TwinOaks Report post Posted August 23, 2008 After a little comment on another thread, I've especially taken notice that this is really a global community. As such, not all of our members are fluent in English- either UK or American versions. I have just a whisp of experience in Spanish and some intoductory French under my belt. I realize online translators are great, and are a really quick way to get a message posted. However, they do make mistakes, or don't accurately translate as we intend- after all, it's a machine doing the translation. Obviously, not every language can be represented, nor can all computers handle the graphics for all foreign languages. Arabic, Kanji, and Ciryllic based languages require additional settings for the computer, and I don't know how the website would process them. For those languages that can be emulated with the standard QWERTY/ English keyboard, I ask all those who are multilingual to assist our members who don't speak English primarly. Though pretty rusty, I'll volunteer to help with any Spanish. I AM NOT FLUENT in Spanish, but remember a fair amount from my school days...and I'll do what I can. I am pretty good at translating Yankee, Southernese, Backwoods, and I'm working on Cajun. Tom Swede, please agree to help with the Nordic languages- I can't say some of the words without pausing for a breath in the middle of it. I hope we can get a pretty good volunteer group together, with multiple people willing to help translate to other languages if the need arises. Thanks for your time, Mike Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TomSwede Report post Posted August 23, 2008 (edited) Självklart grabben! Off course dude! Tjipp tjipp, nu är'e Goliat! Unnecessery sentence but Tina will probably laugh, it's from Hajk;-) I'd like to add that much of the leatherwork we do here doesn't have Swedish terms and I don't communicate much with anyone in the know hows of leather here in Sweden so I usually think in English when working, all my sketches and plans ,drawings, patterns etc has English notes so the leatherworker glossary In Scandinaivan tongue is not so familiar to me but I'll help out any way I can. PM me or whatever... Mike! Try this one and say it fast, repeat it faster and faster: Sex laxar i en laxask.......I'd die to hear you try that one...... (oh, sex is Swedish for six) Tom Edited August 23, 2008 by TomSwede Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TwinOaks Report post Posted August 24, 2008 Mike! Try this one and say it fast, repeat it faster and faster: Sex laxar i en laxask.......I'd die to hear you try that one...... (oh, sex is Swedish for six) Tom TOM!!! I live in The South. We have LAWS against that kind of language!!!! Speak like that around here and you'll face the Church Ladies!! ( and boy, can they swing a Bible hard!) Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ArtS Report post Posted August 24, 2008 I bought a German translation program years ago to translate a letter to my Aunt overseas. We I tried it then sent it to my mother to see how it read. It was a mess and I just put it away. It made no sense. It made the same mistakes that I make by translating directly and not changing the sentence structure. ArtS Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TwinOaks Report post Posted August 24, 2008 Art, that's exactly why I started this thread. I used an online translator for Eng. to Spanish, and it just didn't look right. I remembered enough Spanish to be able to read most of what the translator wrote. An easy way to check it is take the 'translated' version and plug it back into a translator back into English. So, while I used the online translator, I went back and tweaked it to say what I meant to say. If I hadn't known any Spanish, the translation would have been horribly wrong, and probably VERY confusing. Having members that are multi-lingual helps solve part of the problem, because we can input the correct syntax along with the correct words. An example: The Spanish word for 'eggs' (as in scrambled eggs) is huevos. I DARE you to go to Miami, Phoenix, L.A., etc. and ask for 'huevos'. You'll either get laughed at, or propositioned. It would seem that the coloquial version of 'eggs' is blanquitos please excuse the spelling of that if it's wrong. It translates literally as 'little whites', so you see where knowing the 'slang' would be useful. Mike Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
wildrose Report post Posted August 24, 2008 I have a degree in Spanish, and while not as fluent as I used to be, I do have several good dictionaries/texts for when I'm stumped. I'd volunteer to help. My French is too rusty to be of help. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TomSwede Report post Posted August 24, 2008 TOM!!! I live in The South. We have LAWS against that kind of language!!!! Speak like that around here and you'll face the Church Ladies!! ( and boy, can they swing a Bible hard!) Are they around here *taking cover, ducking, suatting down, looking anxiously around* You can practice over at my place any day if you want, that word is definitly not gonna raise any eyebrows here but off course we also have rules about offensive speaking, unwritten though. I have another practice but it's hard to explain instead and more suited for a Scandinavian person. I keep in mind and if i come with any other good one I post it for you. Tom Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jordan Report post Posted August 24, 2008 I'm pretty good at deciphering physician's prescriptions, does that count? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
