T2K Lingua

[General Pain]

InT2K based games we (players) meet lots of npcs from various contries speaking various languages. This means GMs and players for that sake could use help in adding flavour to a campaign by using proper language.

I know people could use online translators like:

http://www.worldlingo.com/en/products_services/worldlingo_translator.html

http://babelfish.yahoo.com/

http://translation2.paralink.com/

and loads others...

But the proplem with these , is that they usually translates gramatically wrong.

So what I hoped was that my fellow board members could help eachother with translation questions.

For example:

How would a russian say:

"Oh my god don't press that button"

Other use for this thread could be dialect questions and local slang.

I hope this could prove usefull. So if anyone has a sentence they would have translated into norweigian , post it here.

[pmulcahy11b]

Dale Brown's books have a lot of grammatically-correct and properly-spelled words and phrases that occur in the various parts of the world his characters are operating. And there are also quite a few cultural bits -- his books are why I learned, before I even joined the Army, why throwing your shoes at someone and calling him a dog is so insulting in the Arabic world.

Of course, that will only give you the words and phrases -- figuring out how to pronounce them is much more difficult. I was lucky to have a GM who spoke Polish as my first GM and a Croatian mother, so I can pronounce some of the thornier words -- but the place names on the maps get mangled pretty easily.

(BTW, my mother speaks five languages. She says English was the hardest language to learn!)

[weswood]

I've used an online translator for some phrases in Rae's PbP game and have ran into that problem. It just wouldn't translate "I like the way your butt wiggles when you walk" from English to Polish.

I've also ran into the pronunciation difficulties Paul was talking about. I was taking an English class at a local college and the intsrtuctor asked if anybody knew what a certain word meant. Blank looks until she wrote it one the board-omniscient. "Oh, I know what that is, I've just never heard it spoken" I paid her back though, I threw in the word laager in an assignement, she had to look it up in a dictionary.

[JimmyRay73]

I picked up some useful bits from Tom Clancy books and other "Cold War" era spy novels, and from the T2K 2nd Ed book. It also helped that i often tried to learn the important bits of any language from anyone I found who could speak it (i.e. how to order a beer, ask where the bathroom is, and insult someone badly).

Remember, it's a bad idea to say "Yob t'voyu maht!" to any Russian you don't intend to fight, but "una cerveza por favor" and "donde esta el bano" are damned useful things to know in Spanish. Just hope the guy that replies to the last one points at the door, so you don't need to know how to say "second door on the left" in Spanish...

[Marc]

I picked up some useful bits from Tom Clancy books and other "Cold War" era spy novels, and from the T2K 2nd Ed book. It also helped that i often tried to learn the important bits of any language from anyone I found who could speak it (i.e. how to order a beer, ask where the bathroom is, and insult someone badly).

Remember, it's a bad idea to say "Yob t'voyu maht!" to any Russian you don't intend to fight, but "una cerveza por favor" and "donde esta el bano" are damned useful things to know in Spanish. Just hope the guy that replies to the last one points at the door, so you don't need to know how to say "second door on the left" in Spanish...

"Segunda puerta a la izquierda"

Yesterday night we ran a short (3hr) role playing session. The character assaulted by surprise a fortified house occupied by polish militiamen. As always I threw myself enthusiastically to interpret my poor NPCs crying for help in my particular and totally imaginary version of polish.

All the non-native English speakers have a natural ability, developed since childhood, to sing the songs in English of their favourite groups "by ear" without knowing anything about English and without any idea about the meaning of the lyrics. I have extended this ability (with my lack of sense of shame) to manage a fluid roleplaying Polish, Germany, Russian, French or whatever language needed. Of course this powerful ability is fed by Hollywood influence. For example, my Germans always say sentences that must have words like "Raus! Raus!", "Alarm" and, of course "Panzer!". Always shouting...

[headquarters]

"Segunda puerta a la izquierda"

Yesterday night we ran a short (3hr) role playing session. The character assaulted by surprise a fortified house occupied by polish militiamen. As always I threw myself enthusiastically to interpret my poor NPCs crying for help in my particular and totally imaginary version of polish.

All the non-native English speakers have a natural ability, developed since childhood, to sing the songs in English of their favourite groups "by ear" without knowing anything about English and without any idea about the meaning of the lyrics. I have extended this ability (with my lack of sense of shame) to manage a fluid roleplaying Polish, Germany, Russian, French or whatever language needed. Of course this powerful ability is fed by Hollywood influence. For example, my Germans always say sentences that must have words like "Raus! Raus!", "Alarm" and, of course "Panzer!". Always shouting...

Slavic languages :
Russian for stop! or I will shot : "Stoj! ili ya Istrajano!"
SERB:Stani ili ya putsam!

Serb/Russian/slavic for GOD : Bog
hands up : Ruki u vies!
weapon : oruzje
west : zapad

[Marc]

Slavic languages :
Russian for stop! or I will shot : "Stoj! ili ya Istrajano!"
SERB:Stani ili ya putsam!

