"Mada, mada dane"

The results of an experiment from the weekend. Posting to archive.

I'm not a good person to ask for accuracy... I can translate from french to english okay but not so well the other way around, which is a sure way of saying mada mada dane.

That is I can read french novels, but I don't always understand totally everything that is going on... But then again the stories I tend to read in french are... Romance, and therefore I'm more interested in the unintentional comedic aspects than plot specific details. (I swear - cheap French romance novels are a goldmine!#)

And as for writing in French; well it took me well over an hour when I was trying to answer support in french on the one problem - not with composing my answer in english that was easy, but the translating to French was a bitch and a half. (I luvs the firefox spell checker though) That was a while ago though (twas approved, though I was criticised for something that I got of the french vox site... heh.).


But French is something I'm interested in improving in a round about when I have time kind of way.

I'm not entirely sure why, since I uh am clearly not learning it to converse with my family since there are none that I'd care to talk to in french at the moment and I'm more interested in reading and writing it than talking, which is where it would be useful at the moment [oddly enough I'm opposite with Japanese, it would be more useful at the moment to read and write that but I'm more interested in conversing].

(also Australian accents are shit for pronouncing french - our voices are too flat. My throat doe snot make the sounds in my head. =/)

So when someone offered me a translation opportunity that is needed and can focus on something interesting... I decided to check it out.

I'm not really comfortable with this; I feel too awkward with the translation, but the only way to improve would be to force myself to keep translating this kind of stuff; I can't just whirl it under the rug, I have to know the details and this is a real opportunity for that.

Hôtel de Kanazawa , le 11/1/97

Chère ethel ,

"Dormir un peu" : tu parles !
Ma "petite sieste" a duré jusqu'à minuit. Je me suis réveillé hagard. Que de temps perdu !
Je me suis habillé comme un mur et je suis allé me promener : les folles nuits de Kanazawa , c'est quelque chose.
Pas un chat dans les rues, le silence le plus profond.
On croirait que tout le monde est mort.
Les mètres de neige renforcent cette impression.
J'ai marché jusqu'au bord de la mer : la nuit était si noire que je ne voyais pas l'eau. Au loin, quelques lumières de bateaux voguant vers Vladivostok : cette idée m'a bouleversé. C'est fou, le pouvoir évocateur d'un mot : là où j'étais, il n'y avait rien à voir.


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Kwanazawa hotel, the 11th of January 97

Dear Ethel,
"A litte sleep" you say!
My "little siesta" lasted until midnight. I woke up tired. What a waste of time!

I dressed plainly* and went out for a walk; the foolish nights of Kanazawa, they are quite something.
With not a
cat in the streets, the silence was quite profound.
You could believe that everyone is dead.
With the metres of snow reinforcing that impression.
I walked to the edge of the sea, the night is so black that I can not see water. Far off, you can see the lights of boats sailing towards Vladivostok : an idea I find distressing. It is crazy, the power of a word; where I was, you could see nothing.



I'm missing something, but I don't know what.



*I remember hearing not that long ago that dressing in un mur fashion, could refer to slang - a way of saying wall flower; But I'm not really quite sure of how to translate it.

I think that this part is saying basically, they got dressed and went out, probably in a simple boring manner.