Last week we got placed in a new office and started working more directly with the Harvard students and the rest of the people at the office. Last week consisted of us starting on translation projects. I had never really translated anything officially before. I've translated from Albanian into English and vice versa for friends and family, but never formally. This was a very new experience for me and the other girls. Figured out that translating takes a looong time and you need to know the two languages really well. It was a little difficult at first and it took way longer than I anticipated but it was really cool to see the finished product. We've done a few other translations since then and it's great to see how much faster we get at translating. Translating has also been a great opportunity for me to learn the Albanian language a lot better. On the other hand our other tasks have been us working together with others in the ministry on various projects to try to make things easier and more efficient for them. All in all it's been a very good experience, especially for me because I've thought about working in the government and this is giving me a real taste of government in developing nations works. A lot of the stuff I've learned in my classes seem to apply here and the theories that we learn about in class come to light.
On the more cultural side we decided to explore the city more and get a feel of what life is like. We wanted to try some food places because we had been cooking at home and wanted to change things up a little bit. The first place we went to and fell in love with was "Era Picera." This place had traditional Albanian food and Italian food but I wanted to stick to the Albanian stuff. We also found a little crepe place near our apartment that had the most amazing crepes. Here's some pictures of the food we ate!
Petulla të fshira me djath – Crepes with cheese & garlic
Fërgesë tigani (speca të pjekur, domate, djathë i bardhë, gjizë fshati, hudhra, majdanos) – Grilled peppers, tomatoes, white cheese, curds, garlic and parsley
Pilaf me pulë e fara pishe – Chicken and rice with pine nuts
Rice drizzled with beef broth
Crepe with prosciutto.
Kledia,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading about your experiences at work. I've only had a few (informal) experiences with translating and I thought that was difficult. That is really great that you're noticing that you are getting faster and faster. I bet your language skills have improved so much! Are you using any type of software/technology to help you translate?
The food pictures are amazing... and so appetizing. I'm hungry now! The chicken, rice, and pinenut meal seems/looks like something I would really enjoy. Well, everything does really.
Keep up with the wonderful posts. I'm looking forward to your post about 6/8-6/14!
Best,
Tammy