Casual Phone Interview

I got a call from the company that I'm taking exams with. The purpose of the call today was to tell me about conditions of employment and other miscellaneous stuff. It was pretty casual, and it was almost like a small talk. I asked why I passed the interpretation evaluation though I think it was a disaster. They admitted that my interpretation was very slow. But because my result of the translation exam was excellent, they said they saw potential in my interpretation though my performance was not great. Rather, they said that it was amazing that I passed the evaluation even though I have no experience in interpretation. They said 70% of interpreters who are working for the company have a master's degree in conference interpretation. Really?! They are a group of professional interpreters, then. I'm really intimidated now. Even if I'm hired, I don't think I can live up to their expectation.

Anyway, if they liked me in today's phone interview, they will set up an interview with management. Ohhhh, I'm really intimidated.

Contagion

S had a DVD night, and we saw Contagion over a lot of wine and appetizers. Mm, I think I had too much wine because I didn't follow the movie well. Or, I was simply confused with the other movie ... what is it? There was a similar movie about the outbreak of some kind of virus in Washington D.C. several years ago. I believe the original story was written by Michael Crichton. Oh well, I'm more confused now.

Anyhow, this movie must have been expensive to make. Look at these actors. Kate Winslet is awesome (she is a great actor. Her only stigma is Titanic), but she dies soon in the movie. Sucks. Jude Law hides his bald spot in the head by wearing a hat almost all the time, which makes him look more handsome. Matt Damon never dies because he is the main character. Toward the end of the movie, we were enjoying the movie by making fun of it, rather than devoting ourselves to the plot.

Really?!

Really?! I passed the interpretation evaluation?! I just can't believe it because it was just a disaster. But the head-hunting agency is now happy to schedule a phone interview with the company for me. I'm just wondering why I passed the evaluation ...

Disaster

It was just a disaster! The exam questions were not difficult, but I just couldn't translate under great time pressure. I stopped, took a lot of time, translating, posed a lot, made a lot of grammatical error, and so on and so forth ...

I'm now trying to think, "That's OK. It was a good experience. I'm not qualified to do simultaneous interpretation work anyway  because I have no experience."

Phew

I got a call from the head-hunting agency by saying that I passed the exam. Woo-hoo, thanks M for her help! It was relieving, but the scary thing is the agency told me the next step would be an interpretation evaluation. What?! I have no experience of oral translation. I feel intimidated now. The evaluation is now scheduled next Monday, ayayayayayay.

Translation Exam

I was introduced to a job opening in a Japanese corporation by a head-hunting agency at the end of last year. It's a translation/interpretation position in a manufacturer. Because it was the very end of last year, the agency set up the first exam date today. I was told that the exam would consist of two long statements and 10 short sentences, both from English to Japanese and from Japanese to English. The exam is 2 hours and 15 minutes. Why this odd length?!

Anyway, for insurance, I asked M for help. I asked her to proofread my English translation. She kindly came over and checked my English. She didn't change my English a lot, but she gave me very good definitions of English words, which was really helpful.

I manged to finish the exam in time. The company is supposed to let me know about the result in a couple of days.

New Year's Day

Happy New Year!

But I was useless today. Because last night, New Year's Eve, we just kept eating, drinking, playing games and chatting until midnight, we all stayed in bed today, being lazy. We didn't have enough space for food or drink at all. It was a lazy day, but I liked it. It was so peaceful.