THE THINGS WE DO...: What did you do in the Orange Revolution? (03/20/05)

THE THINGS WE DO...

by Orysia Paszczak Tracz

What did you do in the Orange Revolution?

My dictionaries and thesaurus are more dog-eared than usual, and my brain short-circuits more often. I draw blanks at the simplest words - in either language. I've neglected my other writing - and will get back to it (I have to) - but for now I'm still enjoying my self-appointed job as one of the volunteer translators for the Maidan website http://maidan.org.ua/ [in Ukrainian] and http://eng.maidanua.org/ [in English]. And I'm loving it.

My point in sharing this with you is not to call attention to my small contribution, but to encourage the readers of The Ukrainian Weekly who know both Ukrainian and English well to help out, and join me and the many other volunteers from around the world.

At least I think we're from all over. I have no idea who the others are, because we all have nicknames. You get no credit, no compensation, and no glory (I can't even imagine how much the translation fees would be). No one knows or cares who you are, just as long as you translated the news item and it got posted. You do get satisfaction that you have contributed to a very good cause. You feel good because the news in Ukrainian or Russian is going out into the English-speaking world (and that means the whole world at large).

During Ukraine's recent presidential election, this was especially important, because there was so much disinformation from the Yanukovych/Kuchma side reaching the world media.

If you know Russian, that's good, too, because quite a number of the news items to be translated are in Russian. Often you can tell if the translator is a native English speaker, or had learned English in Ukraine - the vocabulary, the grammar and the idioms give that away. So the more translators who know English fluently, the better.

In a reverse case, someone translated Chrystia Freeland's article from the Financial Post into Ukrainian for Maidan. The title was "Breaking the Mold." The Ukrainian translator, in all sincerity and not knowing the idiomatic expression, took "mold" to be a fungus.

There was one moment when I wondered to myself if people out there are actually reading the English page of Maidan. The answer to my question appeared the very next day, when on January 7 in the "Letters to Maidan" section Henk van Eerde from Amsterdam, the Netherlands, wrote: "Happy New Year! Where are your English translators? Are they enjoying their deserved holidays? I do see lots of (probably) interesting messages in Ukrainian, but hardly anything appears on the English pages. Thank you for your interesting and direct reporting in the past weeks. I like your approach and your irony. Let Ukraine continue its path to a real civil society in Europe."

The two people who seem to be in charge of "Rozrobky" - the translation section - are Mykyta and Tizia. They are the ones who reply when you submit a posting, and who keep the translators in line. Who they are I have no idea, but maybe one day we will meet in Kyiv over a beer.

The instructions for translators are simple. First you need to register on Maidan and get a password. This lets you also participate in the Forum, a lively discussion group. There, too, you have no idea who is who and where they came from.

In her instructions to the group Tizia writes:

"The purpose of Maidan is bringing to the world's society the true news about events in Ukraine. Right now all world agencies are full of news from Ukraine, thus our trump card is to have the "hot" news stories. Therefore our humble request: absolute priority for translations is the latest news stories from Ukraine. Again - the news must be from Ukraine and must be immediate. News from abroad has a lower priority and is to be translated only in the case of exceptional importance. How to properly coordinate work with other translators: to avoid duplication, and to ease the work of the news staff, who even without this are overloaded, one more humble request to hold to this procedure - 1) select an important news item from the Maidan News list, according to the above criteria; 2) make a short announcement. For this, hit "reply" - vidpovisty - and let others know that you are taking a particular item (beru taku-to novynu)... 3) translate, go to your announcement, hit "reply" and post your translation. ..."

I cannot even remember when I started translating for Maidan. Probably it was during the first election (seems so long ago now). Work got really intense during each of the election rounds, when the news was coming in fast and furious. And each item seemed more important than the previous one. Some news items were short, others were one or two pages long, and some were longer articles. There was so much material, and all of it was very important.

