Robert Bigler: Translation and Interpretation

Actual Fluency Podcast, episode 25, featuring interpreter and translator, Robert Bigler. Are you thinking about starting your own language learning website? Then check out HostGator. Use the coupon code actual fluency to get your first month for just one cent. Get started by going to actualfluency.com/hostgator. Do you like audiobooks? Well then Audible is for you. If you go to actualfluency.com/book, you choose a free audiobook from a selection of 150,000 titles. Welcome to the Actual Fluency Podcast, the podcast that gives you the tools and inspiration to learn languages faster and more efficiently. And now your host, Kris Broholm.

Yeah, as I said before, since I'm Austrian, my native language is uh Austrian German. No, it's German, just kidding. So we have our own variant, of course, but it is German. And uh I started out with English as my first foreign language in school and then I uh well, I had to choose between French and Italian. Officially I was given the choice, but then it was our school that decided that my class had to take Italian and the other classes uh had to take French. Uh but I was very happy with that decision anyway because I really loved Italian right from the beginning. I had an amazing Italian teacher, which is not always a given either if you talk about language teachers. Though, I think sometimes people, you know, like blame the teachers too often because uh you have to do the work, right? So if if at all, bad teachers have always motivated me to do much more work at home and that.

Exactly. Yeah, because at the end of the day, that's what, you know, like made me progress, or make more progress.

So, uh, well, after I I attended some sort of a commercial high school. And I didn't want to study economics, so I decided to go to university and try and study English and Italian. That's what I did and uh well, I had to change the faculty because the first faculty I was at was only training teachers. And we learned about that later on because at that time, you know, no internet, whatever, those were the dark ages, so to speak. So it was not that easy to get all that information beforehand.

Wow.

Uh I did not graduate in all these four languages. I graduated in the first two, but you don't have to because uh the profession of interpreters and translators is not a regulated one, which means that you don't need an official diploma to be allowed or to be able to work as an interpreter.

So you went to the school which basically built for?

Exactly, exactly.

Specifically for all.

Yeah.

And did you, you must have known that when you joined that one, though?

Yes, yes, yes, yes. That was a very conscious decision then.

Okay. Great. So you you kind of actually by then knew that that was what you were interested in.

Well, the thing is I I never expected to actually work as an interpreter. I always thought that I would be working in an international company. I never thought that this was the kind of work that I would enjoy doing.

And that's awful.

Yeah, it's awful. And and that's not what I wanted. And at that other institute for interpreters and translators, you would always, almost exclusively speak in your target language. You would have a lot of native speakers and that's what I was interested in.

Yeah. And of course you you you're getting kind of the why. You're getting it very quickly. Well, why am I studying this? Well, because I want to translate or interpret.

Exactly. Well, basically it was about people, as we said before. What really drives me in my passion for languages are people. It's, of course, I'm interested in the culture, but culture is like very closely connected with people, right? And uh I I like traveling because I like to see different places, different landscapes, whatever, but again, at the end of the day, it's the people that motivate me to start studying a language and that help me keep studying, right?

Right. So you you you went through all these these languages in the beginning, um and you how did you what was your first job? Was that in translation or?

Yes. Well, uh I finished my studies and I actually my first job was my final examination. So I got paid for that, as a matter of fact, because one of my teachers, she had organized a conference and she needed some interpreters for that. And she said, Robert, why aren't you joining our team? Uh, I you this will be your final exam and at the same time, you get paid for it if you do a fine job.

How much motivation do you need?

Uh that was great. That was really great. And I'm still working with that professor. Uh she now is a colleague and and a deep friend, as a matter of fact. And she was very supportive right from the beginning.

And that was and you you obviously enjoy that since you've been doing it so long.

Very much, very much. This was like uh one of the best decisions that I've ever made in my life and I I don't regret it.

Right. And you've obviously traveled uh across the world and.

I have traveled a lot. I I used to travel much more than I'm traveling now because I used to do much, I I'm both. I'm an interpreter and a translator. So that's another specific thing because most people either work only as a translator or as an interpreter. I do both and I've been enjoying both, but I no longer do as many conference days as I used to and the used to in the past, sorry.

And and when you say interpreter and translator, you know, most people know the difference, of course, but in terms of skills for both, are they different or I mean, of course they they they lean on each other quite well, but what would be the difference between a good translator and a good interpreter?

