[et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ specialty=”off” _builder_version=”3.21.1″ custom_margin=”0px||0px|” custom_padding=”0px||0px|” z_index_tablet=”500″ next_background_color=”#000000″][et_pb_row _builder_version=”3.21.1″ z_index_tablet=”500″ custom_margin=”0px|||” custom_padding=”0px|||” background_color=”#bc9e5d” module_alignment=”center” use_custom_width=”on” custom_width_px=”1200px”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_cta _builder_version=”3.21.1″ title=”The Interpreter ” background_color=”rgba(0,0,0,0.5)” background_image=”https:\/\/www.splash-demos.it\/ild\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/AdobeStock_105288946.jpg” background_blend=”multiply” text_orientation=”left” header_font=”|800|||||||” header_text_align=”left” header_text_color=”#ffffff” header_font_size=”25″ body_font=”Titillium Web|700|||||||” body_text_align=”left” body_text_color=”#7aa2b5″ body_font_size=”40″ z_index_tablet=”500″ body_line_height=”1.2em” custom_padding=”10%||10%|”]<\/p>\n
as a Digital Nomad<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_cta][et_pb_text admin_label=”barra info newsletter” _builder_version=”3.21.1″ z_index_tablet=”500″ text_text_color=”#ffffff” text_font=”|600|||||||” custom_padding=”|||60px”]<\/p>\n
JONATHAN HINE<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ fullwidth=”off” specialty=”off” prev_background_color=”#000000″ next_background_color=”#000000″][et_pb_row][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”intro” _builder_version=”3.21.1″ text_font=”|700|||||||” text_text_color=”#7aa2b5″ text_font_size=”20px” z_index_tablet=”500″]<\/p>\n Most of you know that I am a translator. Many know that for four years I lived and worked on the road. Translation is a very portable career, but I am also an interpreter. Here is what happened to that side of the business:<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider _builder_version=”3.21.1″ color=”#bc9e5d” divider_style=”dashed” divider_position=”center” divider_weight=”3″ height=”10px” z_index_tablet=”500″ \/][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_text admin_label=”text” _builder_version=”3.21.1″ header_3_font_size=”20px” z_index_tablet=”500″ header_3_line_height=”1.5em”]<\/p>\n The phone rings. It\u2019s from Chicago. I move my Starbucks\u00ae tumbler out of the way and go to the corner, where I won\u2019t disturb the other customers, but I can still see my bike outside. <\/p>\n \u201cScriptor Services, Jonathan Hine, may I help you?\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cJonathan, this is Rachel Morris at Dunn, Dunn and Dunn, we would like to use you for another deposition on the case you worked with us last year.\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cThanks for remembering me, Rachel. I assume this is interpreting, or is it more like the \u2018language consulting\u2019 that last year\u2019s hearing turned into?\u201d I hear her laugh, which makes me smile. Four interpreters had tried and failed to understand the witness, a terrified old man from central Italy. \u201cThat was awesome, Jonathan, which is why the partner on the case wants you again. The deposition is here in our main office, not in Alexandria like last time. You\u2019re in Charlottesville, Virginia, right?\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cWell, no. I\u2019m actually closer to you now if you\u2019re in Chicago\u2026.”<\/em><\/p>\n Responding to such requests like this is a little more complicated than it used to be. I can\u2019t just throw a suitcase in the trunk of the car. I sold the car and hit the road in 2013. My income since then more than covered my travels around North America and Europe, including attending the ATA Annual Conferences in San Antonio, Chicago, Miami, and New Orleans.<\/p>\n It\u2019s easy enough to take in and deliver translations by email. But what about interpreting?<\/p>\n Making a living as an interpreter used to be restricted to those living in large metropolitan areas. Not anymore: the interpreter colleagues that I have visited are on the road a lot. State Department escort interpreters accompany their international visitors all over the country, often for days or weeks at a time. Conference interpreters must go where the conferences are because simultaneous interpreting is not a common skill. A distant hospital requiring interpretation services for a rare language or a delicate medical subject may need an on-site interpreter; there are still situations where telephone or video interpreting won\u2019t do the job.