Expert Multilingual Translator – My linguistic journey.

Someone recently asked me how I could speak so many languages. Languages are my absolute passion and this has prompted me to share my linguistic journey with you and to explain how I came to acquire all these languages.

Growing up with South Sotho

I grew up in the small mountainous Kingdom of Lesotho, formerly known as Basutoland and which is well known for its conical hats. By the age of five, I was fluent in both South Sotho and English.

The grammatical structure of South Sotho differs totally from European languages. Basically nouns are classified according to their prefixes which determine the grammatical relationship between the head noun and the rest of the sentence.

Take for example the following sentence: “The Basotho people live in Lesotho” – “Batho ba Basotho ba phela Lesotho.” You can see how the prefix of the head noun “Batho” determines the sentence.

The French experience

I was shipped off to boarding school at the age of 9 – a very bleak place indeed with very Victorian principles. The only thing that brightened my days there was my French lessons.

Our French teacher, affectionately known as “Madame,” was a jovial woman who had a great love for food. She taught us about “mousse au chocolat”, “escargots” and “cuisses de grenouille” (frog legs).

We adored her accent and often burst into laughter whenever she scolded my friend Jane: “Jeanne, you must not sit like a froooog.” I learned to sing the French anthem, “La Marseillaise,” before I even knew my own national anthem.

Madame’s passion for French ignited my love for the language and inspired me to pursue learning more languages. By the age of 13, I knew I wanted to become a translator.

After high school, I spent a year in French-speaking Switzerland, attending Ecole Bleu Léman on the shores of Lake Geneva to polish my French before taking the Alliance Française exams at Annecy University in France. By then, I was already speaking French fluently and began offering French Translation & Editing services.

Acquiring Italian and German

I then began my undergraduate studies in African linguistics, French, German, and Italian, ultimately majoring in French and German. During the holidays, I attended intensive language courses at the Goethe Institute in Germany, spending four weeks each time fully immersed in the language while staying with German families in Prien am Chiemsee and Rosendal.

I made firm friends in Germany who I visited for a number of years thereafter, laying the foundation for German Translation & Editing.

Translation studies

After completing my Master’s degree in translation, specializing in Medical & Pharmaceutical Translations in French and German, I returned to Lausanne, Switzerland, to complete a two-year multilingual business course in French, German, and English.

I had to learn Swiss accounting principles and basic law, which significantly contributed to my Legal Translations services. Even though I studied in the French-speaking part of Switzerland, I lived with a German family to maintain my German skills.

Spanish becomes a passion

While working for GTZ, the German Development Agency, I started learning Spanish, which quickly became a passion. Once I had saved enough money, I spent a year in Spain, living with a fisherman’s family in the small village of Nerja. The family did not speak one word of English so I was really forced to speak Spanish on a daily basis.

I attended an intensive language course at a little school nearby and later prepared for and passed the State Spanish Proficiency examination at Salamanca University in the North of Spain. As you may well know Salamanca University was founded in 1134 and is the oldest existing institution in Spain. It is well known as the guardian of the Castilian language, which reinforced my expertise in Spanish Translation & Editing.

At the beginning of my career, I worked in French-speaking companies like Degrémont (water and wastewater company), SAUR International (also a water and wastewater company), as well as AFD (Agence française de Développement), where I used French daily.

Portuguese added to my repertoire

After my children were born I decided to become a freelance translator and over the past twenty years I’ve translated texts from Spanish, French, Italian, and German into English.

Recently, I’ve added Portuguese to my repertoire, having studied it for the past three years to the point where I can now produce quality translations into English. This expansion has allowed me to offer Portuguese Translation & Editing services as well.

Keeping up with my languages

You might wonder how I maintain all these languages. I dedicate an hour each day to studying Italian, Portuguese, or Spanish, often using the “DuoLingo” app. It allows me to practise anywhere—on a train, plane, or even in a dentist’s waiting room. The little owl, “Duo,” keeps me motivated with reminders to maintain my 1,300-day study streak!

I also speak to French and German clients on a regular basis and have colleagues and friends who are French-speaking. Once a year I hike in a country where I can speak the language. This year it was a 7-day hike in Tuscany, Italy.

The guides were delighted that I had taken the trouble to learn to speak their language. I was also able to converse with the locals in the small villages and to get to know them on a more intimate basis and not just as a passing foreign tourist.

What is the next stage of my linguistic journey

My linguistic journey is far from over. Once I’ve truly mastered Portuguese, I plan to dive into a new language. I’m still deciding which one—perhaps something entirely different, which will take me out of my depths like Chinese, Japanese, or Arabic. The adventure continues!

Feel free to contact me should you require Scientific & Technical Translations, Legal Translations, or Medical & Pharmaceutical Translations in any of the above languages. I would be happy to have a Zoom call with you.