فقدت في الترجمة = Lost in Translation

In Yanbu, and most everywhere in Saudi Arabia, English is an important second language. Most college classes and textbooks are in English and is commonly used by other expats from around the world.

The Royal Commission offices include a Translation Department which I have had occasion to use twice – once for a part of a press release I wrote that was sent out to Arabic speaking media. The other was this week when we needed a legal opinion from our Legal Affairs Department (basically the city attorney). After we received his written opinion in Arabic, I requested to have it officially translated because of the importance and preciseness required. Otherwise, ‘GOOGLE translate’ does a pretty good job of getting the essence of most non-English documents, e-mails, etc. (If you ever have a need to translate anything into or out of English, it is amazing, instant tool – with a few exceptions.)

When translating documents, the Bill Murray movie “Lost in Translation” frequently comes to mind. Some of Google’s translations make me laugh. For example, ‘Kingdom’ is commonly used here as the reference to the national government and/or the country of Saudi Arabia. Google often translates this as the ‘United Kingdom’ – a rather different place I would say.

In speaking, ‘tomorrow’ is another term with a different meaning. Tomorrow does mean the next day. But, when a colleague says tomorrow, you must ask what day he means – rather than actually expecting something to occur on the next day. (A colleague from Houston has taught another colleague from India to use ‘manana’ which is more fitting!)

‘Engineer’ is also commonly used as a title for a majority of people who are college graduates. It encompasses many disciplines beyond what we define as engineer. My boss, who is one of the top urban planners in Saudi Arabia with degrees in planning, nevertheless his title is ‘Engineer Salah.’

Last, but not least, is the use of ‘His Excellency.’ This title is used for the Executive President (basically our mayor and city manager) and other high ranking local and Kingdom officials. It is a term of respect for high office – like we call judges “your honor.”

None of these language matters interfere with daily life but add an interesting twist to working and living here!