Serb/Russian/slavic for GOD : Bog
hands up : Ruki u vies!
weapon : oruzje
west : zapad

Well, I didn't know how it was written in serbo-croatian, but I only remember one complete sentence from my deployments. As you say, HQ:

NATO Stanili ili pushcam! (Or at least it is how I remember the way to pronounce it)

"NATO force! Stop or I will fire!"

It was in another life... Probably, now I would take a closer look to the Serbo-croatian / Spanish booklet.

[pmulcahy11b]

I'm sure I'm not spelling it right, but we'll probably all remember this line from Red Dawn:

Na povish! Na povish!, which they translated in Red Dawn as "My God! My God!"

Anyone know if that is an accurate translation

[Rainbow Six]

I used to work with a Polish girl who thought it was hilarious when I pronounced "Wroclaw"....

[Marc]

I'm sure I'm not spelling it right, but we'll probably all remember this line from Red Dawn:

Na povish! Na povish!, which they translated in Red Dawn as "My God! My God!"

Anyone know if that is an accurate translation

It was a clear sign that their communist atheism was failing before the intimidating and christianizing presence of Patrick Swaize and his Colt .45.

[Mohoender]

About that subject I'll agree with many of you (Marc among them). Keep the sentences simple, shout, and use slang when you know it (strangely that's what you know first in any language). After all the F word is used as a comma in most American college.

About the accent, the cinema will provide you with a large array of accents that are all wrong anyway.

About the translation asked first "Oh my god don't press that button" I would not translate it really but use something else.

In French: I'll say "Putain! touche pas!!" if you want to add some flavor "Putain! Touche pas connard!!" or (more complicated) "Putain! Dgage tu vas tout faire pter!" Hey people, there is very little chance that a french will refer to god and as a result that translate more as "Shit! Noooo!".

In Russian: I'll use "Niet, Niet, Eta nie arasho!" or (if the guy is a good comrade) "Niet, Niet, Tavarich! Eta nie arasho!". For the second russian sentence the translation will be "No! No! comrade! it's no good!".

Thanks for the other one you gave, I didn't know them.

I'm not really speaking Russian but I know the alphabet (that helps) and some of the basics. 1 semester of Russian taken in the US and 1 in France. I have a problem so as I often mix Russian with Portuguese. Then, I might get back to a Russian course in January and I might be of more help after that. If I go through the Russian I'll continue with Japanese but that is long term.

[Marc]

Mmmmmm... mixing Russian with Portuguese seems difficult!!!

I speak Catalan, English and Spanish (in this order), French language being my next target. Although a Catalan can partially understand a text written in French, the pronunciation of your language seems to me an important challenge! I've been working in Italy for a while and I understand the Italian pretty well. There's a lot of similarities between the Spanish, Italian and Catalan, and a lot of common words (the same happens with the Portuguese). It's usual that a word that has become an archaism in one language is an usual word in the other.

[Mohoender]

Mmmmmm... mixing Russian with Portuguese seems difficult!!!

Actually not that much. My mother is fluent in Portuguese and her ex-boyfriend was portuguese. When they crossed the path of some Russians speaking in the street they couldn't tell if these people were speaking Russian or Portuguese. Obviously, the Russians were equally puzzled.

Both languages are entirely different but, strangely, they sound in a similar manner.

For the french pronunciation that is quite easy in fact, speak as flat as possible with little if any intonation. I would say that the french language is one of the language using the less possible sounds. From what I know the number of sounds in french is ridiculously low (as I think it is the case for english) and that explains why the french are that bad at learning foreign language. At the opposite end you'll find languages like Portuguese, Russian, Arab... That's also why an Arab (saudi) can learn a foreign language simply by listening to it and, believe me, it is very impressive when a guy is suddenly starting to speak politics or phylosophy in your own language when he has simply been listening to you for about 2 months (not even full time).

[Mohoender]

Some french expressions that may be useful to T2K (France and a good part of Africa)

A couvert: take cover.
A droite: to the right.
A gauche: to the left.
A terre: get down.
Attention: pay attention.
Bougez vous les gars: move it boys.
Dgage connard: get off, jerk.
En avant les gars: move forward boys.
Feu: shoot.
Halte au feu: hold your fire.
Halte o1 je tire: stop or Ill shoot.
Je me rends: I surrender.
La cible est sur la cte 22 or La Cible est aux coordonnes : target is on coordinnate
Main en lair : hands up.
Mercy: thanks.
Montez, vite : get on, quick.
Ne tirez pas: hold your fire.
Putain, touche pas: shit, nooo or dont touch (as you like).
Rendez vous: surrender.
Sil vous plait : please.
Stop: freeze.
Touche pas connard: dont touch that, you asshole.

Another point as most of us have been in the army, we must all know (from very long term memory in my case) several hand signs that are common to many armies I think and in the field that is useful for the basics. If you understand what I mean, Ill be happy if someone can refresh my memory about them. I'll also be happy to see some basics from the languages you know.

[Jason Weiser]

It was a clear sign that their communist atheism was failing before the intimidating and christianizing presence of Patrick Swaize and his Colt .45.

Well...it's spellled...

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