GoiHata Translation Services

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Fidelity and transparency have been sought after as the ideal in translation for ages. There is even mention of a French critic in the 17th-century who said that translations, like women, could be either faithful or beautiful, but not both at the same time. Being a female Translator, I completely disagree with that statement as “impossible” is the daily challenge in our profession.
Fidelity refers to the level to which a translation accurately presents the meaning of the source text, without adding to or subtracting from it, without intensifying or weakening any part of the meaning, and otherwise without changing or interfering with it while transparency relates to the point to which a translation appears to a native speaker of the target language to have originally been written in that language, and is consistent with the language’s grammatical, syntactic and idiomatic standards. One translation can be a “faithful translation” and another can be an “idiomatic translation” rendering transparency but the two attributes are not mutually exclusive.
Quality in translation entails high accuracy which refers to fidelity and transparency, proper translation of the terminology and attention to the target audience, considering the linguistic codes (lexicon, morphology, phonology and syntax) of both languages. This process requires thorough knowledge of the grammar, semantics, syntax, idioms, composition, form, voice, and the like of the source language, as well as the cultural contexts of its speakers. Translation is inherently a difficult activity indeed as it must take into account a number of constraints, including context, and writing conventions.
Just our conscious effort to pursue high accuracy, beautifully manifested through fidelity and transparency, will render a translation which will be considered “faithful” to the original text and “useful” to its potential readers even though acceptable translations can be as creative and original as their source texts.

Paulina Torres De Witt
www.goihata.com

www.goihata.com
Successful people are continually looking for ways to expand their knowledge because they understand that to be updated is a must in order to have the chance to seize new opportunities. They repeatedly invest in the process of self-education. They are always buying and reading books to acquire knowledge and put into practice what they learn. They regularly attend seminars given by experts and are eager to listen to those who have greater experience. We have to learn from them because they have the right attitude.
By contrast, the vast majority of the population is completely different. They hardly read books; they actually prefer to browse magazines and newspapers. When they read a book, it usually is the latest pulp fiction bestseller… I’m not criticizing pulp fiction writers though - everyone has the right to do as they like - but I’m trying to emphasize the fact that if only 15% of the population buys books, it means that 85% of the population don’t read books at all… pity! Of course, these people never go to seminars either (unless their companies pay for it), and they are not interested in buying courses to develop themselves in any way. They say they can’t afford it but astonishingly, they can afford their cigarettes, alcohol, etc. Times are tough but in most cases though, not investing in a book that will help you improve your life style is simply an excuse. Ironically, the people who need to commit to self education are the last people to do it.
You have to weigh the financial cost against the long-term personal cost of not obtaining the knowledge you require. Let’s learn from successful people: Translators cannot afford to be outdated when we want to do well in our fields and achieve all of our goals!

Paulina Torres De Witt
www.goihata.com

www.goihata.com
Knowing the pros about becoming a freelancer now it is the turn for you to consider the cons as well as everything in this world has intrinsic duality.
Uncertainty By far the biggest factor! It would be great to start operations with a client base which could guarantee regular work for you to get the income needed even though you must be prepared for eventual delays on payments. But if you still do not have enough clients as to take the big step and sweat at the thought of leaving the comfort zone of a monthly salary then it would be wise not to venture on your own yet. There is no sense in putting yourself in a situation where stress will make your life miserable, right?
Lack of employment benefits This factor is important to be considered too as there are certain benefits you will lose. For example, you won’t be getting paid while you are on holiday, and so your earnings should compensate. There are also other benefits that you will no longer be entitled to such as health insurance and retirement benefits (although you can learn to organize your finances so that you put aside a percentage to cover these items)
Marketing yourself To get new clients, people need to know about you, and if you are working for yourself then the only way for this to happen is if you promote yourself. You can go from cold-calling and e-mailing, to online and newspaper advertisements, to attending events where you can distribute your business cards. How you accomplish this will be down to you and the industry you work within, but you have to organize yourself to dedicate considerable time to promote your business but don’t let yourself be put off with this, be proactive and creative!

Paulina Torres De Witt
www.goihata.com

www.goihata.com
Maybe you are starting in this profession and feel comfortable working in an office as their Translator but believe me sooner than later you are going to feel the need to expand your horizon and consider becoming a freelancer. You have to properly consider several aspects though before deciding whether to take the plunge and go freelance yourself.
Most of the attractive pros of becoming a Freelance Translator are self-evident so let’s consider just a few of them:
Working from home I guess this is the top most feature! No more daily commute to an office, no more traffic jams, no more wasted time, no more stress! The time you save can be used to advance in your current translation task or enjoyed as spare time.
The ability to set your own hours The second top most feature, of course! The ability to choose when to start or stop work is quite appealing but consider this: sometimes you will be required to overlap your hours with those of your clients as you have to be flexible and this means that you will frequently find yourself working overtime, usually more than in the ‘normal’ working world.
The income is all yours Another obvious appeal to freelance work is that the profits that you make are yours to keep. What you earn, you keep it in full except for any required taxes.
More variety and choice in assignments Working on your own means that you can choose over the kind of projects on which your skills are focused – allowing you to develop in areas that you are interested in, and keeping away from tedious jobs you might be assigned to do in a regular job which you would obviously not be able to decline in favor of your personal likes or interests.

