Nunani

September 28, 2001

Zen and the art of campfire cooking

RACHEL ATTITUQ QITSUALIK

The other day I was carrying groceries home and thinking about how heavy food is when you have to lug it a few blocks. But I remembered that, compared to Arctic distances, a trek from Value Mart is not that bad. Fifty pounds of fresh char, over rocky ground, can be a bit difficult. Those readers whose duty it was, as kids, to carry such catches may know what I mean. Fish, even gutted, is mostly water — which we all know is heavy.

Char in turn reminded me of ducks and geese, which we bagged in the fall. Other wonderful past catches included clams, berries, caribou, and that eternal staple of life: seal meat.

The world may turn in its uncertain ways, but it is nevertheless nearing fall qaggiq time — festival — and I begin to crave Inuit "soul" food. And food is never just sustenance for Inuit, but a way to renew oneself emotionally.

Autumn food preparation is my favourite activity of the year. I like to cook. Best of all, I like cooking outside, over a campfire. This is sad, in a way, since campfire cooking is virtually impossible for me now. There is nothing like it: the taste and scent is somehow different from oven-cooked food, as though the open air alters its chemistry for the better.

And there’s quite an art to it.

First, you have to gather several bags of Arctic heather, moss or twigs, depending on how much smoke you’re willing to put up with. You need three square rocks, roughly of equal size, as much like pieces of brick as possible. There are the matches, of course, and a bit of Kleenex makes great kindling. You’ll be there with some very fresh ice water, tea or coffee of choice, some thinly stripped fish or caribou, and one large, flat rock. You won’t use shale, because it cracks, and your rock will be nice and dry — assuming you don’t want the moisture in it to heat and make it explode (children used to be allowed to play with this process so as to get it right).

You’ll pluck some fur from your parka, holding it up to determine which way the wind is blowing, then arrange your rocks in a semicircular shape, the open side away from the wind. The semicircle is just wide enough to accommodate a pot or kettle.

You start the fire — not a raging blaze, just at a level that it stays under control. Once you’re sure it’s not petering out, you place water to boil above it. You keep feeding the fire a little, kindling and stoking it once in a while.

Eventually, you place the flat rock to heat near or in the fire, set the water aside once it boils, and fry some fish or caribou on the rock. Make some bannock afterward if you so choose (I always so choose). Throw tea or tea bags in the hot water, and holler for your friends to help you polish off the feast. Clean up by burning all non-toxic garbage, throwing sand onto the hearth. You need rest after all that hard eating work, so it’s time for tea and scary stories, or (if anyone has the energy) playing games of strength.

Oh, and if cooking away from the community, don’t forget batteries for your flashlight, as the darkness comes sooner now (unless you like stumbling around marshlands after dark; it’s happened to me). Oh yes, and sand works best for cleaning your bannock bowl in a running stream. And don’t forget to bring some freshly campfire-made bannock to your less adventurous family and friends; they will thank you, even if there is sand in it. But I digress.

Want to do all of this indoors? You’ll avoid the mosquitoes, smoke in your eyes, and sand in your bannock — but you’ll miss that wonderful smell of burning heather, and the glorious colours of an Arctic sunset, unlike any other in the world.

And there’s the mood. You’ll miss feeling as though everything fits in place, as though comfortable in your own skin — that mood of a human doing what humans have always done, are supposed to do, since humans have existed.

And don’t forget to eat as much as you can, because the more you eat, the less you have to carry home.

Pijariiqpunga.

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September 21, 2001

Lost in the translation: part four

RACHEL ATTITUQ QITSUALIK

(Continued from last week.)

Not only is the profession of translating misunderstood on the basis of linguistics, but also as a business. Like writers, translators are either thought of as rich and famous, or as the scum of the Earth.

As also happens with writers, those who require the services of a translator too often display irritation over the fact that translators are necessary. A translator is rarely welcomed by a client, since the client resents having to “waste” money over a trifling matter such as language.

The feeling partly stems from the common misconception that any bilingual person can be a translator. To quote my friend, Betty Harnum: “Everyone has hands — not everyone can play the piano.” Few realize that translators are academically accredited. You get what you pay for.

Some clients, in fact, so resent having to pay for translation that they welch out altogether. Government departments are the worst for this, with administrators situated between a rock and a hard place, assigned projects requiring translation — without the budget to pay for them.

