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Freelance translator and/or interpreter, Verified member This translator helped to localize ProZ.com into Norwegian
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Source text - English When my wife told me she was pregnant, I got that stomach-churning sensation that hits you on a plunging roller coaster. I was excited, yes, but... oh my God. Parenting was for, well, parents.
So here I stand, bug-eyed and sweating buckets like some poorly-drawn cartoon character, the question marks floating in the air around my head while I try to prepare myself for the complete care and responsibility of another living being besides my cat. I'm responsible for making sure this little human doesn't grow up and turn into a complete monster. If the child turns out a social moron-- my fault. If the babe can't find Luxembourg on the map, blame me for not providing a better education. They'll need therapy, and of course that will be on my head too. So many opportunities for wrong turns!
I remember the day my father sat me down and awkwardly told me about the birds and the bees; it was perhaps the most excruciating and embarrassing half hour of both our lives. I can't do that to another human being.
Maybe I'm getting a little ahead of myself here. I can do this, I say; I'll be a great father. My child will be reared a well-rounded, educated, upstanding citizen of the world, and he or she won't hate me.
And then I imagine the baby, still safe within the confines of my wife's belly, suddenly opening an alarmed eye as the thought enters his or her mind: "What if my dad just can't hack it?
Translation - Norwegian Da min kone fortalte meg at hun var gravid, fikk jeg sommerfugler i magen akkurat som når du kjører berg-og-dal-bane. Jeg var spent, ja, men... herregud. Å bli foreldre var, vel, for foreldre.
Så her står jeg som et spørsmålstegn, med øyne på stilk og svetten rennende som om jeg var en annenrangs tegneseriefigur, mens jeg prøver å forberede meg på det hele og fulle ansvar for et annet levende vesen utenom katten min. Jeg er ansvarlig for at dette lille mennesket ikke vokser opp og blir et komplett monster. Hvis barnet blir en sosial taper - min feil. Hvis det ikke kan finne Luxemburg på kartet, så kan du skylde på meg for dårlig utdanning. De kommer til å trenge terapi og det er selvfølgelig min feil også. Så mye som kan gå galt!
Jeg husker den dagen da min far på nølende vis satte meg ned for å snakke om blomsten og biene; det var kanskje den mest uutholdelige og pinlige halvtimen i begge våres liv. Jeg kan aldri gjøre det mot et annet menneske.
Kanskje jeg er litt for tidlig på avtrekkeren her. Jeg kan klare dette, sier jeg til meg selv; Jeg kommer til å bli en god pappa. Mitt barn skal vokse opp med hodet på riktig plass, en utdannet og hederlig verdensborger, slik at han eller hun ikke kan hate meg senere.
Og så forestiller jeg meg at babyen, fortsatt trygt plassert i min kones mage, plutselig slår opp et øye og tenker letter bekymret: "Hva om fattern ikke takler dette?"
English to Norwegian: 6th ProZ.com Translation Contest - Entry #3493
Source text - English Eroticism has this in common with an addictive drug: that there is a coercive element to its pleasure with which part of us is in complicity, and part not. Thus ever since time began men have been trying to enjoy eroticism without being destroyed by it. Societies, religions can be defined in the way they deal with this conundrum. Polygamy, monogamy with repression, monogamy with affairs, monogamy with prostitutes, serial monogamy. Not to mention individual solutions of great ingenuity, or desperation: Victor Hugo with the door knocked through the wall of his office, to let in a girl each afternoon. Auden's flair for finding call-boys in every town. Picasso who simply refused when wife and mistress demanded he choose between them. Then there is always the hair-shirt of course. But perhaps the thing to remember when you wake up with a life full of fresh paint and tortuous complications is that eroticism wasn't invented for you, nor merely for the survival of the species perhaps, but for a divinity's entertainment. Nothing generates so many opportunities for titillation and schadenfreude as eroticism. Which is why it lies at the centre of so much narrative. How the gods thronged the balconies of heaven to see the consequences of Helen's betrayal! And your friends are watching too. Your antics have put the shine on many a late-night conversation.
On the borders between mythology and history, that wily survivor Odysseus was the first who learnt to trick the gods. And perhaps his smartest trick of all was that of lashing himself to the mast before the Sirens came in earshot. There are those of course who are happy to stand at the railings, even scan the horizon. Otherwise, choose your mast, find the ropes that suit you: sport, workaholism, celibacy with prayerbook and bell... But the kindest and toughest ropes of all are probably to be found in some suburban semi-detached with rowdy children and a woman who never allows the dust to settle for too long.
Translation - Norwegian Erotikk har dette til felles med et vanedannende narkotikum: med nytelse kommer avhengighet, og en del av oss liker det og en annen ikke. Derfor har menn siden tidenes morgen prøvd å nyte erotikk uten å la den ødelegge deres liv. Samfunn og religioner kan defineres etter måten de søker å løse dette problemet på. Polygami, monogami med undertrykkelse, monogami med sidesprang, monogami med prostituerte, seriemonogami. For ikke å glemme intrikate individuelle løsninger eller desperasjon: Victor Hugo med en "ekstra" kontordør for å kunne slippe inn ettermiddagens kvinnelige bekjentskap. Audens nese for mannlige eskorter i hver bidige by. Picasso som simpelthen nektet å velge mellom kone og elsker når de begge bad om det. Og så har vi selvfølgelig hårskjorten. Men kanskje det viktigste å huske når du våkner opp til en fargerik men problemfylt hverdag, er at erotikk ikke ble oppfunnet til glede for deg eller til videreføring av våre slekter, men mer som guddommelig underholdning. Ingenting medfører mer opphisselse og skadefryd enn erotikk. Det er også grunnen til at den er så sentral i mange fortellinger. Å hvordan gudene stimlet seg sammen på himmelbalkongene for å bevitne konsekvensene av Helens forræderi! Og dine venner følger nøye med også. Dine krumspring har livliggjort mang en samtale på sen nattestid.
