“la parole exportée”

I’m reminded of the following anecdote by a blog post written by Werner Patels.

It goes to show how obsessed with acronyms translators can be. Once upon a time, I interpreted at a rather hard meeting and at breaktime, we were lucky to get hold of the printout of the next presentation.

On one page, there was a diagram of a process, with, right in the middle of the page, in big bold evenly-spaced letters, this *acronym*:

E C H E C

So I asked the speaker: What does this stand for?

He looked at me with a funny look, and seemed a little uneasy.

So I asked again, in my best professional voice.

So he laughed. What? You don’t know what ECHEC means?

That was NOT an acronym, it was a REAL word!

Ever heard of the word ‘failure’? That’s what ‘échec’ means. If you didn’t do this properly, the process failed.

Of course I knew the word. But when you have very little time to talk to a speaker before his presentation, you tend to go for very technical words and acronyms.

What a laugh! (and how I hate to look so stupid! ;-))

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Yesterday and the day before, I interpreted at a conference in the software industry. Of course, I’ll get a check at the end of the day, or rather at the end of a few weeks, but there’s another priceless advantage that one can derive from this job, where we are, basically, observers.

Forget about insider knowledge. This was a public conference, so no confidential data was exchanged. And anyway, we work on a contract.

The interesting point is that at conferences, you don’t see the lame ducks of an industry. (Or if you do, you see how they are going to fix that). The companies that get showcased are those that are putting all their energy into building successful businesses, and those that have indeed succeeded and are striving to stay on top.

So you get to see the best. It’s not a seminar, but you get lessons live on how to succeed, how to market yourself, you get a view from the perspective of some of the most influencial players in a market. Of course we don’t see what goes on behind the scenes, so I’m not talking about taking everything at face value. But success doesn’t just happen. You have to put a lot of work and energy into achieving it.

So although using insider knowledge is forbidden, there’s no law to stop you from feeling energized, even as a tiny business, after an event like that, and lessons to be drawn.

And just think that I’m paid to get that education…

I’m getting ready to interpret at an important meeting tomorrow afternoon. I was hired only yesterday, so I spent most of today reading; it’s a blessing that in addition to my general knowledge of the subjects likely to be covered, there is an abundance of resources (the press, videos, all sorts of materials).

What’s really strange is this: the more I prepare, the less I feel prepared… And it’s always been like that, it’s part of my character, I suppose. I’d like to be able to say that the older I get, the easier it gets. But no, no hope of that ever happening

Does anyone have that feeling, in their own line of business?

It’s probably just a coincidence, but the blog name ‘Certain Ideas of Europe‘ (on the Economist.com website) brings to mind the ‘certain idea of France’ that has informed so much of France’s foreign policy in the past decades.

But the post I found, a fairly old one for this day and age, since it was written in January, has this heading: ‘Five months left to learn French‘. It’s interesting and funny, as I’m reading it just after France started its 6-month turn at leading the European Union. I have written somewhere that this made for a very lively Spring season in the conference interpretation community. My bet is that the Fall season is going to be busy too, and I am already predicting an incredibly crazy month of December, with -as is always the case, but probably even more so with this Presidency- the outgoing country desperately trying to finish off jobs, putting together last-minute agreements, in the hope of leaving a remarkable legacy. Hmmm.

The post concludes with a quote from the French European Affairs Minister, saying:

“Also, a European presidency in which we will be using French to communicate, a great deal.”

Ha. Indeed. As a professional translator, I can only applaud. More business. This is one of the favorite themes of this Presidency. We’ll see. However, what I found really funny, were the comments. Same old stories. Same old rivalry. Same old tally of who in Europe wants to speak English, not French. (What about German? Spanish?) Same old accounting of how much French the English language has absorbed over the centuries (and vice versa?). Same old squabbling: ‘French is a dead language.’ No, it’s not.’ ‘Yes it is.’ One could have argued: ‘What about British English?’

Who’s right? Who’s wrong? Do we care?