Preperation continued…

The sworn translator I hired just sent me the translation last night by e-mail (Thanks, Marie!). She says that she will send me the notarized copy by snail mail. I gave her my address, and I’ll pay her through Paypal today or tomorrow.

 ESIT has changed their deadlines (Yippea!). Now I have until February 20th to download the admissions application (already done) and until March 1st to send in my application along with all the necessary documents (will do that as soon as I receive the notarized translation). Things are coming together…the administrative aspects of this process haven’t been as much of a pain as I thought they would be (knock on wood) and the extended deadline was a big help.  Now I just have to book my flight and hotel. I think I’ll do that now during my pause dejeuner.

Tonight is going to be busy. I’ll start studying my Spanish, maybe translate some press articles for practice, most likely from BBC Mundo or from elmundo.es for Spanish, and lefigaro.fr for French.  I also have to practice my violin. I had my third lesson yesterday.  So far, we’ve learned “Mary Had a Little Lamb” and “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”. I played “Mary” for my family the other day. They applauded : )

 Maybe my music lessons will make my mind nimble for language learning and translation.  Our instructor said that learning to read music was like learning a new language.  So tonight I have 3 languages to study. French, Spanish, and music!

Preparation…sworn translator

I chose a sworn translator to translate my Bachelor’s diploma and notarize it. I sent her the document yesterday by e-mail, but she hasn’t e-mailed me back yet. I’ll take my laptop to work so that I can check my e-mail at a cafe during lunch.  Everything has to be sent in by February 15, so time is of the essence. I know, I know, I should have gotten started a little sooner, but I must confess that I am a bit of a procrastinator.  I’ll try to do better

Today is payday, so I think I’ll buy my plane ticket and book my hotel during lunch as well.

So much to do…

First day…here goes…

Hello. It’s my first post in my brand new blog, and I’m all tingly with excitement!  I started this blog because, lately my thoughts have been focused on one thing: becoming a professional translator. I say “lately”, but really it’s been my career choice for a few years now: ever since my days as a young foreign language major who knew full well that she wasn’t going to teach (a very popular career choice in the language field) and wondered what in the world she was going to do with a BA in French and Spanish, if not that. So, I decided that translation was the way to go, and since then, I’ve never looked back. Since graduation, I’ve been holding down a job as a bilingual administrative assistant (Spanish-English) at a local company, and I’ve since learned a lot of maritime and shipbuilding vocabulary in Spanish as well as in English. But now it’s time to move on, so I’ve decided to continue my studies and pursue a Master’s in translation.  My school of choice is the Ecole Superieure d’Interpretes et de Traducteurs (a.k.a. ESIT) at the Sorbonne University in Paris, France. This year the entrance exams will be held the first week in April, so for the next two months, preparation for these exams will be my main focus.

In this blog, I will share with you my journey into the translation industry, first as a “translator wannabe”, eventually as a “translation student”, and then finally (hopefully) as a a full-fledged, qualified “translator”.