Nihonshu (sake) has been my hobby for a few years and finally, after a lot of dithering, I decided to get myself a sake qualification🍶

There are a lot of courses and qualifications available that come at varying prices and with varying time commitments.
I chose the Sake Service Institute's International Kikisake-shi (国際唎酒師) because the SSI offers a correspondence course that meant I could study at home at my own pace. It also sounds kind of cool😎

The course comes with a 300 page textbook but thanks to participating in numerous online events over the past 18 months, and the Monday night Taste With The Toji sessions in particular, not a lot of the information was new to me so the main challenges were finding time to complete the assignments and deciphering some of the slightly dodgy English in the textbook🤣

At the end of a recent online tour, organized by Autabi, a small Tokyo-based travel agent that specializes in tours to meet producers and people living in rural areas and a group set up to promote three of Japan's taro soups, the participants were tested on how well they had been paying attention during the tour and their knowledge of taro soup. Participants who got 10 of the 15-question test answers corrected were awarded a Taro Soup Master Certificate.
I got 14 answers correct so am now a Taro Soup Master!!!

During the tour we visited Nakayama in Yamagata Prefecture, Tsuwano in Shimane Prefecture, and Ozu in Ehime Prefecture, all areas famous for growing taro, and learnt about how the soup differs between the regions.

日本三大芋煮マスターになりました
先日参加したオンラインツアーは日本三大芋煮連絡協議会とのコラボで企画されました。山形県中山町、島根県津和野町と愛媛県大洲市を訪ねて、町探検と芋煮について教えてもらいました。そして、ツアーの最後にマスター認定試験が行われました。各地域や芋煮についての試験でした。

During an online networking session with fellow translators I debuted my Zoom business card virtual background.
A few people noticed it, so I thought I would explain more about here.

Over the last few months I have spent quite a lot of time on Zoom. I use a webcam placed on top of my monitor, which faces the back of my office - a counter and whiteboard-cum-noticeboard which, while not untidy is somewhat unsightly (I wasn't expecting anyone to peek into my world when I designed the layout!)

Luckily Zoom has a virtual background feature.
This is my go-to background that I use in social and non-work related zoom sessions.










It is a picture of my garden, taken in early May, before rainy season killed off my petunias.

In August I read a blog post written by an interpreter about using more professional looking backgrounds:

The article includes a link to a YouTube video on how to create your own Zoom business card.
Essentially the background is a PowerPoint slide, saved as a jpeg file.

As a translator I interact with my clients mostly by email, with the odd (very occasional) phone call, and most work-related seminars are webinars in which participants' cameras are turned off. This means that most of my Zoom endeavors do not require a professional background.

My husband, however, gives online seminars and regularly participates in online meetings with clients. So much so that he has set up another desk in our bedroom so that he is not talking all day in our office and I can concentrate on my work (and without having to worry about accidentally appearing on his webcam).

So, making a business card seemed like a great idea but also a bit of a hassle so I came up with a cunning plan to get my husband to make one and give it to me to adjust for my own use.

I sent him a link to the blog post and "suggested" to him that he ABSOLUTELY must have a Zoom business card. Luckily he read the article and agreed, so he watched the video and set about making his PowerPoint slide. At which point I asked "was it hard to make?" and he offered to give me his slide. SUCCESS!
(he tells me that the YouTube video is actually pretty amazing, and filled with excellent advice!)

After the networking session I added some more information to the card.
I'm not convinced of the need for a QR code given that most people I interact with a likely to be using a PC to access the internet (which is why I added a URL to my card) so I might tweak the card at a later date.

This is it, together with my husband's:

I wrote an article on legal translation in the July 2019 edition of the Tsuyaku Honyaku Journal (Link) published by Ikaros.

通訳翻訳ジャーナル 2019年7月号(リンク）に法務翻訳についての記事を書かせていただきました。

よろしければ、アマゾンでお買い求めください！

May 1, 2019 saw the start of new era, both for Japan and for Orian.
Orian entered its second decade in business and moved to a new address, hence commencing the "Nerima Era".