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″][et_pb_text admin_label=”text” _builder_version=”3.21.1″ header_3_font_size=”20px” z_index_tablet=”500″ header_3_line_height=”1.5em”]<\/p>\n Although I do a lot of chuchotage, which is simultaneous interpreting into the ear of the listener (no equipment), I am not a conference interpreter. My clients are not jetting me to Vail or Buenos Aires. When I do get a call (like the fictional vignette above), the cases are always unusual, and the situations justify the expense of paying my travel. Even before I lived on the road, there were travel expenses to leave Charlottesville.<\/p>\n Today, I can take in requests for non-translation services (including interpreting) wherever I am. I include the travel expense of going to the job in the estimate. It may involve searching a few schedules and time to buy tickets, but I can still prepare an estimate. The cost-benefit of using my services depends on where I am when the call comes in. For example, one client in Virginia was willing to wait until I rode past their location to perform some document triage. Another client wanting revision training waited until I arrived at a place where I could leave my bicycle, then paid for the round-trip travel to the training. But when the Association of Translators and Interpreters of Florida (ATIF) in Miami needed a replacement presenter for a workshop, I happened to be in town, so there were no travel expenses.<\/p>\n This business model won\u2019t work for a court interpreter who arguably must be where the trials (and court certification) are. But translators who only interpret occasionally and interpreters whose business already has them traveling to most assignments have no need to sit at home waiting for the phone to ring. To be sure, the business must be up and running before venturing out to travel full-time, so that the work is already coming in. At that point, it makes no difference to the clients where you are, if you can respond to their need.<\/p>\n There may be personal reasons for taking to the road on a near-permanent basis. For example, having an empty nest, or wanting to visit far-flung friends and relatives more often (or maybe for the last time). Depending on your vehicle and your lifestyle on the road, and whether you keep the house, living on the road can cost more or less than staying home. Also, some business models are simply more effective from one location. Careful analysis and planning can reveal the feasibility of going nomadic or confirm one\u2019s satisfaction in staying put. <\/p>\n Buona strada e arrivederci a Palm Springs!<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ specialty=”off” prev_background_color=”#000000″ next_background_color=”#bc9e5d” _builder_version=”3.21.1″ z_index_tablet=”500″ global_module=”506″][et_pb_row global_parent=”506″ _builder_version=”3.21.1″ z_index_tablet=”500″ custom_padding=”|60px||60px” background_color=”#7aa2b5″][et_pb_column type=”3_4″][et_pb_text global_parent=”506″ _builder_version=”3.21.1″ z_index_tablet=”500″ text_orientation=”right” text_text_color=”#ffffff”]<\/p>\n Jonathan Hine<\/a><\/strong>, CT (I>E) translated his first book, The Struggle against Blindness by Luciano Moretti, in 1962. More recently, he translated Beyond the Age of Oil by Leonardo Maugeri (Praeger, 2010), Schio: Industrial Archeology (Sassi Editore, 2013), and Combat Aircraft by Riccardo Niccoli (White Star, 2016). A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy (B.S.), the University of Oklahoma (MPA), and the University of Virginia (Ph.D.), he belongs to the PEN Center, the American Translators Association (ATA), the American Literary Translators Association (ALTA) and the American Translation and Interpreting Studies Association (ATISA). He now writes and translates books, while bicycling and blogging at www.freewheelingfreelancer.com<\/strong><\/a>. <\/p>\n
\nMaybe because I grew up in those parts, I could understand him: he was speaking English with such a thick accent that they thought it was a regional dialect. Once I explained that he and his grown son were not suspects, he relaxed, and I got him to speak Italian so that there would be something to interpret (the judge could not understand his English).<\/p>\n