Well, first of all, if uh if you want to go into the business of interpreting, I think you shouldn't be a very shy person. Uh you should uh be able to work under a lot of stress. I mean, translating can be very stressful as well, but it's a different kind of stress because even if you have a tight schedule and a tight deadline, you still have more time to prepare for the job or you have the opportunity to take out part of that pressure by just, you know, organizing your day.

I think I met him. I don't remember his name though, but I think it sounds like somebody I've met as well. Yeah.

Yeah, I think he's from the Ukraine, but I'm not sure.

Okay.

You know, he lives in Germany, I think, but but I'm not totally sure. And uh but he said that it was just not his type of job. I mean, he couldn't imagine doing that for an extended period of time.

Right.

I I do think that if I mean, let's face it, even though you have to be precise and clear on what you say when you do uh work as an interpreter, as a simultaneous interpreter, you will not be as precise, as clear, as specific as someone who does a written translation. So I think that you have to be very, very good uh with languages in both cases, but maybe even more precise when you work as a translator.

Right. And you need to maybe you need some more creativity. Sorry. Maybe you need some more creativity as an interpreter because you need to think quickly on your feet.

Yes. Yeah. You have to uh more creative in the sense of uh being able to get yourself out of a difficult situation very quickly. And you have to to to be in command of your voice. You have to make sure that even though you are about to get into trouble because you know, you yourself, you know that in about 10 seconds, you will either come up with a term that fits the context, or you will go down, whatever. So you you feel that pressure. You feel that anxiety, but you got to make sure that the people listening to you don't.

Of course. So have you had any of these kind of.

Oh, yeah, sure.

Do you have any any particularly bad ones you can share?

Uh, well, there were a few bad ones, I think. I mean, things have changed uh in a way because nowadays, we almost all have internet connection in our booth. We have our notebooks, our laptops. So I have I I don't know, 20, 25 different electronic dictionaries on that notebook. Of course, it's not that you can look up every single word because then you won't be able to listen to the speaker and interpret at the same time. But it's still some sort of a safety net that takes out some of the really nasty kind of pressure that you can have.

Wow.

And that's really difficult.

That sounds like an uphill battle.

So we had like, especially with names, uh yeah, I mean, there there are many, many many cases where I thought, gosh, yeah, that was close or that was even terrible. So I waited at least 10 minutes before I left my booth. So nobody would see me.

But do you you don't always get the text, do you?

No. Uh that is the theory. I mean, you should be given the text like next week, right? I'm going to a EU conference. Just before we talked about an hour ago, I checked my email again because they promised they would send us the documents. And nothing. They said, okay, unfortunately, we don't have anything, but you can look at our website and we have a list of the speakers.

You're used to it.

Exactly. And the topic next week isn't going to be that specific. If it's a very technical conference, I either deny or I refuse uh that job assignment or job offer if I don't get uh any papers beforehand, or I'll just try to make sure that there are at least a couple of really, really good technicians in our team so that I can ask them in need if if I'm in need of help.

Yeah, it's a whole I mean, I'm that's why I I find it very interesting to talk to because I there's not that many interpreters, at least not in the Polyglot community, oddly enough for some reason, but I didn't know maybe they're not maybe they're not vocal of that. But anyway, um it's it's something that a lot of people who might be watching this might be thinking about going into as a career, um translating and interpreting or one of the the two.

Uh no, what I do, but everybody does it differently, okay? Um well, at first, when I started out, of course, I needed much more time to prepare. Uh I needed to make sure that I know all the technical terms. But, you know, as time goes by, you realize that maybe there are about 50 or 100 specific terms and the rest is just normal lingo. It's just like everyday language. And you have to be very, very, you know, confident when it comes to these everyday expressions, you know, if that is something that causes you problems, then you have to do something about it.

That seem unusual or something.

Yeah, exactly. For that, I I look up in a dictionary or on the internet. And if I still have time, then I go through the text to to understand the flow. You know, to the red thread that he or she is using. Other than that, I just try to relax and take it from there.

And of course, and of course, there's a difference also between doing that kind of conference interpreting and let's say you were in Russia and you were on a TV show and they had an American guest. That's one example I've seen.

Yeah.

And uh he was uh Mila Kunis, I think, they had on, and uh there was just this voice. It's really obnoxious, but.

Yeah, and we do that sometimes as well. I don't like it at all. But sometimes that's the only way.

That must be incredibly difficult because it's on the fly, the person who's speaking doesn't even know what he or she's going to say. So how is a translator going to immediately pick it up?