På grensene mellom mytologi og historie var det en luring ved navn Odyssev som først lærte hvordan man kunne lure gudene. Det lureste han lærte var kanskje hvordan å surre seg fast til masten før han kunne høre sirenenes forlokkende kall. Det finnes de som trives best med å stå langs rekkverket, kanskje til og med skue utover horisonten. Hvis du ikke er en av dem, velg en mast og finn et passende tau: sport, arbeidsnarkoman, sølibat med bønnebok og klokke... Men de aller beste og samtidig sterkeste tauene kan mest sannsynlig finnes i et eller annet forstadsrekkehus med skrikende unger og en kvinne som vet hvordan man holder mannen sin fornøyd.
Fra: Eros, et essay av Tim Parks.
English to Norwegian: 7th ProZ.com Translation Contest - Entry #4877
Source text - English Winters used to be cold in England. We, my parents especially, spent them watching the wrestling. The wrestling they watched on their black-and-white television sets on Saturday afternoons represented a brief intrusion of life and colour in their otherwise monochrome lives. Their work overalls were faded, the sofa cover—unchanged for years—was faded, their memories of the people they had been before coming to England were fading too. My parents, their whole generation, treadmilled away the best years of their lives toiling in factories for shoddy paypackets. A life of drudgery, of deformed spines, of chronic arthritis, of severed hands. They bit their lips and put up with the pain. They had no option but to. In their minds they tried to switch off—to ignore the slights of co-workers, not to bridle against the glib cackling of foremen, and, in the case of Indian women, not to fret when they were slapped about by their husbands. Put up with the pain, they told themselves, deal with the pain—the shooting pains up the arms, the corroded hip joints, the back seizures from leaning over sewing machines for too many years, the callused knuckles from handwashing clothes, the rheumy knees from scrubbing the kitchen floor with their husbands' used underpants.
When my parents sat down to watch the wrestling on Saturday afternoons, milky cardamon tea in hand, they wanted to be entertained, they wanted a laugh. But they also wanted the good guy, just for once, to triumph over the bad guy. They wanted the swaggering, braying bully to get his come-uppance. They prayed for the nice guy, lying there on the canvas, trapped in a double-finger interlock or clutching his kidneys in agony, not to submit. If only he could hold out just a bit longer, bear the pain, last the course. If only he did these things, chances were, wrestling being what it was, that he would triumph. It was only a qualified victory, however. You'd see the winner, exhausted, barely able to wave to the crowd. The triumph was mainly one of survival.
Translation - Norwegian Vintrene pleide å være kalde i England. Vi, og særlig mine foreldre, tilbrakte dem med å se på wrestling. Wrestling på svart/hvitt-TV lørdag ettermiddag representerte et lite innslag av liv og farge i en ellers så fargeløs hverdag. Arbeidsklærne deres var falmet, sofatrekket - det samme år etter år - var falmet, minnene om hvem de var før de kom til England var i ferd med å falme også. Mine foreldre, hele generasjonen deres, slet bort de beste årene av livet sitt i en fabrikk for slikk og ingenting. Et liv med slit og strev, med deformerte ryggrader, med kronisk leddgikt, med avkuttede hender. De bet tennene sammen og svelget smerten. De hadde intet annet valg. I tankene prøvde de å koble ut - å overse fornærmelser fra medarbeidere, ikke bli irritert over den nedsettende kaklingen til formennene, og i tilfellet indiske kvinner, ikke vise misnøye med å bli slått av ektemannen. Du må tåle smerte, sa de til seg selv, lev med smerten - smerter som skyter opp armene, ryggsmerter fra å lene seg over symaskinen i mange år, fortykkede knokler grunnet håndvasking av klær, vann i knærne etter skrubbing av kjøkkengulv med mannens underbukser.
Når foreldrene mine satte seg ned, med en kopp te med kardemomme og melk i, for å se på wrestling en lørdags ettermiddag, ønsket de å bli underholdt, de ønsket å le. Men de ønsket også at godhet, for en gangs skyld, skulle overvinne ondskap. De ønsket at den brautende bøllen endelig skulle få som fortjent. De ba om at godhetens representant, som lå på matten fastlåst i den onde motstanderens armgrep eller som holdt seg til nyrene i smerte, ikke skulle gi opp. Hvis han bare kunne holde ut litt lenger, svelge smerten, gå hele distansen ut. Hvis han bare klarte dette, wrestling var jo wrestling, så var sjansen der for at han kunne vinne. Men det var dog bare en delvis seier. Du kunne se at vinneren, totalt utslitt, knapt kunne vinke til publikum. Den virkelige triumfen var at han fremdeles var i live.
Language and translation has always been my passion, and this is reflected in my education and work experience from Norway, USA and Australia.
As a native Norwegian living in the US, I translate exclusively from English into Norwegian. I have a highly recognized degree in translation, a master's degree in communication, SDL Trados Studio and Post-Editing certification, and Memsource certification. I am also a ProZ.com Certified Pro. In my 16 years of translation experience, I have worked with clients from all over the world on media/film/television, travel/tourism and marketing/PR texts, and by using my services you will get a qualified and reliable linguist who will return a quality product on time.
I am also a member of American Translator Association and a volunteer for Translators without Borders.
CV available upon request only. Thank you for considering me for your next project!
Kind regards,
Toralf Mjelde
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Member since Aug '07
Toralf Mjelde 
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