But what do you actually DO, Mummy?

When my children were younger and were asked at school about their parents' occupations, they would offer their teachers quite a colourful description of Mummy's job: along the lines of  "she sits at her computer all day and sometimes shouts a lot" or "she gets money for English".

Now they are that much older and grasping the concept of thinking in two languages themselves, it is easier for them to understand that I am a translator, and I like to talk to them about what I do every day. But I am still sometimes surprised, if not alarmed, at how little is known out there in the big wide world about what being a translator actually entails. Here are just a few of the remarks I've had made to me over the years, often by people who should know better :)

What do you need dictionaries for if you're a translator?
Believe it or not, having an excellent command of one's native tongue , and one or more other language(s), does not automatically mean we can throw away the dictionary. I have considered myself a "fluent" speaker of Spanish for many years now, but not a day goes by without my learning a new word or a new turn of phrase. The same is true of one's own native language... languages are alive, ever-changing and evolving creatures. Throw into the mix the technical element - I recently translated a 40 page catalogue for a company selling industrial bolts and screws - and the dictionary, in all its different shapes, sizes, types and formats - remains a fundamental tool for the translation process and the translator's best friend.

In a few years time, your job will be done by machines.  
Not if you want half decent translations, it won't.
If you've never tried it, I would urge you to visit any of the many online sites offering instant translation from and into seven thousand different languages. Enter any sentence you like - the "quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" is one of my favourites - and translate it into the language of your choice and back into English a couple of times. The results are amusing but they also demonstrate my point, and that of so many of us in the language industry who find us fighting our professional corner over and over again in this regard - machines can do an awful lot, but they will never be able to match the human brain when it comes to understanding context, tone, intonation, phrasal verbs, proverbs, exclamations... to name just a handful of the different elements which form part of a translator's world.

 My cousin spent two weeks in Seville last summer, so she knows Spanish. She could be a translator too!
While I will always maintain that living in a country is the best - the only, even - way to learn a language properly, unfortunately there is a great deal more to becoming a professional translator than that. One of the things I love about my job is that I never stop learning how to do it. Each new job will present a linguistic assault course of some kind and it's up to me to rise to the challenge. But it is important to remember that translation requires so much more than fluency in a second language. It demands an excellent command of your native tongue, many years' total immersion in thte language and culture of your other working languages, extensive reading and study of grammar, and an extraordinary capacity for mental gymnastics, often under pressure. I would encourage anyone with a love and a flair for languages to consider going into translation, but my advice would always be not to run before you can walk. Start off with two weeks in Seville, but don't be fooled into thinking that's enough.

You're so lucky, all you have to do is write things in English!
I could spend hours talking about the translation process in itself, but I'll save that for another time. Yes, I consider myself lucky to be able to do a job I love, and be my own boss...and yes, translating takes up the bulk of my time - but there are many other things to do as well: accounting, taxes, expenses all need to be taken care of; you need to keep up to speed with fast-developing technology and software to boost productivity and stay competitive; clients have to be found and negotiations made, not to mention researching specialist subjects, compiling glossaries and refreshing your skills in all your working languages, including your mother tongue.

Obviously, my children can't quite grasp all the ins and outs of my work yet, but at least they no longer ask, "What do you actually DO?"