Yeah, but that happens a lot with press conferences. Uh the same. Yeah. And most of press, most of the press conferences are done in consecutive style, however, which means that the person speaks first three, four sentences and then you translate that or interpret that. And I prefer definitely simultaneous interpreting.

Yeah. And and what what really got me was that uh they asked like Mila Kunis about interpreting. And she said that the simultaneous interpretation of these press conferences and like a live setting is not a translation, it's more of an interpretation. Like obviously that's where the name comes from. What do you think are the biggest like pitfalls you can do as an interpreter when you are making your own interpretation?

I mean, the thing is when when you use the term interpretation, it's not uh something that uh refers to the content. That is very important. So the content always has to stay the same. What you do is, and and that's my only explanation for why that works, simultaneous interpreting, because if you really try to translate that like consciously, you just wouldn't have enough time to do that.

Right.

And.

Which is the difficulty. That's exactly.

Exactly. That's that's it. And but that's the only way it works because it it's just like now I'm I'm speaking in English, but of course, I'm not thinking of German words beforehand. I could never do that. So it's like sort of my my if you want my English speaking identity that is working right now. And it's the same as an interpreter. And the thing is that sometimes when I'm especially when I'm really tired, and if you ask me what I said, you know, like afterwards, after the conference is finished, I couldn't tell you a thing. And it's just like, it's going through me, right? It's it's some sort of I'm some sort of a medium, I guess.

Fantastic. Well, I I'd really love to uh to hear your thoughts about general language learning as well, but I got to ask you if you're interested in Toki Pona.

Uh I have to say I heard about it for the first time like two days ago. I definitely want to see that presentation.

Okay, okay. Because it's right now. Okay. I'll watch it. I'll watch it on YouTube. It's that 120 words language or whatever. Made of 102 words. Oh, you should. I mean, we could talk about it much.

No, it's that's okay, that's okay.

Okay. Don't worry. That's a good thing that we're recording it because I was like with the ones being at the same time is hard.

Well, the thing is that when I first started out adding languages to the ones that I learned like in a school system. As I said, that was like many, many years ago, uh before internet and even before the times of satellite TV. And what I did is that I just bought an ordinary common language course, one that I liked.

Okay. So practically oriented.

Exactly. And uh I try to speak more or less from the first day speaking in a sense of maybe just repeating sentences that I hear, always try to use audio material. Nowadays, that's quite easy. And then, exactly.

Right. Oh yeah.

So it's like, you know, like trying to practice simple strokes, you know, like for somebody who tries to learn how to swim like for ages before actually trying to swim for over a certain distance.

So you you try to go to the native material as fast as possible. What what would you then look up say children's stories or something?

No. Uh I I'm also surprised when people suggest that one should start out with children's stories. I think they are most some of the most difficult stories.

Oh really?

Yes. Uh the a lot of concepts that are presented there are quite difficult sometimes. And I'm not talking about stories for like children that are three, four years old. I'm talking for children that are between, I don't know, eight and 12 or 14. So there are a lot of words that you don't always use in your daily life. And uh the grammar structure, or the grammatical structures that they present there, they're quite complex as well. And it's not always the kind of story that I can relate to as an adult, right?

Right. And I have to agree.

And I hate courses.

But how do you, so you cut, right, that's my that was my next question because you know, when you've gotten the basics down, you can understand, you have a working vocabulary, let's say a few hundred words or something. Picking up the, you know, Putin's my life or whatever.

Yeah, that's what I did, as a matter of fact, in English, yeah.

Yeah. You read one.

Yeah. Well, well, he that it was somebody else wrote about Putin. And uh Putin's Russia. Uh that was a title.

But but how do you how do you do that because to me, that's quite a step going from that basic knowledge of a language all the way up to native language material.

Here, but the thing is, yeah, but the thing is that the basic grammatical structures are all covered in the course that I've done before. And then I have, let's say, I normally have between 800 and 1,000 words after the first step. And then what I do simultaneously with, you know, like trying to read authentic material is that I use frequency lists. I know a lot of people don't like them. I love them.

That's great. I think it's pretty genius, actually.

Yeah, it's like, you know, those are experts who have chosen like between 4 and 6,000 words that are the most common words. And they put them in context. You always have an example sentence. And I I learn maybe, I don't know, 50, 100 words a day. Learning in a sense of of reading through these sentences. I I don't freak out if I don't remember that word. But I come across it again in in a in a similar context. And then I will understand what it means, what it stands for. I'm not looking up every single word here.

