Experiences with translations

I once had a difficult translation assignment from French to English, relating to translating a telecommunications regulation document for the EU. The timeline for completing the project was very tight, and I understood that it would be very difficult to complete the project if I thought conventionally. I did have two nights to do the work (which included about 16 K words in the source language). I had done a lot of translation work in the telecommunications domain before, but from German or Dutch to English. However, I was very familiar with the terminology in English.

I had an idea then. I reviewed all the target documents that I had in English (those related to all the translations I had done from German and Dutch into English), and had a good night’s sleep. When I woke up in the morning and started working with the French document, I was in for a very pleasant surprise. I already knew all the telecommunications-related terminology in English, although I had never seen the exact same terms in French before, and I proceeded to complete the translation of the document during the day itself. After a brief review the next morning, I sent across the reviewed translation, which was of very standard quality.

I’m just curious to know if anybody else has had the same type of experiences while translating documents, and, if so, specific details about the same.

Anyways, enjoy your first week-end in the new year, and the new decade :).

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