“Hello, is this Relja? I am calling concerning your interpreting services for the adoption case with the _______ family.”
“Ah, yes, I’ve received the email a couple of weeks ago. So, when am I needed?”
“Er, today.”
“Er, today?”
“Yes. I’m dreadfully sorry, there’s been a mix-up, and, well, please, I desperately need an interpreter for today’s case!”
The middle-aged lady’s heavily-British-accented voice sounds very sincere, but far from desperate – she was very composed, pleasant even, and I will soon find out why – the work she does is anything but easy.
Luckily, I’m free at the time she needs me, and I decide to spend an hour or so at one of my favorite cafes, a quiet tea house, before meeting with her, in order to prepare myself, both mentally and with the necessary vocabulary.
I enter the cafe and go up the stairs to take my usual seat. One of the girls who work there is talking with some guy. I say hi to her and, out of courtesy, to him, thinking that they’re friends or something.
“Oh n-no, we don’t kn-know each o-o-ot-other, but now th-that we’ve m-met, wo-would you li-like to par-par-participate in a psy-psy-psychologi-ca-cal test I’m do-doing for my fa-faculty?”
I stop and try to think. I have a very delicate adoption case in which I’m the interpreter. I have less than an hour to do at least some rudimentary preparation (e.g. google some common technical terms in adoption issues and their Serbian translations etc.). It is imperative that I am mentally relaxed; somebody’s future greatly depends on how well I’ll translate their words. I am short on time, and the guy who wants me to do the test has a stutter.
“Ok.”
