The Boy with a Cervix

1st Version - "The Boy with a Cervix"

Kairos: Talking about peoples' jobs/careers. My goal in telling is to give people a laugh (safely because I am the punch line).

When I first wanted to start interpreting, I took a professional course where I received formal ethics and skills training. When I graduated from the course, I understood basic interpreting concepts and could interpret many words that I didn’t know by using techniques I had learned. I was working in the emergency department at the time our story takes place. A family had been involved in an auto accident and had come to the hospital to be checked up; no one had been hurt badly. The patients who suffered from the worst pain were the mother and the teenaged son. They were sent for X-rays and eventually given a strong dosage of Ibuprofen. When the nurse had received the doctor’s orders I was called back into the room to interpret the discharge instructions.

“The doctor’s diagnosis is a cervical sprain,” she said.

Now, I was not sure what a cervical sprain was but I had the skills to interpret it; but I messed up. The ending in English “-al” also exists in Spanish but I wasn’t 100% sure that cervical translated that way. I knew that cervical came from the word cervix because I knew the term “cervical cancer.” All of this went through my head in about 1.25 seconds and had to make a decision.

I interpreted, “El diagnóstico del doctor es esguince de la cerviz.”

Literal back-translation of what I interpreted would be “sprained cervix.” Wrong. At the time of this unfortunate translation mishap, I sometimes relied on patients to correct me or to at least ask questions if my interpreting was lacking (it usually wasn’t). But that day when I told a mother and her teenaged son (a boy) that they had sprained their cervixes, there was not a single look of doubt on their faces. They left without expressing any sort of concern to anyone at the hospital. To this day I do not know if that poor boy believes he had a sprained cervix but what I do know now is that I can, with confidence, use “-al” as a cognate in Spanish/English interpretation.

[349 words]

2nd Version - "Jorge has a Hoo-hah"

Kairos: Talking about the professionalism of translation/interpreting. The purpose is to emphasize the importance of maintaining skills by creating a possible outcome for the mistake 

“Pin*** gringo pendejo,” thought Jorge as he walked across the middle school field. It wasn’t quite time for the students to go home yet, but Jorge was so embarrassed, so angry that he didn’t care if he got another detention. Ever since his parents moved his family to Naches, Washington, he had hated school, hated the stupid town, and, most of all, hated English [Climax].

Jorge had been involved in a car accident that weekend. Nobody was seriously injured, but his mom’s car was totaled and Jorge’s neck was really hurting. At 12 pm noon today, Jorge was supposed to take the medicine the doctor had prescribed for the pain. When Jorge got out his medicine, however, the teacher became upset and questioned him in front of the class.

“Why are you taking drugs in class [Auxesis]? Did you get this approved by the nurse?”

“I don’t know. We had a accident. And my neck hurts very bad.”

“These are prescription drugs for your mother, not you! Don’t lie to me.” [Documents]

“I don’t lie! My mom hurt too!”

“What did the doctor say was your injury then?”

“He say I have sprain my cervix.”

“Now I know you’re lying, Jorge! Boys don’t have a cervix, only girls!” [Genus][Ellipsis]

Jorge could feel his face heating up and an icy chill shoot through his kidneys [Metonymy]. “The man at the hospital told me I had a sprained cervix,” he thought. Some of white boys that played American football started chanting, “Jorge has a hoo-hah! [Parallelism][Alliteration]” Jorge grabbed his bag and stormed out the door in a rage of embarrassment before the teacher could reprimand the young jocks [Synecdoche] and tell Jorge to sit back down.

The heavy school doors flung open at Jorge’s forceful shove. He thought, “I hate gringos. I’ll never trust them [Impossible]. I’d be better off dead than being told I’m a girl from some stupid gringo at the hospital” [Degree]. He wasn’t sure where to go from here, but he wouldn’t stop walking. He held back tears as he headed out across the middle school field. 

[349 words]