I am so happy to be back with you. Your reaction to my yesterday's post was amazing. Big thanks to everybody who is praying for peace, too. I am truly blessed, having all your support!
As you know, Friday is that special day of the week when I recommend a great colleague. I am very happy to resume this tradition. And the person I am recommending today really deserves our attention. It's Magda Phili. I met Magda a while ago. She even wrote a guest post for my blog once. Her creativity and writing talent continue to amaze me. Have you checked out her blog called "which translates to"? It's a very young blog, but you will definitely love it. It is unique.
I asked Magda for an interview and she agreed! So I am happy to share a bit more about her with you:
1. Could you share some fun/weird facts about you that you don't normally share in your bio?
- I often translate in the company of my 4 year old daughter. She has actually helped me develop my time management skills and to come up with creative solutions because working from home can be pretty challenging.
- I constantly need to keep myself (and my hands) busy so when I am not translating or writing, I crochet.
- Music is important to me. Especially for writing. When I translate I sometimes listen to epic music because because it's fast, particularly motivating and without lyrics.
2. What was the best project in your career?
A pharmaceutical translation for which I received an email from a client saying that the end client was extremely pleased with my work and made no changes to the text. I was very happy because clients don't always give feedback.3. What was the worst project in your career?
There isn't exactly a "worse project". The only thing that I sometimes wish was possible is to have more flexible deadlines. I recently translated a manual which wasn't that easy and the deadline was pretty tight. I worked very long hours. At the end of the project, my hands were ''shaking'' for two days.4. What are the three things you love most about being a freelance translator?
- Freelance translation gives me the possibility to better explore my native language in a variety of contexts and to unravel some of its linguistic treasures which would have been impossible without a motive i.e. translation work.
- Since the age of 23, I have been commuting to work whether it was in London or Milan. It's a great relief that I now work from home. What's more, I am a bit of a lone wolf, I love staying indoors and I hate office gossip (and gossip in general).
- Working from home was what I was hoping to do since the day I found out I was going to be a mom. But besides this, I was tired of my meaningless banking job and, therefore, freelance translation was my way out. But this wasn't just a way out of office life because I became passionate about translation and working with words. If only I knew this is what I would be doing eventually, I would have made different decisions earlier in my life such as a degree in languages or translation.
5. Why do your clients love working with you? What's unique about your services?
I sometimes wonder... Just joking. I guess it's because of my flexibility, promptness and focus on every little detail. Clients feel more secure when they see that a translator asks them questions if something is ambiguous about the original text or if further information would be helpful for a more accurate translation.Dear Magda, thank you so much for your honest replies! I certainly wish you all the very, very best in your career!
Olga Arakelyan,
Your Professional Translator
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