Interpreter and translator - Pyotr Patrushev

1. Collecting Rent in the Tower of Babel
©By Pyotr Patrushev http://russiantranslate.org/

2. My life & work as an
interpreter & translator

3. A beginning…humble
in appearance…
but rich in experience:
my village in Siberia…

4. Tower of Babel:
a mighty
metaphor
God mixed up humanity’s unified language and scattered
the nations.
He thus provided employment opportunities and travel to
a band of dedicated professionals called interpreters and
translators…

5. I helped these people and
many others find a common
language…
Vanessa Redgrave
NSW Governor General Marie
Princess Margaret
Prime Minister Bob Hawk
President Putin
Dr. Andrei Sakharov
President Yeltsin
Prime Minister Rudd
President Gorbachev
Prime Minister Howard
Dr. Andrew Weil

6. I first learned the value of interpreting when I
was interrogated by the Turkish secret service
after my escape from Russia… You can get shot if
someone misinterprets you… I learned Turkish in
jail by converting a Russian-Turkish dictionary
into a Turkish-Russian one during my 12
months of solitary confinement…

7. My first attempt at interpreting was in 1963
in Istanbul, between a Bulgarian nurse, a
German doctor, a Turkish policeman & an
English-speaking Dutch social worker… it was
an emergency… helping a Soviet defector
who was hospitalised…

8. They look happy…
I worked at the APEC meeting
in Australia,
Sydney in 2007

9. Homeland Security
Don’t mess with these guys…
Or these…

10. Working inside
the fence…
Why do we need fences
this high to separate
the people from the
leaders??

11. Tete-a-tete… and
a time for a quiet
joke …
Sorry, I am not
allowed to tell you
what the joke was
all about…

12. Ah, what the
hell… might as
well enjoy the
view…
…Heads of State
cruise Sydney
Harbour under the
watchful eye…

13. Languages in a Global World
• Culture itself is becoming more global
• Languages keep you in contact with the rest of the world
• All jobs are becoming more international
• With multinationals it’s essential to be able to communicate
across the globe
• A language gives you the ability to communicate in the global
market
• Companies which buy and sell products all over the world need
people with the ability to speak other languages and a
knowledge and understanding of other lifestyles

14. Some of the conferences
I interpreted at:
World Bank Red Cross United Nations
Chiefs of Defence of
NATO and Allies
Olympic and Asian
Games
Global Alliance for
Vaccines and
Immunisation
UNAIDS Programme
G8 Development
Ministerial
Conference
CCAMLR Scientific
Committee
Antarctic Treaty
Space Treaty
Intl. Association of
Anti-Corruption
Authorities
Marine Ecology and
Environment
Chefs de Mission
Meeting, BOCOG
International Civil
Service Commission
English Rugby Board Oil and Gas
Extractive
Industries
Transparency
Initiative
International
Congress of
Archivists
ICEM World Mining
Conference
Economic and Social
Commission for
Asia and the Pacific
Codex Committee
on Fats and Oils
Animal and
Pandemic Influenza
APEC Energy
Ministers Meeting,
3R (Reduce, reuse,
recycle)

15. Certified
Translations
are very
much in
demand
Educational
Diplomas/
certificates Art and
Trade
Catalogues
Websites
in Word
and HTML
Brochures
and
Newsletters
Medical
translations
Technical
Manuals
CAD
drawings
Trade
agreements
Tenders
Passports
Birth
Certificates
Legal
contracts
Migration
and Skills
Recognition

17. G20 Brisbane, 2014

18. Helping to get funding for clearing landmines in Cambodia…

19. A hot topic…

20. ESCAP, Korea, 2010
Everything from transport to water supplies…

21. But it is the people you meet and work with that brighten
your days… like these Russian and Australian vets…

22. You need to be productive and active in the languages that
you interpret to and from…
Not just studying the dictionaries…
But through a broad life experience and study…

23. I translated
Everyone Can Win,
one of the most
copied and pirated
books in Russia..
My published books
in Russian &
English…
A wildly imaginative book. Amazing
tales...” Robyn Williams, ABC
Radio National
Download these books on
http://www.pyotr-patrushev.com