Both the start of the Reiwa era in Japan and the start of the Nerima era for Orian have resulted in a fair amount of admin work.

The start of Reiwa means I need to update my macros and Word add-ins so that I can automatically convert Japanese dates to Western dates. This is a bit of a pain as I set up the macros so long ago that can't remember where they all are...(^^;

This is the macro I use:
https://www.wordvbalab.com/code/10313/

While my accountant took care of most of the official procedures for changing the company address such as contacting the Legal Affairs Bureau, there is still quite a lot that I needed to do myself, such as informing the tax and pension offices, my bank, the post office, clients, not to mention updating the address on estimates, invoices, email signatures, and envelopes, ordering new business cards and an address stamp and so on...

This is the third time Orian has moved and it should also be the final move!

5月1日は日本とオリアンにとって、新しい時代の始まりでした。
オリアンは11年目に入り、練馬区に引越しました。

日本の新元号への変更と会社の住所変更とにより、様々な事務作業が発生しました。

新元号への変更でも和暦を西暦に自動的に変換できるように、マクロとWordアドインを更新する必要がありました。
ずっと前にマクロを設定したので、マクロの更新方法を忘れてしまって少し面倒でした(^-^;

私が使っているマクロ（の一つ）はこちらです：
https://www.wordvbalab.com/code/10313/

顧問会計士は法務局への届出などの住所変更の一通りの手続きをしてくれましたが、自分でやるべきことがたくさんありました。税務署、年金機構、銀行、郵便局、顧客への新住所の連絡や、 見積書、請求書、電子メールの署名、封筒の住所の更新、新しい名刺や住所印の注文などなど・・・。

オリアンの引越しは今回で3回目であり、これが最後の引越しになると思います。

新しい元号とともに始まった今年度も、引き続きよろしくお願いいたします🎶

On September 15th I attended an event at Microsoft's head office in Shinagawa.
The event was called 『Microsoft Officeユーザー 感謝祭！ ”今よりもっと”を最新のOfficeで』

When I say "attended", I was actually asked to MC three sessions.
The participants were 100% Japanese, and while I am not a good judge of age I would guess they were mostly aged 30-55 and 70% male.

As a translator and business owner, I am a heavy MS Office user but this event focused on Office 365, which I have never used, so it was all completely new to me. And although it was also somewhat irrelevant to my work situation, it was actually quite fascinating to see a) what Office 365 is capable of and b) how it is being used by people outside the translation community.

Here is a random list of some of my take aways from the event:

1. An MS employee demonstrated giving a presentation using PPT with real-time translations of whatever he was saying appearing as subtitles below the slides on the screen. While not 100% accurate the concept is fascinating and will surely be usable in the future as technology improves.

2. Joint editing of Word docs is still sluggish but I can see how it could be used by translation companies to check large documents when deadlines are tight IF the sliggishness is resolved.

3. Two of the three speakers connected their phones to the projector to demonstrate apps

4. MS's technology (in the rooms) was all new to me. I had a switch been the speakers' screens (PC) and another screen (PC) showing sponsor details during the breaks. The rooms had two screens and some speakers demonstrated functions by hooking up each screen to a different PC or phone. As a speaker, having such options opens up the possibilities when preparing a presentation.

5. One speaker explained that Line and FB Messenger are now more secure than email due to the encoding/encryption these apps use. Skype for Business, he said, is the safest way to send files.

6. Said speaker also commented on the US trend of employing experts versus the Japanese trend of outsourcing tasks. He also mentioned the differences between the US and Japan in the way application forms are written (designed).

7. I am not a tech person so a lot of the presentations went over my head but it was still very interesting, and I got a good sense of where the world is heading in terms of technology, and I'm glad I "attended".

