Translation And Immigration

 

Lost In Translation

Lost in translation is the title of one of my favourite films but this is not about films, it’s about translation; specifically, why do the French not get translations into English checked by an English native-language speaker? I and English friends have encountered many examples of mistranslations, from the gor blimey to the hilarious to the potentially dangerous. Here are some examples.

A friend visited a restaurant that had its menu translated into English. The menu listed the usual entrées, plats, desserts and the problem was with plat, flat or dish in English. Flat in English means on the same level or apartment. So the translator had some choices to make. He or she got it wrong. The result was a flat of the day and flats to take away. Hilarious but not too difficult to fix.

Some years ago I used Avignon airport frequently to visit England. Inscribed on a very large plate glass wall in the waiting area are the words Bienvenu en Avignon, le coeur de Provence. The English translation beneath it reads Welcome in (sic) Avignon, the hearth of Provence. Avignon residents might be surprised to know they are living in a cheminée. No harm done but very expensive to fix.

The other airport local to Mollans is at Nimes. On the wall inside the airport building is a large security notice, in French and English, with the English translation garbled. OK, it’s a security notice so much of the content can be inferred but the potential for misunderstandings is large. Isn’t airport security important enough to ensure an accurate translation?

Finally I sometimes visit wine websites to look at their English translations. One such was the Chateau Du Clos, in the Bordeaux area. It claimed that one of its wines was the colour of rubies, translated as “rubish”. I emailed the owners to point out that this was suspiciously close to rubbish and asked if they really wanted to claim their wine was that colour. The result was a good bottle of wine for me and a return email stating that the owners were thinking of suing the company that had created the site and the translation. Could be expensive for someone.

In all these cases what would it have cost to ensure an accurate translation from a native English speaker? Now whenever I encounter a mistranslation into English I offer the correction as a gift.

But before we English start smugly smiling it works the other way too. When the French new wave films hit Britain in the late 1950s one of the star films was Truffaut’s Quatre Cents Coups. The English translation was literal: The 400 Blows. But the film has nothing t do with 400 blows; faire les Quatre cents coups means to make mischief. So making mischief would have been a correct if not the sexiest of titles. I’ve no idea what the distributors paid for the right to distribute the film but it will certainly have dwarfed the cost of an accurate translation.

Immigration

I got an insight into the immigration issue in a dinner party at my house the other day with friends who are not racist or particularly politically active. It was to do with the safety net. The insight was that to defuse the issue countries need to ensure that they offer their existing citizens at least as much as they do to asylum seekers and would-be immigrants. This particularly concerns housing. Asylum seekers and would be immigrants are confined, which isn’t great for them, but they are housed. In the outside world (too) many people are sleeping on the streets. Finland has avoided this discrepancy by ensuring housing for all but I know of no other country that has done this. I haven’t yet had time to think this point through but intend to do so in the coming weeks.

It's A Waiting Game

 

It’s A Waiting Game

The Mairie always provides a new year lunch for free for the old folks in the village sometime in January and, for me, that is usually the only event of significance before March. It was, as usual, a good meal with a prawn, smoked salmon, ham and salad starter followed by roast pork in a mushroom sauce, cheese, dessert and wine “à volonté”. Hats off to the Mairie and members of the village council who served it. After that………..what, until March? I’m waiting for potatoes to appear in the garden shops so that I can buy some for my allotment; they’ll need a month for sprouting before I can plant them. At the same time onions should be available for planting. So basically nothing happens until I can start work on the allotment. I could do some clearing of debris there in the interim but that depends on the weather. So passing the time reduces to reading, listening to music or watching TV. It feels like an age but really that’s not so bad, is it?

(Don’t) Contact Us

I don’t know how many people have tried to contact the organisation behind a website and found it a frustrating experience but I certainly have many times. Contact Us can generally be taken to mean Please Don’t. Forging relationships with customers? Well, if you are buying, otherwise…...(who needs customers?). It’s all part of removing staff (and cost) from the process. Customer service? That’s a term that applies only to the sales staff. I’ve tried to interest relevant magazines in the issue, particularly from the point of view of old and limited fogies like, with no success. Isn’ t there a helpline phone number? Of course there is, if you can find it, but how long can you hang on the ine before you die? And if you have a specific problem there is probably a menu that will include all options except the one you want. So, an ELSE clause, an “other” option? Dream on.

I have had a bee in my bonnet about user testing for as long as I can remember until I recently found out that UX specialists are employed (sometimes). UX specialists are trained to examine the user experience on a website. That’s great, even if they don’t measure up to my benchmark of a 90 year-old granny living in Kazakhstan who has just been given a PC for her 90^th birthday and wants to buy a present on-line for her grandchild in England. But what is the remit of these UX specialists? Are they allowed to investigate and test beyond sales? There seems little if any evidence that that is the case. So do we just have to suffer and get on with it? Well, it seems to me that there is a gap in the market there; and if there is a gap in the market there could be an opportunity for someone to exploit it. Nationwide has only recently woken up to how to exploit its position as a mutual, doing so in a manner that no other bank in the UK can copy. So there is hope, even if it is tenuous. In the meantime I’m waiting, waiting for some organisation to meet my Kazakhstan granny test.