Just as long as you get the context. Exactly.

And and I keep however, I keep learning the words with that frequency list.

Of course. And then when you you find yourself understanding it, you just move to the next page and it's like.

Exactly, exactly. And and I enjoy reading books in different languages. So maybe at the beginning it might be a good idea to read the book in your native language first and then read the same book in the target language.

Yeah, I've heard that. People talk about Harry Potter all the time.

Yeah, yeah.

Or Gary Potter.

Yeah, for example, I I bought uh Obama's biography. Yeah. In in English, German, and uh Japanese. I couldn't find it in Chinese. I haven't found it in Russian either, but in French and, you know, Italian, whatever. And it's great. First of all, I'm interested in the story. Secondly, there are many, many very useful constructions and a lot of really useful, for me, useful vocabulary, right?

That's amazing. And you obviously added a lot of languages. And I like I like the term added, by the way. I don't remember who coined it, but I think it's a really great.

Okay. Yeah. Maybe Brian.

Yeah. I it might have been that actually. Yeah. But it it's just a great distinction because when you say learn a language, that's so arbitrary, really. So when you say added one, that makes it much clearer.

Maybe that was Japanese. Uh first of all, it was a language that I, the first language that I started out of the Asian languages that I've studied so far.

Why did you why did you start that?

Well, that was a totally random decision. Honestly, it's so weird. That's a that's a decision. But I I don't know. Maybe it was just fate or destiny. I remember uh that day or that night very well because I was totally swamped with work. And I had been working until 3:00 in the morning. I was totally pissed off to be honest. Because I wanted to go to bed and then I said, okay, I'm going to finish that translation. Then I'm going to do something nice and I'm just going to surf on the internet.

Wow. From that movement, that's the movement.

Yeah. And then I looked into the books and I went like, what's that? Okay, I knew they had some weird writing system, but three different forms, you know, and then the grammar and everything. I wanted to give the books back and then I said, no, okay. I actually put them beneath my my bed and I said, okay, if I don't look at them, maybe I'm not interested in them anymore.

You've persevered.

Yeah, yeah, very much.

But what there's one thing is is how do you I mean, you say you were so close to giving up. What was the thing that kept you going if it wasn't a divine intervention?

Uh it was my friends, as a matter of fact. It was my friends, my Japanese friends that I simply wanted to be able to talk to. And it was uh it was the country. By the time I had been there, you know, like I was totally in love with many things that are Japanese. I wouldn't want to live there as a Japanese person, but uh you are in a somewhat different position as a foreigner in a more privileged position, I guess.

Right.

You have to Yeah, you have invested so much time in it and then, you know, like maybe there are a couple of days where you go like, okay, let's just forget about it. Life is too precious. I'm not going to waste any more time on trying to learn that language. But then, you know, like if it's something you really like, you're drawn to it, and it will get you back, no matter what you do. So.

Yeah. And also, I guess being a European, knowing an ancient an Asian language puts you in maybe a 0.1% of the population or something.

Yeah, especially with Japanese. Not so much with Mandarin, I guess.

Oh yeah. I guess I guess that Mandarin is quite popular. Of course, there's 1 million native speakers plus all the learners around the world, but speaking uh I mean, in Denmark, for instance, there's not that many uh Chinese or Japanese.

But even at conferences, it's uh much more common to find uh Chinese speakers and Chinese interpreters than Japanese ones.

Right. So you you you have even more special in a way.

Yeah. Yeah, in that in that respect, I guess, yeah. And as I said, I really like uh the country. I have some really good Japanese friends and uh it is a beautiful language. It's just driving me crazy sometimes.

Right. I I find it incredibly interesting and I I almost feel like as a pretty I thought you're studying it too.

No, no, no, I'm not. I'm not at all, actually. I haven't started yet at least.

But um I feel like as a as a kind of a new member to the Polyglot community in the language learning or language adding community, I guess you should call it. Um I almost feel like there's a bit of a pressure almost to learn an Asian language because that seems to be like the flavor of the I do remember that when I saw the first few videos, some people were criticizing some of the uh well, some of the polyglots that they were I guess they even criticized them for being racist or whatever, which is stupid.

Yeah, exactly. I think that's totally true. So maybe, you know, I haven't even looked into the culture or anything, but maybe I'll find that Cantonese is better for me or Mandarin.

It's it's wonderful. It's it's, you know, like and it's always the people that draw you into that language. When I first heard Mandarin without having had any intention of actually studying it, I thought, okay, yeah, it doesn't sound that bad, but it's not really a language that I think I could ever, you know, feel uh attracted to or whatever. And now it's one of my favorite languages. And it's I.