2018年10月28日（日）にサイマルアカデミーの東京校でワークショップを担当します。

タイトルは「ネイティブ翻訳者が教える日英契約書翻訳ワークショップ 」です。

翻訳学校でワークショップを担当するのは3年ぶり！

サイマルアカデミーのウエブサイトに詳細は書かれていますが、一部をここで紹介します。
＿＿
【第1部】
法務文書の翻訳と通常の文書での翻訳の違いや的確な翻訳をする為に知っておくべきことなど、契約書の英訳について一から分かりやすく説明します。レイアウトをはじめ、決まり文句、「甲」「乙」「丙」や数字の扱いなど、翻訳時に悩む点も取り上げます。また、法務翻訳をする上で必要な情報、有益なリソースやツール、検索方法、最近の動向などもご紹介します。

【第2部】
実際の契約書から一般条項を中心に翻訳演習を行います。一般条項には、定義・契約期間・裁判管轄・準拠法・不可抗力・準拠法・知的財産権・反社会的勢力排除などが含まれ、どんな業種や種類の契約書でも取り決めておくべき一般的な条項です。実務で扱う頻度が高く、翻訳のコツを知っておくことは重要です。
＿＿
申込締切は10月16日（火）です。

I'll be running a workshop on legal translation for Simul Academy on October 28.

6月29日～7月1日に大阪で開催された第29回英日・日英翻訳国際会議（IJET-29）で登壇しました。

タイトル「To Be or Not To Be…Productive」のもと、翻訳における生産性の向上のヒントを60分間で紹介しました。

今回のセッションで「インタラクティブな場を作る」を個人的なチャレンジとして意識していました。コミュニケーション講座で学んだプレゼンテーションの技術も盛り込み、会場を歩き回ったり、参加者と会話したりと試しました。

結果として私からの発表だけではなく参加者からいろいろなアイディアをいただくことができ、有意義な時間となりました。

参加いただきましたみなさま、どうもありがとうございました！

なお、10月の日本翻訳者協会（JAT)の東京活動委員会（TAC)月例セミナーで、拡大バーションを担当することになりました。大阪で時間の都合で細かく説明できなかった技などを紹介する予定です！

東京に戻る前にお好み焼きを食べました😋

6月末に開催される第29回英日・日英翻訳国際会議（IJET)に登壇します。

IJETで登壇するのは6年ぶりです。

2012年のIJET-23で3人の先輩と法人化についてお話しました。
2014年のIJET-25で実行委員長を務めました。
2016年のIJET-27でJATLAWのプレイベントでもう1人の法務翻訳者と登壇しました。

今回は一人で登壇します。
ワクワクドキドキ楽しみです！！

課題は「Productivity」（効率化）

60分しかないのに、既に30枚のスライドを用意しました・・・

主人も同じ枠に登壇することになっています。
主人はWordのワイルドカードについてお話します。
ワイルドカードは効率をあげるため、一つの手段です(笑)

IJET-29は大阪市内で開催されます。
大阪に行くのは2年ぶりです。
かつて住んでいました。
551Horaiの肉まんを食べたいです！！

I'll be speaking at the 29th International Japanese-English Translation(IJET-29) Conference at the end of June.

It is six years since I have spoken at an IJET.
At IJET-23 in 2012 I talked about incorporating along with three other translators.
In 2014 I chaired the IJET-25 organizing committee.
At IJET-27 in 2016 I spoke with another translator about legal translation at the JATLAW pre-event.

So this will be the first time I am speaking on my own at an IJET and I am very excited to have the opportunity to share some of my tips on productivity. My session is only 60 minutes and I have already prepared 30 slides...

One of my tips involves using wildcards in MS Word and my husband will be giving a presentation on that very topic at the same time in another room.

This year's IJET is in Osaka, a city I lived in for four years.
As well as hanging out with other translators, I am looking forward to getting my fix of nikuman from 551 Horai!!