As each of my translations appeared on the English page, I felt good inside, that I was helping out in the one concrete way I could.

On December 23, 2004, before the last vote, Mykyta wrote to the translators:

"Dear translators, stormy days are approaching. In only two days (or whatever way you're counting) there will be an enormous flow of very important news. I do not have to tell you what a publicity campaign was created for our election by the world media. I think that even though it is the Catholic Christmas, interest in news will be very great. And we must take advantage of this chance in bringing to the world the truth about events in Ukraine. So that we are organized for this 'rush hour,' I think we need to survey the available resources. Please let us know with a short note when and how much you will be able to translate during the third tour [of voting]. For example: 'Will be available on the 26th, 14:00-19:00, 27th, 9:00-11:00.' Thank you in advance. I'm taking this opportunity to thank you for your enormous work! The English version [of Maidan] survived just because of you! Razom nas bahato! - Together we are many!"

And so we continued. I'm afraid to say it was a compulsion, but during breaks in Christmas festivities, I stole away to sit at the computer and wrack my brain over "temnyky," "dovirena osoba" and "Yanychary."

There must have been many questions to Mykyta and Tizia, because they posted a three-part glossary on election terms, government organizations and positions, and general election and Orange Revolution terms. For people in Ukraine, these words were common knowledge. For me in Winnipeg, I finally learned that "bratky" are not little brothers nor the pansy flower, but thugs. And the word "temnyky" took a while to figure out - the prepared government text [i.e., one-sided propaganda, not actual reporting] to be read by broadcasters on the television stations. Some of the terminology is maddening, because often English words are Ukrainianized. So, "mitynh" is rally [don't even get me started on the "h" and "g" issue] and "favoryt" or "lider" is front-runner.

On Inauguration Day, January 23, Mykyta posted a message:

"Sincere thanks to our translators! All of you contributed to this victory and it deservedly belongs to you as well. Without your work, we would not have be able to make this site what it is today. Sincere thanks to all of you! I know that you worked not for someone's gratitude, nor for money, nor for glory. You worked for your future (or that of your children or loved ones ...) or for principles. Please humbly accept our words as a symbol of our deep respect for you!

"Regrettably, I cannot list all the translators here because there are many, many of them. It was a great pleasure to work with each of you! Sometimes our coordination was a bit off, and your hard work was left unposted. I know that this [resulted in] an unpleasant feeling, but you did not throw stones at us but instead reacted to our problems with empathy. Again, I thank you for your productive cooperation and understanding!

"Likewise, I especially wish to thank all our editors - this is a complicated and difficult job for which people are normally highly paid. You worked for free, but as you see, not for naught! May our great success be our greatest thanks to you!

"However, I do not wish to bid you farewell with these words. We (and this is the collective thought of Maidan) do not consider the revolution as ending with the inauguration of the new president. The final chapter of the Orange Revolution will come when falsifiers [of the elections] are behind bars. Until then, the revolution continues! And the evolution of civil society has no end...

"On the behalf of Maidan Team, Mykyta."

One stage of the work is done. For President Viktor Yushchenko and his government, the hardest work is yet to come. The Maidan website continues its work. In fact, they declared that "from today, the Maidan site is changing its motto from 'The Pulse of Civic Opposition' to 'The Pulse of Civic Action.' The battle continues!"

I hope the readers of The Ukrainian Weekly will join the group of translators in this battle.

Maybe one day a grandchild will ask me: "What did you do in the Orange Revolution, Babuniu?" I'll be proud to reply that I participated, from an ocean and a continent away.

PS: Ukrainska Pravda also is looking for volunteers to translate even just a few paragraphs of news per week into English from Ukrainian and/or Russian. To see the news, go to http://www2.pravda.com.ua/. There is a link to the English page. Contact Serhiy Danylenko at danko2000@ukr.net for more information and to volunteer. Apart from donating money to the good causes of the Orange Revolution, translating is definitely a concrete way of helping.

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