I have the same experience in the in Russian, too, like I just then, I mean, I I chose to learn it pretty, I've heard it a bit, but it always sounded kind of rough and a little edgy. That sounds a strange coming from a Dane, but there's difference, there's difference.

Okay, now be careful what you're saying. I I'll do it. But a lot of people say that German is also this kind of brutal commander language. Yeah. And I disagree because I think the whole combinations with um with the uh putting the verbs at the end creates a very nice flow, and the complex tenses, um something like the um hypotheticals.

I mean, of course, I'm biased, but I do think I think German is a very nice language. I think it has been getting a lot of bad reputation for totally different reasons. Sure. Yeah, political reasons and then, you know, when when I watched those Hollywood movies where they portray even, you know, Nazis who undoubtedly were criminals and, you know, we don't really have to go into the details.

Germans always the bad guys.

Yeah, but the thing is the way they make them speak. Not even Nazis spoke like that. I mean, it's I don't know where they got that from. So that is really weird.

Yeah. And I I've trouble understanding say Swiss German and Bavarian German.

Bavarian German to me is not a problem. Swiss German, yes.

I I did the whole change the G I don't know how to how to reproduce it, but I had a Swiss roommate and he tried to speak to me and yeah, I understood, but somebody was also completely lost on me.

We have similar, like similar dialect in Austria in Vorarlberg where they actually speak more like the Swiss and every time I go there, I mean, it's a beautiful part of our country. People are very nice, but I feel like a foreigner because to English. Yeah, it's like honestly, I feel like a foreigner because I can hear that I sound totally different from them.

Right. Well, that's interesting. And I I guess uh it's an interesting development anyway, because you have kind of a similar relationship between Swedish, Norwegian, and and uh um Danish, but they're defined as distinct languages. Whereas, you know, something like Swiss German could probably be its own.

Well, I mean, I'm not linguist, but I think so. Yeah.

It probably should. I mean, my my friend even told me that they had their own dictionary.

I I yeah, I think they had.

Yeah. I mean that's it's it's funny to see how that happens. Maybe it'll change. Maybe Austrian would be a language. I don't know, but.

Who knows. I don't think so. Well, actually it is, well, our standard version is just German. It's just German with a few regional differences. And and the dialects actually, except for the one spoken in in Vorarlberg, are German dialects, you know.

Right. And you know, right wingers, left wingers, whatever. It's just my native.

See.

So you see you see the language as German kind of without considering the the political aspects. Maybe like English in the colonies or something like that. So it's a tool of communication, not a like political.

And like here in Berlin, I mean, uh of course, people notice immediately that I'm Austrian, you know, the moment I open the mouth. Sure. Sometimes they think I'm from Bavaria.

Okay. So like naturally or something.

Yeah, and and that was really nice. Yeah. I find it really cool. But it's funny that you kind of get picked up as I mean.

Yes. People don't know where I'm from. If I speak Danish, they'll think. They'll they'll say, are you Irish or something?

Okay. No, with uh normally, the funny thing is that sometimes at home in Austria, people think that I'm from Germany. But that's not because I speak with a German accent, but I tend to speak standard German, even, you know.

That's your influence from all the languages, surely. Exactly.

Exactly. And and my work. Exactly. And and then people go like, even in my hometown, you know, that was a few years ago when I was buying a dress for one of my nieces. And and then the shop assistant would ask me whether I liked the town. And I said, yeah, very much so. I live here.

Yeah, I guess so. And one thing that we haven't touched on is when you have all these languages, and some of them you learned a long time ago. What what steps do you do to ensure that the that they they stay relevant?

Yeah. I I do a lot of reading. I love reading in all my languages, in German as well. And I listen to a lot of podcasts. That's what I still can do even if I'm really tired after a conference or if I have done a very difficult translation.

Like a political.

Exactly. That's that's what I do. Sometimes I I go into YouTube and I convert the video into an MP3 file and then I upload it onto my MP3 player and that's what I do.

Okay. That's simple and uh and it works. I think it's it's a good thing to do because you shouldn't fuss about it either.

No.

You will forget things. Definitely. That's that's the rule and uh.

I just don't freak out about it. Exactly.

That's uh that's I think that's uh what I had in in mind anyway. I want to just uh thank you for taking the time. It's been a real pleasure.

Thank you.