Translators can be curious creatures – usually they are not only willing to do the necessary research to learn more about the topic of their source text, but they might even enjoy this process. When you have a job dealing with a wide range of issues you’d only had some general idea about before, and you end up learning new skills and discovering previously unknown territories, it’s cool and rewarding. Embarking on this journey, however, translators could do with some help from the author of the source text. When your translation service provider comes back to you to ask for some clarification, it does not show a lack of expertise or research skills. On the contrary: it is a sign that they pay attention to detail, are aware of possible pitfalls, the importance of context, different ways to address the reader, etc. They want to make sure that the final version of the text reflects the original as much as possible.

Feeding your source text into a machine translation service will produce instant results, with no questions asked. But if you have no way to check it, keep in mind that the instant solution might not be the one you need. There are good reasons to engage in conversation with your translation partner. Even if they don’t have to amend the translation after receiving answers to their questions, the step of clarifying details, such as tone of voice, purpose of the text, context etc., still serves as a quality assurance tool.

Translators sometimes have to ask questions, as they are not able to read minds. Nor can they read palms. Speaking of which, no two palms are the same: in a gardening context, the palms with fingers are probably not the type you would expect on a tree. (Yes, this is another one from the collection of true gems mentioned before.)

Deciding whether you need a translator or is it enough to use some readily available tool depends on why your text needs to be translated. 

Automated translations can be quite useful when all you need is a quick overview of a text, to help in understanding the main points. But if you have ever seen a funny photo of incomprehensible, stupid, or hilarious mistranslations in shop windows around the world, you should keep in mind that oftentimes these are the results of someone not knowing the given language, but still making efforts to convey the meaning of their message, with the help of their fading memories from a language class, a dictionary, or some automated tool. If your text ends up in the more visible shop window of the internet, it is definitely good practice to have your text translated, or at the very least proofread by a professional translator, so that it is your actual message that gets to your audience, and it is only funny because you wanted to raise smiles yourself.

I have been working on machine translation post-editing projects for a few years. The demand for these types of projects is huge, and given that most of the time these texts are the re-cycled versions of previously written, checked, double-checked, and published texts, just with a few updates, it is completely understandable not to have all of it re-translated again and just have a quick read-through and translation of the actual changes. From the translator’s perspective, these can feel soul-crushing and I can understand why some translators reject working on them; sometimes they can be more exhausting than creating your translation from scratch. And there is a tendency to pay less for these kinds of projects, as you “only” have to edit a pre-existing translation.

When I first worked on a machine-translated text, I found some true gems hidden in the Hungarian version. It was annoying at first, but I soon got into the habit of collecting these. This is how I came upon this one, where the original phrase of a “long-time fan” (of the concertgoer type) somehow turned into an appliance deployed full-time, probably not at musical events.