Last day of class!

10.6.09

Today was our last day of class. All the coursework for the entire four weeks was due today, and it was rather apparent that most of us did not get adequate sleep the night before. In addition to turning in all of our papers, we each had to orally present our journals on translation. It was probably one of the most interesting classes we had, because the speaker and topic rotated every 20 minutes, rather than the same thing for 3 whole hours. We then all received our certificates for completing the program, signed by all of our professors.

After class, we were able to play in the translation booths, which was an absolute treat! I got in a booth and started fiddling around with the switches and stumbled across the channel of the booth next to me. The girl in there was taking an exam and was interpreting from Italian to German. I then played a German clip and attempted to interpret into English. It was so fast! I could understand just fine when I was only listening to it. But to listen to what is being said, translate that, while simultaneously listening to and absorbing what is currently being said while you're translating the previous sentence and formulating the next sentence is practically impossible. I felt like my brain was going to explode and I only did it for like 2 minutes. Every time I got a sentence out, I missed four others that went by while I was translating the first. I hope my audience doesn't mind getting only a portion of the story. Because interpreting is so taxing on the mind, interpreters are not allowed to work for more than 30 minutes at a time - due to mind fatigue. I only lasted 2 minutes in the booth and operated at maybe a maximum of 25%. Looks like I've got a lot of work ahead of me.

After the booths, we took a few hours to just relax. We had an intense morning of presentations and needed some quiet time. In the evening, we had our final group dinner at an Italian restaurant with the whole class and Professor Camilla Nielsen, Professor Bruce Murray, and Professor Lowe.  All in all it was a great day... except for the food poisoning from the Italian restaurant that caught up with me a few hours later. yuck.