dxa9733's blog

The second project was a narrative story about a drug induced young girl. It was a complete change of pace from the first project because it told a story using opinions and emotions while the first project was filled with facts and statistics. In some sense the first project seemed a lot simpler. Facts are facts and cannot be skewed to show your opinion. therefore the translation of the first article was right or wrong. Yet here we have this story of a troubled girl full of emotion and puzzlement. Who knows how she meant a certain phrase or opinion? The thing that made this project a little easier was putting myself in her shoes and becoming the character. If i were her how would i have said the next line? this helped me in translating this much longer text to the best of my ability.

By the time the youth center closed at 10:00 I still hadn’t felt anything. I went to the subway with Pete. We met up with two of his friends, Frank and Pauli. They wore matching clothes. They were extremely at peace. I wanted that. Peit said to me “They’re on H.” I was on it too.  The effects hadn’t yet kicked in. I was too focused on myself to just let go. As soon as the train started moving I immediately freaked out. It was pure insanity. It felt as though I was in a tin can which was being stirred by a humongous spoon. The noise from the subway was driving me crazy. I thought I couldn’t stand the mixture of sounds anymore. The people in the subway had painful looks on their faces. The same look these Babbitt’s always had.  Taking a closer look you could clearly see how disgusting they were. I imagined that this fat Babbitt just left some shitty bar, or just got off from a shitty job. Then this pig face goes to sleep watching television and reflecting on his job. I thought to myself, I was glad I wasn’t like them, that I was with the in-crowd. I thought that the H had given me a new perspective and it made me clearly see how shitty these zombies are on the subway. Thoughts like that crossed my mind, even days afterwards. But then, I got afraid of all the faces. I looked at Piet. He was also uglier than usual. Compared to the pig faces his faced seemed quite small. But he still had some normality. I was happy when we got out at Rudow. I was really tripping now. All the lights seemed extremely bright.  I saw a street lamp above us that was even brighter than the sun. I was freezing in the subway. On the other hand I was burning up. I thought for a moment I was in Spain and not Berlin. It was like one of those beautiful posters hanging in the travel agency at Gropiusstadt. Next to the road the trees had turned to palms over the beach. Everything was so bright. I didn’t tell Piet I was high. For some reason I wanted to be alone on this cool bestial trip.
We went home with Piet. He was such a prolific artist. One of his paintings hung in his room. It was an immensely fat horse being ridden by a skeleton carrying a sickle. I stopped looking at the picture. It was death and I had seen it one too many times. The concept and picture didn’t frighten me anymore. My naïve thoughts overcame me as I thought about the picture. This weak skeleton could never overpower the powerful horse. The skeleton had already lost control over the horse. We spent a long time discussing the picture.
I went home. As usual my mother was still awake. The usual interrogation commenced, where I had been, on and so on. She seemed so absurd to me thick and fat in her white nightgown her face overcome with rage, just like the Babbitts in the subway.  I didn’t say a word to her. We barely spoke anymore. Only when it was absolutely necessary and even then about insignificant things. I wanted no affection or contact from her. Sometimes I imagined that I didn’t need a mother at all anymore, or any family for that matter. My mother, her boyfriend, and I lived in separate worlds these days. They had no clue of what I was doing. They probably thought I was a completely normal kid…what was I supposed to say to them? Either way, they wouldn’t have understood anyway. They would take away and ban everything. My mother should have had the most regrets. She lashed out at the entire household just because she was stressed out from work and worried about finances. In my opinion she had herself to blame for introducing everyone to such a meaningless existence. They will carry out a purposeless life.

I found that the translation assignment was challenging. The way some of the sentences were phrased made it harder to derive a meaning and give an English replica while still upholding the true meaning of the text. The title for me was the hardest and I still don’t quite understand it. The article itself did get easier the more I understood what it was about. Then instead of even translating I could see the words the author used and used to same words to form an English counterpart. After this semester I hope to sharpen my German skills and learn how to properly translate documents and news articles such as this one. Instead of guessing at what the author implied I wish to be able to clearly state his purpose. I also wish to see how the text applies to me, and if maybe some city in the United States there is an American writer whose publishing an article just like this one without knowing that half way across the world someone feels the same way.

North germans feel left out in the cold due to traffic jams!

Technical health insurance advises to relieve yourself with educational CDs and Audio books.

A survey published by the Forsa institute claims that the Northern Germans are keeping their cool when it comes to the influx of traffic. Announced on Wednesday the survey was commissioned by the social researchers.  Only 20% of the residents of Lower Saxony, Hamburg, Bremen, Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania who were surveyed claimed the traffic jams got on their nerves.

On the other hand, in Saxony, 32% of the public said they were stressed out by traffic jams. In Berlin and Brandenburg the number dropped to 26%. The survey shows the traffic jams have the least impact on Bavarians of whom only 18% claim annoyance.

The scientists from the study recommend dealing with inconvenient traffic jams with relaxation exercises, educational CDs or audio books.

Forsa interviewed more than 1000 people between the ages of 14-65 in January of this past year.