A day in a life as interpreter... Being a freelance translator and interpreter is a rather well-earned part time for me. Couple of hours work usually results in substaintail payment but these hours also mean a rather tense and brain consuming session. Today I was asked to interprete a commeration ceremony for the Japanese Chamber of Commerce. At first, it was agreed that English would be the main language of the event with me translating it to Thai and another interpreter to Japanese. Then on Friday we (us interpreters) were informed that Japanese and English would be used. Aha! here came the joy of interpretion. It was rather nervy as I had to listen to the Thai translation before changing to English...live!! Imagine yourself being in a interpreter's booth knowing very little what would be said in Japanses (in fact not a word!!!) and trying to turn these words into formal and yet flowery English ;) That's not all. During the reception dinner, there is also a speaker presenting details of donation project in Japanses and I had to turn it to English. In front of me was a Thai translation of the presentation with red marks to tell when the speaker would pause and I do my job. Hmmmm....I was just diving through the session, speaking in an announcer sort of voice while not knowing whether I did it right or not. Oh! how I loved this sort of excitement.

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