Somewhere out there, if this video reaches someone in the world, and it touches their heart with hope and relief, if that happens, then that is worth all our effort made for this video!

After Thanksgiving, we spent quite some time working on this video. There was a lot of thinking involved in order to make the video exactly the way that we wanted it to be: hopeful and gentle in the new year!

The video has 6 slides, but it can be considered to be 2 parts. The first part with 3 slides is the reflection of our thoughts about changes, challenges, and how to face them. Our answers came out to be to embrace them, to seek the best of the situation, and to tackle them with a comfortable pace.

The second set of another 3 slides is about taking action. The music stops after the first 3 slides and plays again at the 4th. Everything is awakened. It’s about how tomorrow will be better, and the new year will be full of hope, joy, and success.

The pictures of nature are taken from our surroundings. They’ve touched our hearts and serve as inspirations that will guide us along the new year. These simple and soft pictures indicate what we foresee 2025 to be like, and sets the path for the next year.

The first photo: Light is cast on the mountain top and turns the mountain top from green to golden, which signifies magnificent opportunities to come.

The second photo: It’s an image that coincides with the idea of us taking a comfortable stroll into the new year.

The third photo: The text is displayed between clouds, which embraces the message of changes. A rainbow is also a great symbol stretching towards a bright future.

The fourth photo: This is a picture of dawn taken by us, which is filled with hope and beauty.

The music is relaxing, calming, and reflective, which matches our theme perfectly. Every slide is on the beat and not too strong. The music stops at the end of the first set and starts again distinguishes this year from next year.

The video is a collective expression of Monterey Language Services. Through our expression, we hope to make connections with those who come pass our path. We wish everyone a wonderful and successful 2025 and it is filled with optimism and opportunities for growth.

We also have a traditional and simplified Chinese version, which is very convenient for people to greet each other in the new year with positive, uplifting messages.

Following the celebration sound at the end slide, we open the door to the new year! Happy Holidays, Happy 2025, and Happy New Year!

Flipbook Link: https://heyzine.com/flip-book/295aedfedf.html

How did the idea come up?

One of the participating interpreters Sasha commented: The thought of coming up with such a book is already an achievement.

That’s right, the idea to give advice to future interpreters didn’t occur to us until after having completed a series we did that compared professional interpreters to AI.

Starting from Interpreters and Music to Interpreters and Voices (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO-QGEbwcTr2MdhbLPPGszMw8Rdc5J9aI), the 12 videos we’ve made in 6 months led us to a certain question:

• How are we going to pass the torch on to the future interpreters in the era of AI?”
• We began thinking about if it was possible for us to share advice to encourage the future of our industry.

Who did we reach out to?

This subject is bigger than our company (Monterey Language Services), so we reached out across the globe to various colleagues in the field to ask them what kind of advice they would give to future generations.

Judging by the number of quality, in-depth, and complete responses we received, it seems that our idea to seek out advice from colleagues was a step in the right direction.

Navigating the complex undertaking

Martha graciously shared the medal she was awarded for writing the bilingual publication. It was very inspirational and taught us that we can learn to open our mind beyond interpretation assignments! It awakened our awareness of our role and responsibilityto disseminate the value of our heritage to other language speakers.

As a result, we decided to pursue putting a face to their quotes and deliver even more layers of information to the project, and that thought has really elevated the project and made everything more intriguing!

Captions and pictures

We are totally in awe to receive amazing one-line captions, such as:

• Bing’s regarding “the wealth of information disguised as language”
• Lenne’s regarding eye contact on the job. Lenne brought it to our attention that there are many different theories as to how long to maintain eye contact and where to look while talking to someone vs. What an eye-opening piece of feedback from Lenne!
• When we received Elizabeth’s picture with lots of beautiful divine light on her face, we were blown away. She explained that her husband took that picture as she was preparing for prayer ministry at a Christian retreat.
• Elizabeth gave us 3 options for captioning. We picked one, but her other two are equally powerful:
• A peaceful heart helps our minds connect the right words. Don’t be overwhelmed; rely on help from above.
• The key to quick recall of obscure terminology is the peaceful alertness of a watchman.

Our director of translation, Mei-Ling, cannot agree more with Elizabeth that feeling peaceful is the way to cope with uncertainty or obscure situations that we often face at work. It’s at those times that we should take some time, get some space, clear our minds, and seek inspiration. Once we find our inner peace, we will know what to do and understand that things will work out.

• Virginia’s holiday picture from her family is an invaluable contribution because, not only is it the only picture in the book with more than just one person, but it also shows how important it is to have a support system behind every one of us, let it be your family, friends, colleagues, or a professional team.

