Terry and Riggs - Kyu

It was interesting to learn that there are many sayings in Japanese that when translated to English, should be omitted because they have a different connotation, or it makes the writing bad. It was funny how the text talked about the translation of itadakimasu as being silence. This is a classic translation problem I believe everyone has encountered, and it was interesting to see another perspective. Yet, it also mentions on the other hand how silence can mean saa or tondemonai as well, and I found how different cultures have different ways of communicating, even through silence. It was also funny how the text mentioned that the answer when an American asks you how to say something in English is to not say what the American wants to say in Japanese ninety percent of the time. This was something the professor also touched on previously with her past experience, and I thought it was so true.

Reading this immediately made me realize I had made the wrong choice in translating the AERA article because I had tried to stay faithful in translating the title. Looking at the examples given, I understand how important it is to translate it to a more intriguing title because while it may make sense in Japanese, often times when directly translated to English, it just sounds boring. Another key pointer that I resonated with was the difficulty in translating metaphors, literary allusions and etc. I have been trying to better understand how to do this, but I think it is important to understand how to stay faithful to the rules of English writing than to preserve the original text, especially with these literary techniques, which can completely ruin the sentence if translated unsuccessfully.