Some of My Translation Publication

（自2009年以來，我一直有機會做中英文筆譯出版品，有小說、研究報告、短篇故事及政府文案。）

Since 2009, I've been involved in large translation projects; novels, research, short stories and official pamphlets were the genre I dealt with.

In 2009, it was Gaile Parkin's Baking Cakes in Kigali: A Novel .

Parkin was a journalist in Africa. She turned her observations into a novel about a woman named Angel, who had the ability to create happiness and hope for people around her  with wonderful and tasteful cakes.

I worked on the Chinese translation of this novel in 2009 before I flew to the Netherlands for study.  The final product was 幸福推手, published by Big Tree (Taipei) in 2009.

When I left Taiwan, I brought another translation contract with me. It was Sandra Dallas's Prayers for Sale.

This is a very different story. Set against the Depression during 1930s in a mountainous town called Middle Swan, Colorado, it tells about the unlikely friendship between two women set apart from each other by sixty years and also by very different life experiences. What binds them, however, is a shared woe over lost loved ones, which they try to tackle with by stitching blankets.

Working on this Chinese translation and my Dutch studies at the same time from 2009 until 2010 was really a tough time for me. After all, it was here: 我願為妳祈禱, published by Big Tree (Taipei) in 2010. And my Dutch grades were good enough to get me into an honor's college.

As translation is never the only thing on my plate, working overnight or over long weekends seems to become the norm. In 2009 and 2010, I was in the middle of pursuing a degree. After I returned to Taiwan in 2012 and started working in an office, translation also always comes to occupy a piece of my desk.

Two things my translation after 2012 have in common (and probably in the future too) are, first,  they are only about Taiwan's indigenous peoples, and second, they are English translations from Chinese materials.

In 2013, I helped with the English translation of Dr. Zhou Ming-chieh's （周明傑）field research about Paiwan elders with hand tattoos in the village of Puljeti, Pingtung County. This book came out in December 2013, published by Bureau of Culture Park of Council of Indigenous Peoples.

Book Title: A Catalogue of Hand Tattoos at the Puljeti Village of Paiwan《排灣族佳興部落手紋圖錄》.

In the book, Dr, Zhou interviews Paiwan elders with hand tattoos and describes their life stories in details. Besides, with the help of one of the interviewed elders and a Paiwan language teacher 邱宵鳳, he reviews the entire tattooing procedure from selecting candidates (in the hierarchical Paiwan society, there are very strict rules about who can be tattooed and who can tattoo), preparing tools, giving tattoos and the after-treatment. Most importantly, he prepares a list of the tattoo patterns, describing their meaning and use for specific ranks.

Hand tattoos were banned during the Japanese Occupation Period. However, as soon as the Japanese left, young Paiwan girls could not wait  to commit themselves to such terrible pain for one or two months just to have these beautiful and privileged decorations on the back of their hands and wrists. Men did tattoo as well. Unfortunately, the last Paiwan man with body tattoos passed away in the first half of the twentieth century, so only women hand tattoos are left to us nowadays.

I will always remember sometime ago at a conference on Paiwan hand tattoos, a Paiwan elder asked the Paiwan chief (a woman with hand tattoos) if just for the sake of passing on this beautiful culture, he could or people could freely use these patterns on their hands. Our lady chief was not at all ambiguous in her answer: a silent smile. Hand tattoos might eventually leave the world, yet this lady chief's powerful grip on tradition will always be remembered.

For 2014, I was part of a translation project on indigenous literature. In the team, we had seven translators working on 39 poems, 27 prose and 23 stories.

A related story is available at another blogpost: Anthology of Taiwan Indigenous Literature.

This is so far the most reported translation project I was ever involved in. There was a book launch at the 2015 Taipei International Book Exhibition. Taiwan Indigenous TV also talked about it: 首套原民文學翻譯選集 發表亮相。

At the book launch, I gave the first autograph in my life to a requesting reader. Kind of interesting. Hopefully, next time it will be my own book that I am signing.

My most recent translation was done just last weekend (2015), 184 pages and 50,364 English words in total. It was an official introduction to the sixteen indigenous peoples in Taiwan, titled: The Austronesian Origin: Indigenous Peoples of Taiwan.  It will come out either late 2015 or early 2016.

This publication is, in my personal point of view, the most up-to-date (though indeed very concise or limited too) information in English about contemporary Formosans, their origin, life, society and culture. I myself learned a lot about other indigenous peoples too just by doing the translation. A Paiwan, for example, is not less than an American to a Rukai. We are all strangers, yet we are also one family.

Either as an interpreter or a translator for indigenous agencies or publishers, I am always underpaid. Seriously. Yet, somehow, I am also always overpaid. Payment comes in varieties. As long as I am involved in this work , I will be paid in one way or another.