Collaborating with others and not fighting alone are very moving pieces of advice, and can really help one to progress. The flipbook is testimony to that. After all, so many passionate professionals in the industry came out in full force to support, not only this project, but the future of our industry as well.

• Pictures of Ruth, Layla, Jose, and Mei-Ling show that doing extra-curricular activities actually sharpen your mind and thoughts and make us a stronger and better interpreters!
• The pictures from Rania, Elizabeth (Love What You Do), Lisa, Paulo, and Maria show core elements, skills, and practical tactics required of interpreters.

Last, but not least, we also would like to give thanks to Rania’s contribution. Thanks to her summary of all the major advice, everything fell right into place, which we couldn’t appreciate more. We are proud to echo what Bing says–  “the flipbook is well designed and exceptionally inspiring,” what Elizabeth says – “I am sure it will be a blessing to newcomers and seasoned professionals alike.”

Conclusion: AI vs. Humans

Finally, the conclusion of the flipbook is on pages 14, 15, and 16.

• On page 14, Helena and Sasha identify the elephant in the room –
• Then on page 15, Vanessa challenges AI saying – “if you interpret/translate like a machine, a machine could take your job, but if you bring your humanity into the work, you can really stand out.”
• On page 16, Jose further concludes that –
  “In our fast-paced digital world, the intrinsic human qualities of empathy and warmth remain indispensable in interpretation.”
• “So, continue honing your skills and nurturing those invaluable soft skills – they are your most powerful tools in this profession!”

We were amazed to see that the interpreters provided different perspectives on AI and Humans, and echoed each other so well! The participating interpreters’ conclusion coincides with what Monterey Language Services is convinced of after making 12 videos to compare the performances of professional interpreters to AI.

Wonderful insight and advice

The messages from all these accomplished interpreters with their fingers on the pulse of the industry, with their heartfelt words and their pictures – it’s all really come together to make something special that we’re excited to share with whomever needs to hear it, especially during this time of uncertainty.

We love the awesome quote from Bing “the wealth of information disguised as language”. There’s so much information coded in language, and it’s up to us as interpreters to decode it for others to understand, which is something that machines still fail to master.

We clearly see a bright future for those interested in becoming translators or interpreters! So keep calm and keep going!

“Keep calm and keep going” is a powerful reminder for everyone. Don’t get too much into your head or scramble for a fix, or rush to make progress. Just stay calm, do what you have to do, and carry on. With time, everything will turn out well, naturally. Thanks to Lenne for providing the perfect ending for such a complex undertaking that, as Martha put it, will benefit everyone in the world of languages.

Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yl0vHQPHXA8

Though the industry has been working to have AI better replicate emotion, the current AI is still very monotonous and one-note in terms of its ability to express emotion. As our Chinese colleague Yingjie, who has been involved in natural language AI, commented: It is too early to talk about AI mimicking human emotions.

Exactly because diversity and richness have been the areas where humans outperform AI, this behind the scenes post will be unavoidable lengthier than our usual blogs. In other words, we would like to take the time to discuss diversity and richness and focus on the human side of stories rather than music genres or instruments.

When Mei-Ling casually recorded herself during a relaxing weekend, her intention was for this to serve as a demo for interpreters to participate in and show that the contributions can be just as light and candid as hers. She didn’t expect the video to be so diversified at the global level.

An ASL interpreter Kendra gave us the initial idea to include interpreters whose native language is ASL and interpreters of color. Originally, she was thinking to represent our local bay area communities. But then it was only natural that it evolved to include greater representation of the world communities. Besides interpreters from all over the United States including Hawaii, we have participation from China, Congo-Brazzaville, Egypt, and Israel.

We are so honored to have received contributions from all types: freshly recorded contributions from Davy, Fadhma, Oscar, and Mei-Ling just for this project; good times contributions from Qianxi, Sameh, Flower, and Nia; nostalgic contributions from Christy and Soheir; formal and elegant performances from Laura and Ayumi. Last but certainly not least, Jody contributed an easy-to-understand ASL presentation, and Sharon for giving us such a powerful contribution that we, as members of the global community, can all relate to. What a wonderful group of interpreters!

As you may have noticed, we have kept the audience very busy all the way: They have to watch clips, hear music, read storylines, listen to words from interpreters as well as from voices in the background, think about messages delivered, and all of these are meant to be done simultaneously. This is because we want to create an opportunity for the audience to experience what an interpreter has to go through when interpreting. After all, interpretation does require a bit of talent!

It’s natural to think that interpreters and music are all about performances. However, our perception changed after we received Fadhma’s contribution. We realized that it helped balance what we have been doing, which is listening. It cannot be understated the diversity that Fadhma brought to the project and how she expanded our horizons.