So some resort to letting the translator translate the documents, then delay on payment as long as they can. By the time they legally must pay, the administrator simply can’t be reached. The departmental buck is passed until it is unlikely that the translator will ever get paid.

If the translator is ripped off, he or she has legal recourse, but this costs them precious time and money — and the client is usually counting on this. I know of several translators, including myself, who are due money they will never see. The only way to punish such crooked clients is by blacklisting them, dirtying their name in the freelancing community, so they will pay through the nose for future services.

Then there are the clients who simply want a biological translating machine — a slave. With the constant mantra of, “just do a quick one,” they bombard the translator with tons of material that must be translated within short, often impossible, deadlines. This is what I call an “assembly line” attitude, and no true translation can occur this way.

Generally, when you read over translations someone has hacked out in this way, it is simply gibberish. At best, it reads like baby-talk, and is simply embarrassing.

In my opinion, however, the biggest pitfall of translating is the potential to end up in hell-jobs, such as translating a serial killer’s description of how he butchered several women. Hell-jobs result from clients withholding job descriptions, waiting until a translator has taken a job before releasing details. This is born of desperation — they just want to hook a translator any way they can.

I’ve had clients admit, at the last minute, that they don’t even know what syllabics are, or that they don’t have Inuktitut fonts on their computers (so they can’t read what I translate for them). They just want you to sit down and do it all for them, making magic at one bargain-basement rate.

I had one lady explain a project to me for over two hours. When I finally brought up money, she smiled and asked, “Could you just do it out of the goodness of your heart?” She actually had the gall to be angry when I laughed in her face.

These negatives are contrasted by those few I’ve met who think of translation as a glamorous trade, with translators akin to diplomats. But while it is true that a translator sometimes plays a diplomatic role (such as in simultaneous translation), and while it is possible to make decent money, such is only possible when the work is available. The opportunities for work are like doors that randomly open and close, and the dry periods are lean indeed.

So let’s be kind to our translators – they bring together and fashion understandings between the languages of the world. And as people who draw from creativity to do their job effectively, let’s keep in mind that their professional integrity is important to them. It is important to them that others know and understand what they do.

And, given the reliance of Nunavut on translators for official documents and meetings – and given what Nunavut land claims negotiations owe to skilled translators — might it not be a good idea to declare a Nunavut “Translator Day?”
Pijariiqpunga.

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September 14, 2001

Lost in the translation: part three

RACHEL ATTITUQ QITSUALIK

(Continued from last week.)

Most people understand that Inuktitut stems from a completely different language group than English (or other Indo-European languages). Nevertheless, the ramifications of this fact are lost upon many. They do not understand that its differing origins mean that the logic upon which the language is structured — the very thinking itself — is different.

So I’ll say it here and for all time: a native Inuktitut speaker literally thinks differently than a native English speaker.

The reasons why this is so have to do with the ways in which the two languages deal with the basic relationships between concepts, such as places, items, and times.

In Inuktitut, for example, one freely places oneself in any time. While it is true that English refers to different times, it is typically assumed that one is always situated in the present: I went to the store. I had just gotten home. I will go again. In all instances, the speaker is referring to possibilities or happenings from his or her place in the present.

In Inuktitut, however, it is normal to linguistically refer to the past or future as though it were the present. One is placed as present in the past, or present in the future. In a way, Inuktitut does not assume that one is always in the present, but instead makes the past and future a flavour of "now."

English can do this, but can only do so in regard to the past, and it represents a break with convention — a strange style that a few fiction writers and conversationalists use. "So I’m walking along, see? I come to the usual spot, and look over the edge to notice this guy waving at me…" Et cetera.

There are other major differences, as well. Double negatives, for example, are impossible in Inuktitut. Suppose you were to ask me, "Is it not necessary to do a report?" In English, I would first begin with an assertion, "No," then re-assert by following up with, "it is not necessary to do a report." I am addressing the situation, not the phrasing of the question. But in Inuktitut, I must address the phrasing of the question first. In Inuktitut, I must say, "Yes, it is not necessary to do a report."

Perhaps some readers will have already guessed, from this just how sticky the translation of legalities can get, whether of documents or live speech (referred to as "simultaneous translation," a process first used in the trial of Nazis at Nuremburg). Legalities require an exactitude of language, and much of the very legal profession itself is preoccupied with quibbling over the exact meanings of legal matters, even in the one language of English.

