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Left to right: Taras Bazyluk, Marta Zielyk, Iryna Kurowyckyj and Melanne S. Verveer. aries. Maybe they do exist, but I have a feeling I would need to visit rare book collections of libraries or dusty old attics to actually get my hands on one. Where do I look up the most complicated nuclear disarmament terminology when for decades, any fields remotely associated with armaments or sophisticated technolo gies in Ukraine were dominated by the Russian lan guage. I am truly envious of my fellow-staff interpreters who have access to entire roomfuls of specialized dic tionaries in their chosen languages. At least these types of words, dealing with science and technology usually have black or white meanings. It is the other diplomatic, ambiguous terminology which often causes much consternation in relations between the US and Ukraine. The word which gave both sides much trouble during the drafting of many documents is "commitment”, as in one president is “committed to” that or this policy. Once I spent literally, I am not exag gerating, six hours discussing the various possibilities of translating the phrase commitment into Ukrainian — should it be “ виявляє відданість", or “обіцяє", or “має намір” each of which has its own specific nuances. What a headache it was. Especially for me because when texts of treaties are being negotiated I am the primary one responsible for assuring that both the Ukrainian and English texts say exactly the same thing. This “conforming process” often lasts twice as long as the actual negotiating process. I vividly remeber one occasion when the heads of the US and Ukrainian dele gations agreed in principle on a statement at a lavish dinner. They went to their respective hotel rooms to sleep and left it up to us, their staffs to conform the texts. The signing ceremony was scheduled for 8:30 a.m. the next morning and we got the texts conformed, finally at 7:30 a.m., that is one hour prior to signing after having worked all night. We witnessed the signing, bleary eyed, grumpy, wrinkled, hungry but certainly exhilarated. However, words are not the only thing a diplomatic interpreter deals with. I am very often called upon to interpret Ukrainian history, traditions, cultural habits, mannerisms. Our two countries are divided by an ocean of differing attitudes towards time management, diplo matic protocol, political correctness, acceptable social practices, in short, by all which makes countries unique and valuable each in their own way. These differences make for a wonderfully diverse world but they do not facilitate efficient discourse between nations. Under the heading of cultural interpretation comes that bane of the interpreter’s existence: the joke. The two countries have a different attitude towards humor —don’t laugh — humor is serious stuff. It can be used as a negotiating tactic, or as a medium to get a certain message across. What frightens me most when I am sit ting at the table with an American and a Ukrainain dele gation is when I hear the following words being spoken: "I’d like to tell you a little joke”. I groan inwardly just praying that the joke will be translatable, that this par ticular attempt at humor will transcend cultures. Most of the time it doesn’t. Another scary aspect of high level interpreting for me is having to deal with White House speeches. I have great admiration for White House speechwriters —they are very talented, creative people. But — when I get an advance text of a speech (If I get an advance copy of a speech) the very first thing I do is go through it to see if there are any quotes from Taras Shevchenko. After all, speechwriters don’t know Ukrainian and get these quotes from a book of English translations of Shevchenko. Do 20 ’’НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ", ЛИСТОПАД 1996 Видання C оюзу Українок A мерики - перевидано в електронному форматі в 2012 році . A рхів C У A - Ню Йорк , Н . Й . C Ш A.
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