We are also so proud that we have the younger generation’s participation. Oscar’s son, Santiago, sings, plays the piano and the ukelele. Interestingly, he has occasionally interpreted spontaneously for family and relatives, and he is good according to Oscar. In Santiago, we see the hope of our profession and believe the interpretation profession will continue to prevail over AI for many years to come. In addition to Oscar and his son’s duet, we were blown away to watch the contribution from Davy with 3 sons during their family time. Davy’s 3 sons are so adorable, moving along with the music rhythm so naturally that I see the future of our beautiful world in the children of music lovers like Davy. What a beautiful family from Congo-Brazzaville!

Sharon has a huge heart to write such lyrics in her original song Safe Harbor: “No matter what your faith might be, the color of your skin, who you love or who you flee, I will take you in.”  These words cover the full span for world peace and harmony. We are glad to have Sharon whose lyrics have added breadth and depth to this video project!

Flower was celebrating her major birthday and decided the theme to be “Around the World.” We are so appreciative of the richness that has flown out of her clips. The presentation of Mexican, Spanish, American, and Chinese elements in the song, dance, and outfits is both culturally and visually global. What a music and cultural feast to share with us!

Sameh is an Egyptian residing in Egypt and was giving training in Kenya at the African Translators Association. In his singing, we hear “mighty place to be”, so we inserted a scenery background of Kenya, which adds the exotic feel that interpreters experience when they travel to places for assignments. Sameh did professional singing during his last 2 years at college, and he does a lot of styles, ranging from country music to jazz, that explain why he sang so freely and we really enjoy it and admire him!

We cannot thank Nia enough for selecting such a great song for the world community. It perfectly concluded the video project that we have explained in our Part 1 Behind the Scenes blog post. We’d like to thank Qianxi for thinking of us while having a good time during a karaoke party on a small island in south-eastern China. We thank Jody for providing such a wonderful piece for everyone to understand, a clip of her ASL interpretation performance of the star spangled banner. We also want to express our heartfelt thanks to the nostalgia and wonderful past that Christy and Soheir’s contributions did, bringing us back in time and allowing us to relive the past. We would also be remiss if we didn’t give a fond shoutout to Laura and Ayumi’s performances, which represented some of the finest and most expressive types of music, played at the highest level. All of these interpreters have brought the video to a broader, and higher level, ultimately adding much more enjoyment to the audience. Thank you so much!

Every individual contribution represents how the human brain works. We didn’t dictate what each individual would do in their contribution. It was completely up to them and their free choice. And yet, all of the individual contributions have aggregated as a whole to give us a very good sense of our mission and what we are capable of as professional interpreters. As Oscar put it, how uplifting and positive for us all as interpreters!

And then, we wondered what would happen if this topic was taken by an AI without any intervention—what would an AI party resemble without human intervention? Would it be as diversified and rich, or as enjoyable and heartfelt, or as uplifting and positive for us all as interpreters, as if it’d been done solely by humans and their individuality?

Video Link: https://youtu.be/yl0vHQPHXA8

After watching the video, don’t you go thinking that we only sing and dance as interpreters! One of the interpreters featured in the video, Fadhma, was so inspirational with her words, and prompted us to write the behind the scenes story.

Interpretation is such an abstract concept, so we were trying to figure out how we could explain it. Ultimately, we realized that we could demonstrate it using something relatable and timeless like music. It’s something that everyone is familiar with and likes. This is why we link interpreters to music and we are proud to say that through the collaboration of our fellow interpreters around the world, we have vividly drawn various analogies between our interpretation profession and music.

That’s right! The role of interpreters is as important as music to all of us! In the video, we pose a question: Imagine what the world would be like without interpreters? And then the voice on the background answers to it exactly “on all those faces, what do they say?” We are amazed by how our colleague Hina has wonderfully found that line of monologue from one of Nia’s contributions. That basic answer provides the core foundation for our mission as interpreters.

We then asked a Chat AI: Answer simply on what the world would be like without interpreters? The answer was: Without interpreters, the world would face significant communication barriers and misunderstandings. Interactions between people speaking different languages would become extremely challenging, hindering international cooperation, business transactions, and cultural exchange. Traveling and understanding different cultures would also become more difficult, resulting in a more isolated and divided world.

The Chat AI’s reply is decent, but it is insufficient as it only gives an answer about the consequences. How do you go straight to the core like a professional interpreter in answering the question and allowing us to use the answer in a fast yet must catch all video? This is one aspect in the production that professional interpreters can distinguish ourselves from AI!

We cannot stress enough the significance of interpreters weaving diversity and unity through communities. Again, the video background voice champions and answers right to the heart – “Yeah…ah! The colors of the rainbow, so pretty… in the sky.” The hues of the rainbow so unbelievably fit into the messages we would like to deliver, and we felt like they are a godsend.