Paulina Torres De Witt
www.goihata.com

- www.goihata.com
I recently read a very interesting interview to Mrs. Brett J. Epstein who works as a writer, Translator, editor, and English teacher in Sweden. She shares insights on the essential elements of the Translator’s craft and business.
She describes, and I totally agree with it, the job of Translators as the art and craft of bringing the authors’ real expressions, as well as their ideas, inferences, disposition, voice, style, and so forth, from the source language to the target language, without being either excessively literal and strict with the text or overly free and loose. In her opinion, a Translator must consider what and how would the author have written the document if he were writing in the target language. So, for her, translation is the delicate and formidable job of perfectly recreating the authors’ original document and I consider this statement is accurate and truly honors our efforts in a very nice way.

Due to her activities she considers that translating creative work like literature is more challenging and more interesting and thinks that writers are the ideal people to be Translators as they have experience with writing, the writing process, analyzing literature, and editing. She suggests that one of the best ways to learn about translation is to carefully read and study a document in both its original language and its translation trying to understand what words and phrases really meant and why the Translator had made certain choices comparing it to what you would have done, had you been the Translator in charge.
During the interview she also mentioned some reading material that I would like to read myself like William Weaver’s essay “The Process of Translation”, Vladimir Nabokov’s essay “The Art of Translation”, and “Performing Without a Stage: The Art of Literary Translation” by Robert Wechsler.
Paulina Torres De Witt
- www.goihata.com

– www.goihata.com
On every profession it is important to be updated but in ours it becomes vital! We ought to read constantly and a whole variety of themes: let’s take advantage of the internet to read newspapers from different countries every single day and let’s keep a file with all the information that we gather here and there, that way we will have access to the right word, the precise name and any special date at all times. It is a must to be informed and on the alert.

There are several things we can do: A good idea is to keep personalized lists with terms, words and phrases that catch our attention and we consider might be useful sometime; read reviews and books related to our business to be aware of the latest changes and/or tendencies; open a folder in Favorites on your browser to save the links considered important for consultation as well as learning; adapt to changes by buying the latest equipment and software in order to be more efficient and productive; join discussion groups on the Web; share information with colleagues around the world.
When time is not an issue, although I know most of the time it really is, let’s offer our services without any charge… Remember the saying, the more we give, the more we get! You can easily find several institutions that are helping out the global community in a selfless manner and we can be part of that chain and contribute with our favorite cause, as doing so will keep us active and will provide an excellent opportunity to share our knowledge without expectations except for the satisfaction of helping others. There is always something interesting to share with the entire world, it is just a matter of reaching out and offering a hand.

Paulina Torres De Witt
– www.goihata.com

Language and culture are deeply related and the language stands as the maximum expression of that culture. The Japanese and Spanish cultures are worlds apart as their geographical location. Each language has its own idioms and borrows expressions from their religious background and people’s way of thinking. The language is the mirror image of the culture of that country and when translating from Spanish to Japanese language we also need to do cultural translation.
Some issues encountered by Japanese Spanish translators. Idioms with deep cultural roots
Well known biblical expression like “man can not live by bread alone” which means that human beings need something more than material things. The people need something more to enrich the mind and soul. This expression would have little meaning in a country without a Christian heritage.
Or Japanese expressions like “hito no fundoshi de sumo wo toru”, which means to practise Sumo using a borrowed fundoshi (a sumo wrestler’s belt). This could be translated as “it is not comfortable to depend on others to do something”.

The Spanish language has gender and singular and plural, from the sentence itself we discover that the action was done by a male or female and if the object is one or many. Spanish is a straight and direct language and this is not perceived as being rude or impolite.

In Japanese there is no gender neither singular/ plural articles that suggest the number,
In Japanese we could say “ringo wo tabemashita” which literally translated means “ate apple” which could be any of the following combinations: He/she ate apple/s. He or she ate one apple or many apples.
One more issue is the length of the text. Spanish text normally takes a lot more space than Japanese and when asked to make a Spanish replica of a Japanese manual or web site. The physical dimensions are a big constrain. How do we solve all this? With many headaches.

David Sawada Japanese Spanish translator

www.goihata.com