Imagine the difficulties that arise concerning questions of time and place when Inuktitut is involved. A lawyer, for example, asks a question in cross-examination: "Were you not at your brother’s house on the evening of the fifth?" The English-speaker, forced to answer only in the affirmative or negative, answers "no." If that witness were an Inuktitut-speaker, however, he would have to answer "yes," because he is addressing the phrasing of the question, not the situation. Then there are complications arising from tense, which can make for an awesome legal mess.

(Actually, another complication arises in the example above. One cannot say "brother" in Inuktitut, since there is no such generic term in Inuktitut — an Inuk must state "one’s sibling, same sex as oneself, older," "one’s sibling, different sex from oneself, younger," etc. Inuktitut has few generic terms, as English does. It’s vocabulary is expansive because it is very specific about how it labels items.)

One can see, then, that if the translator is to circumvent this potential mess, he or she must at all costs avoid literal translation. A true translator looks past syntax and into the actual meaning of statements.

So is it any wonder that an anthropologist who studies another culture is soon compelled to learn that culture’s language? Or is it any wonder that a scholar, when studying the classic literary works of Greece or Rome, is soon compelled to learn Greek or Latin? A language is an expression of a culture, an indication of how a culture thinks, which is why a cultural shift also means a linguistic change. A people cannot be understood unless its language is also understood.

(To be continued.)

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September 7, 2001

Lost in the translation: part two

RACHEL ATTITUQ QITSUALIK

(Continued from last week.)
One of the most common misconceptions is that translators do no real work - that, since the mechanics of languages are all the same (the most common mistake) , it must be easy for someone to translate from one to another.

The perception is that translation is a word-substitution game, whereas it is actually a process of completely breaking down a concept (often one that is specific to a culture), building it up again using concepts inherent to the language into which it is to be translated. This takes a great deal of mental energy, since in order to translate, one has to "role-play," stepping outside of either cultural context so that a given concept can be reinvented from one tongue to another.

A good translator's mind, in a way, cannot afford to be completely English or completely Inuktitut. And such reinvention, of course, means that the reconstructed, translated model - the "end product" - can vary greatly with the skill of the translator.

In this sense, a translator is not merely a linguist, but actually a sort of diplomat. It is the translator, and his or her grasp of the concepts innate to either tongue (serving as his or her toolbox or repertoire) that dictates how a concept is to be perceived.

How a concept is perceived is important, of course. It determines the emotional and psychological impact of a message upon its listeners. That is why, despite what futurists once predicted about computers doing our writing for us, we still need professional writers in this day and age. A writer is a sort of translator, too, but he or she breaks down and rebuilds concepts within one language.

Let's take the example of the magnificent words from the Bible, in Luke 11:9-10, and 13-14.

"And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them; and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
"And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men."

Anyone would be frustrated to find that a translator had rendered these words into the equivalent, in another language, of:

"Some angels came and scared them. An angel said to stop being scared because there was good news for everybody.
"And there was suddenly a whole bunch of praying, and saying, we like God and everybody should be happy."

The latter, anyone can agree, would constitute a terrible translation. It gets the basic gist of the message across, but the basic gist is just not good enough. Imagine a translator's frustration, then, when a client (by the way, government workers are the worst for this) demands, "Just do a quick version." Not only will that "quick version", frankly, suck, but it is bound to make both the translator and the client look like complete idiots.

We do not normally make conscious judgement calls about our own language. What I mean is that, while many of us do have to be careful of what we say, it is rarely a constant concern throughout every minute of every day.

Translators do have to be concerned over every word and every phrase. The very essence of the job is to make judgement calls on how something is phrased. This means that a good translator is constantly stretching his or her brain while at work, constantly thinking creatively.

This can be very taxing, especially after a whole day of translation. It is for this reason that translators must prepare beforehand, taking time aside before a job begins, in order to go into what I call, "translation mode." Like forcing oneself into a sort of meditative state, the mind must be gradually set into a mode that rests neither with one language nor the other. The reason for this is that each language requires its own style of thinking, its own culture.

I can always distinguish someone who has never worked with translators before. Such an individual is invariably shocked - even skeptical - that translation constitutes "work" at all.

They assume that language is a simplistic, instinctive process. "You speak both. Why can't you just yak one into the other?"

(Continued next week.)

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