This video has certainly re-ignited our sense of mission and the mission must go on even further in spite of AI technophobia. AI is capable, but then can AI interpret our tones, our feelings, our energy, our life, our passion, our emotions, and our sense of mission that professional interpreters have shared? Seeing this video, we are reminded once again that interpreters who are full of life with a good sense of mission will continue to prevail over AI! We are thrilled and honored to connect with all the amazing interpreters in the world! At this point of conclusion, the messages of the video become clear that these are real life, real energy, real interpreters, and real interpretation that AI can not replace, at least not in our lifetime! Being surrounded by the predominant AI waves today, this video serves as a therapeutic piece to relax the minds of human interpreters, so let’s go sing and dance!

This graphic novel project is part a type of new media, a pioneering effort by a handful of creators in search of a new medium for presenting art, story, voice, and music. A pool of talents was gathered for an old-fashioned romantic adventure with elements of Arabian Nights, Cinderella, and the Shangri-la myth. The story depicts a romantic adventure that spans modern-day New York City and the ancient, fictional country of Gao in China. In the midst of modern and old, fiction and non-fiction, West and East, English and Mandarin, romance and mystery, the graphic novel indeed is exotic to watch.

The work has been produced into ten video chapters. To give you a glimpse of our translation work, among what has been published: Chapter 3 has the most translation voices so far. The significant amount of Mandarin presented among English voices indeed makes the graphic novel stand out as a unique and interesting entertainment piece!

Monterey Language Services took extra time to polish the translations into Simplified Chinese to ensure not only accuracy, but an enjoyable and colloquial read for native speakers. Some of the challenges for this project were derived from cultural differences in how to translate certain phrases created specifically for the graphic novel.

For example, we have the “golden doom,” which refers to a specific event in the story. Because the event transports people similarly to the Christian idea of the rapture, our translation was “极乐升天,” which means “bliss ascension” in Chinese language.

One more example of the cultural challenge is rooted in English homonyms. The sentence: “They follow the standard of Lord Kang and swear on his eyes.” In this sentence, what does “standard” mean? If we suggested “average or normal requirement,” it actually would be incorrect! “Standard” in this instance means a battle flag—something ancient soldiers would follow on the battlefield.

Another difficulty was dealing with the ambiguity of written words. In spoken English, a person’s tone can very easily denote sincerity or sarcasm — consider the phrase “good job” being spoken sincerely and being spoken sarcastically, and their meanings become very different. While the context and illustrations in graphic novels can alleviate this confusion in text, sometimes the tone could be just missed. One such problem occurred in our initial translation of “What a stunt,” a line which our translator took be said in admiration, when in actuality, it was an insult. Through our editing/reviewing process we discovered the issue, and the translation was changed from “真是好身手” (really good) to “真有一套,” which has a similar meaning in a more sarcastic tone.

We are incredibly proud of the work we were able to provide for this project, and would like to add more viewing pleasure and excitement by sharing the above behind-the-scenes glimpses to our translation work. We wish all the success to the audience and contributors to the graphic novel. The chapters will be published in video format weekly on YouTube until the tenth and final one is uploaded.

The Athletes in the Spotlight
Thinking back to the London Olympic Games this past summer, the elegant divers and agile gymnasts delivered near-perfect performances in front of the world and left millions in awe. While we appreciate the outstanding performances of these athletes, it is very easy to overlook the thousands of hours and the sheer amount of energy they devoted for their brief moment under the spotlight.

The Translators and Interpreters behind the Scenes
Translators and interpreters are, in many ways, similar to Olympic athletes. In the interpreting booth, conference interpreters work 20-minute segments, performing their “sport.” And behind the clear, informative message generated in this 20 minutes are thousands of hours spent on professional training, developing vocabulary, and public speaking skills. Translators, too, have to spend many years polishing their language and writing skills in order to deliver work of utmost quality.

Quality through the Pursuit of Perfection
While Olympians can enjoy the attention and spotlight, translators and interpreters, more often than not, remain behind the scenes. This, however, does not stop these linguists from perfecting their skills. Many translators and interpreters are on a journey of lifelong learning, continuously and meticulously honing their skills for quality performances. The “mental workout” that these linguists go through can be as strenuous as athletic training. So if the opportunity arises, remember to recognize those seemingly nameless interpreters and commend them for their hard work. Because in way, they are just as amazing as Olympic athletes.

Monterey Language Services strives to provide the highest quality of translation and interpretation services. Please feel free to contact us for more information.

This think quality story brought to you by our team member Ringo Li.