"What Do You Do With Languages?"

Someone asked me this recently.

Currently I am not doing anything active with languages except English. That's to say that I am not using them for work, but there are some interesting jobs with languages.

Work in export/import.
Teach
Translate in specialized fields (Engineering/Law)
Work in ESL
Work in a school setting with immigrant children
Medical interpreting.
Interpreting for events (Health fairs, conference)
real estate
acting (not kidding)
read books in other languages to evaluate them for publishers

What do you do with your languages?

Some more exciting options for the adventurous:

Espionage
Liaison between organized crime groups, between producers/consumers of illicit material
Mercenary in wars
Copyright infringer, obtaining counterfeit items
Computer hacker
Hitman
Sex tourism
Coup organizer
Underground sportsman (barefisted fighting, dog fighting etc)
Genetic/chemical experimenter, to local regulations
Al Qaeda

I knew someone would mention espionage. I didn't write that one, nor the others.

I f you live in Europe, as soon as you do not stay in your own small country foreign languages are VERY usefull. In north America, which is almost a English-speaking continent other languages are not really usefull.

Translate (English, German, Japanese, Portuguese)
Teach (Portuguese, Japanese, English)
Read (Spanish, French, Dutch, Chinese)

I have also worked with import/export for a while using English and Portuguese in Japan.

Cheers

Mess with K. T. (English)
Drink beer at Oktoberfest (German)
Con fat cat Russian tourists (Russian)

Do you translate both in both directions, J.C.-san?

Mess with K. T. (English)
Drink beer at Oktoberfest (German)
Con fat cat Russian tourists (Russian)

Who are you? Zamir, Tony's friend?

"Some more exciting options for the adventurous:

Espionage
Liaison between organized crime groups, between producers/consumers of illicit material
Mercenary in wars
Copyright infringer, obtaining counterfeit items
Computer hacker
Hitman
Sex tourism
Coup organizer
Underground sportsman (barefisted fighting, dog fighting etc)
Genetic/chemical experimenter, to local regulations
Al Qaeda"

K.T. You forgot that using a foreign language to bribe foreign politicians is also an important factor.

Do you translate both in both directions, J.C.-san?

K.T.さん：
Usually I translate from En/Ge/Jp into Portuguese but have also
translated from Portuguese into German when I worked in Brazil
and occasionally translate from Japanese into English. Sometimes companies
ask me to translate from German into Japanese...
But basically I translate from any language I've studied into another.

Cheers!!!

p.s Do you translate and from/into which languages?

By the way, is it true that Portuguese is either the 2nd or 3rd most spoken language in Japan?

There are at least two Japanese words coming from Portuguese: arigato, from the Portuguese obrigado (thank you) and pa, from pão (bread).

But basically I translate from any language I've studied into another."

That's impressive. Many people only translate in one direction.

I don't know if you would be interested, but a man named Michael Erard
is doing a book on polyglots who speak more than six (I believe that's his magic number) languages. The book is called "Babel No More" and he's looking for polyglots to complete a survey.

"Do you translate and from/into which languages?"

I have checked translations more often than translated the original documents. I've done this from Japanese>English, and on a limited basis in other languages.

Usually people just ask me to interpret because my fee is so low (almost nothing...)

Joao,

Here are some more words from Portuguese.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_words_of_Portuguese_origin

I don't know what language is most spoken after English in Japan, but Chinese, Korean, and Portuguese would be some of the ones that are probably spoken most frequently. I met some BP speakers in Japan, most were of Japanese ancestry, but not all of them.

I lived in the Tokyo area, J.C. lives in another large region, so he may have another opinion.

"I don't know what language is most spoken after English in Japan, but Chinese, Korean, and Portuguese would be some of the ones that are probably spoken most frequently. I met some BP speakers in Japan, most were of Japanese ancestry, but not all of them. "

To João and K.T:

In my experience living in Japan English is spoken only by the tons of English speakers who come to teach in Japan. Other than that its just a subject the Japanese have to study hard (to the point of HATING English) in order to pass the test to enter university. After 12 years in Japan and having literally met THOUSANDS of people, from which mostly are EDUCATED, I haven't met many people who speak a decent English let alone other languages.

In terms of ACTUAL usage the order is Chinese, Korean and Portuguese due to the fact that these nationalities constitute the biggest foreign community in Japan. However, these languages are spoken mainly by the immigrants and do NOT reflect the linguistic knowledge of the Japanese.

I live in Osaka and the biggest concentration of Koreans is in the city of Ikuno-shi.
http://www.city.osaka.lg.jp/contents/wdu020/ikuno/english/outline/index.html

This article doesn't say that the "number of foreign registrations" refers to the Koreans.

"I lived in the Tokyo area, J.C. lives in another large region, so he may have another opinion."

Before the economical crisis affected Japan the biggest concentration of Brazilians was in the states (prefectures in Japan) of Aichi (Nagoya city),
Shizuoka (Hamamatsu city) and Gifu (Kani city) but since April many people started going home due to the "help" of the Japanese government, whereby one would "receive" $3000 in order to go back to Brazil and NEVER enter Japan again.

This policy is similar to the German government towards the "Gastarbeiter" from Turkey: Now you're no longer needed so GO HOME!

The interesting thing is that the Japanese were welcome by the Brazilian government when people were kicked out mainly from Kyushu and Okinawa (poorest Japanese state) in the 20th century when many migrated to Brazil. I'm really disappointed with Japan because not only were the Japanese welcome (still are) but the were seen as a hard-working people and trustworthy but that will probably change.

Cheers!!

By the way, I didn't mean that the Portuguese were the third foreign nationality in Japan, rather that people who use Portuguese, i.e. Brazilians, are.

By the way, the Japanese immigration office homepage has versions in Chinese, Korean, Portuguese and Spanish in addition to English, which somehow shows the linguistic situation in Japan.

http://www.immi-moj.go.jp/

Cheers