Comments on: Social Media Day & Maastricht’s Bid for Cultural Capital 2018

By: Amanda

Amanda — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 10:22:00 +0000

Hi Natasha. Thank you for perspective on the translation thing.

By: Natasha

Natasha — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 10:09:19 +0000

@Judy 160 euro for 500 words? That’s ridiculous and totally not the norm. Translation rates in NL have been the same, alomst frozen for 15 years. It is the job in NL that requires the highest level of education for the lowest pay. Why do you think those TV subtitles are so lousy?

0.09-0.12 ex VAT a word for normal translation work is about the costs — if you’re lucky with your clients. Many pay way less, especially for books. Only rare language combinations make more. Many work part-time elsewhere to make ends meet of have husbands with real jobs.

What you’re saying is not true at all. I’ve been a profssional translator for 9 years in the Netherlands. Many translators live on the poverty line!

By: Eszter

Eszter — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 13:09:36 +0000

I agree that people who settle down in a country should make the effort to learn the language and try to integrate into the society. However (having been mentioned in one of the workshops during the Social Media Day event), most of the international people (apart from tourists) in Maastricht are students, who only stay here for a short period of time depending on the duration of their courses… so, many of them don’t see the point of learning Dutch.

Nevertheless, during this short period they could do so much to promote Maastricht and organise cultural events. But first they have to be informed well, and they have to be encouraged to get motivated. I think if more interesting events are organised in a common language (which is English) they will get right into the topic. The same thing should apply to social media sites; English versions always move a bigger crowd.

BTW, I wear orange any time the Dutch team plays!

By: Amanda

Amanda — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 12:58:38 +0000

Well, I certainly understand why French, German & Dutch have be prioritized from the regional and cost perspective. And I actually agree that us internationals need to make an effort to learn the local language and culture, but I disagree that if we know “a bit” we can engage properly. I can read “a bit” of Dutch (and speak a bit less), but I cannot write well enough to convey the complex ideas needed for something like this.

But really I consider this to be a bar to participation issue. The bar is currently set to allow Dutch, French, and German speakers to participate. Other people can participate, but it requires more work on our part, and next to everything else in our lives, it’s up to the individual if they want to make that extra push. For me, the language thing is probably the minimum needed to lower the bar for my participation. For others (students, unless they’re less apathetic here than in the US, for example), more may be needed to engage them. That’s why I said in my post that the change should not be made for me. I’ve only been in Maastricht a year. I like it a lot, but I may not be here forever. It should be made for other internationals who have really dedicated themselves to this city and this region.

It may be easy for me to say, but I still believe that English is the most common “second language” around here. But if the expat community here mostly spoke Spanish I would be asking the same questions about Spanish.

We are definately enjoying the Wereld Kup. It’s nice to have a strong team to cheer for.

By: Amanda

Amanda — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 12:32:49 +0000

Wow. Thank you for the well thought out reply. I agree that we all seem to have our own cliques and that they can be hard to get into. I generally blame myself for not integrating into groups because I’m naturally pretty introverted, but it certainly would be nice if those group boarders were low. From an expat perspective, I think that some more resources are available now than a year ago and that can only be a positive trend, even if overall coverage is a little still irregular.