional in Taiwan and Hong Kong.) My immediate reaction was that I didn't care. - Although I prefer Simplified characters all you have to do if someone gives you a tricky passage in Traditional is input it into an automatic converter (like this one) and it's transferred automatically.
As it turns out it's not as simple as that. The difference in writing between Taiwan and the mainland is trivial, and easily adjusted for by automatic converters. But they have a certain turn of phrase in Taiwan (and Hong Kong, for that matter) and some local oddities (like the 坪 issue I mention above) that do make for some differences.
Migrant Workers
I've been reading 亚洲周刊 recently. It's pretty good, a real Chinese publication (a lot of publications are just translations of English ones) with some pretty heavy material.
Just now was reading an article on migrant workers in Chinese cities. They have a hard life. And by 'migrant' they don't mean people from other countries, but people from the countryside who come to big cities to work.
You see, people who are from cities have it good. Their children have good schools, they have health insurance funded by the state, and they get an old age pension.
But just because you live and work in a certain city doesn't entitle you to these benefits. The article gives the example of one woman who has lived in Beijing for 24 years. Even after these 24 years her kids can't go to proper schools (unless she pays extra fees) and she doesn't have any medical insurance.
The article mentions the meeting of the CPPCC and the NPC, the country's two biggest political entities, which is happening today. Reform of the system that doesn't allow non-residents to get benefits of the city that they're living in was brought up, but the article mentions that it's brought up every year without any action being taken on it.
I was considering translating the thing but it's really long. Here's a part that I found interesting though:
秦紅霞一個月掙錢不會低於六千元，但因為這種生活的不確定性，她所有的錢都從指縫裏省下來，消費低得驚人。她以炫耀的口吻問記者：「你猜從去年九月到今年 一月，我一共花了多少錢在伙食（吃飯）上？」「五百？」「再猜。」「三百？」「再猜。」「一千？」「呵呵，我告訴你，只花了五十六塊錢……」她幾乎笑得臉 都要開花了，聽者只是驚呆在原地。
And the English:
Qin Hongxia makes more than 6000RMB a month, but with such uncertainty in her life, she saves most of it. Her expenses are astonishingly low. She proudly asked this reporter: "From September last year to January this year, how much money do you think I spent on food?" "Five hundred?" "Guess again." "Three hundred?" "Nope." "A thousand?" "Haha, I'll tell you this: I only spent 56 RMB...." Her face broke out into laughter, and all listening were dumbfounded.
I can tell you that I would be one of those people dumbfounded. A quick Google search tells me that she spent the equivalent of 9 Australian dollars. Granted food is a lot cheaper in China but I can tell you that a day out in China, or even a couple of hours spent in a local establishment downing alcoholic beverages would set you back more than that.
Those 农民工 (rural workers) really have it tough.
Son holds and chats with body on the side of the road
Title says it all. Why do I always get to translate the saddest stories??
“Dad…” “We spoke on the phone only this morning…”
Read the rest at ChinaSMACK!
Break
I've been emailing translation agencies all over Asia looking for work. One of them replied [only one, boo-hoo] and sent me a test. They gave me a week to complete four short translations. I've just checked over two of them, and am about to tackle the third.
I've enjoyed it! It's not easy though. You read the paper every day and think that you understand/read Chinese pretty well, but then someone throws an academic paper about some obscure topic at you; when you get your head around that they give you a blurb that's going in a brochure that they are handing out at an art gallery; once you do that they hand you a press release for a computer program that manages BPM... you don't even know what BPM is so you have to ask Wikipedia...
Anyway, it's great fun so I just had to let everyone know about it. I feel like a ninja ［忍者］ from Japan's past. - In case you didn't know, ninjas weren't soldiers in the true sense of the word, they were trained to fight not on a battlefield but in more improvised surroundings. A ninja had to be ready to fight anywhere against anyone. That's how I feel about translating; your brain has to be really agile. A strange comparison I'm sure, but it's the best I can come up with right now.
Go To Temple?
In English we don't use articles for certain things. Like "school": "I'm at school" is correct, but "I'm at a school" isn't.
Some things we always use articles for. "I'm at the office" is correct, but "I'm at office" isn't.
"Church" falls into the first category. "I go to church on Sundays" is ok, "I go to a church on Sundays" sounds a little weird.
Ok, here's a little conundrum I'm in, and the reason I'm writing this. Do we say "I went to temple" or "I went to a temple"? "I went to temple" sounds a little strange, I first heard an Indian student of mine use it.
In today's pluralistic, multi-religious society do we have a special rule for Christian houses of worship that we don't use for Hindu, Taoist, or Buddhist ones?
Any help? Which is right?