24. Journalist & Broadcaster…
• BBC in London - broadcaster, news reader and program
originator.
• Radio Liberty in Munich, authoring a weekly Science and
Society Show for many years…
• The Sydney Morning Herald, The Good Weekend, The
Australian, ABC radio and SBS radio and TV…articles,
interviews and news features…
Listen to Pyotr’s interviewon ABC Radio National

25. Working for “Aunty” in London…
Working for the BBC was a great experience… Bush
House was a true Tower of Babel, with 40 languages
spoken (recently savagely cut due to austerity
programs…)
Bush House in London, BBC
The canteen with
dozens of international dishes…

26. In-between jobs, you have to polish
your hunter-gatherer skills…
Recuperating on Crete after a gruelling work as a sports journalist during
Munich Olympics in 1972; the Games were disrupted
by a terrorist attack on Israeli athletes…

27. But… you have to keep really fit to work as a global
interpreter…

28. An artist’s romantic impression of my swim out of Russia
Oil painting by Slava Fiantsev

29. The reality was almost as exotic…
My swim from Russia to Turkey lasted 2 nights and was the only successful
unaided swim across the Black Sea (for which I got sentenced to death on
charges of high treason and put on the KGB wanted list for 29 years)
Pyotr Patrushev - the man who swam from Russia videos:
VIDEO (Part 1)
VIDEO (Part 2)
VIDEO (Part 3)
VIDEO (Part 4)

30. With Dr.
Andrew Weil in
the Arizona’s
desert
Working at the Esalen Institute at Big Sur,
California, with Dr Stan Grof (a pioneering
psychedelic researcher), Dr. Andrew Weil (a
leading holistic medicine guru in the USA),
Russian scientists and shamans…

31. In Australia: the “Dolphin consciousness “
conference; with water birth
pioneer Dr Charkovsky…

32. Interpreting during an open heart surgery at a Stanford
clinic with a Russian pioneering surgeon, Dr Vishnevsky

33. I cherish my time with people
who inspired me…
With Dr. Andrei Sakharov, a Nobel Peace Prize
winner in San Francisco

34. Connect with people who do good
work in the world…
On a book tour in Russia
With Helena Cornelius, conflict resolution expert
and the author of Everyon Can Win (Выиграть Может Каждый
скачать бесплатно)
For many years I worked as a
trainer and facilitator in
conflict management in
Lebanon, Israel, Netherlands,
the Russian Caucasus and
Russia itself and contributed
to the training theory.

35. And sometimes one needs to escape from it all
in between jobs…for example…
to a remote farm in New Zealand

36. I later followed my dream of an interconnected world in the Silicon
Valley, working for a pioneering corporation with clients like NASA,
nuclear reactors, and resource companies…
The corporation (Infomedia Corp.) was
started by a French-born astrophysicist
who was a UFO expert and who helped to
create some
of the first military networks, the precursors
of the Internet…
And 30 years later
I am still a
computer freak…

37. I was taken off the KGB’s wanted list
and received a visa to Moscow for the
first time in nearly 30 years…
But Russia was freeing up and
Gorby was calling me back…

38. Interpreting is not really such hard work …
compared to some jobs…

39. Engage in some pretty serious
stuff, like …
Interpreting at numerous Spacebridges between Russia
and the US, linking US legislators, astronauts and
cosmonauts, soccer players, and… Chernobyl survivors…

40. I did not really enjoy working in abattoirs
with Russian vets on lab testing techniques…
But sometimes you just have to…

41. Working with fisheries felt much better…

42. Hey, watch those aliens…
Until the fatigue finally gets
you…

43. Thrills and spills…the sporting connection…

44. Sydney Olympics
2000
Sydney Olympics were the best... I was
impressed by the volunteer service
provided by Australians who made visitors
feel real welcome, Ozzie style…

45. First Youth Olympics Games 2010
Host city Singapore
Motto Blazing the Trail
[
Nations participating 205
Athletes participating 3,531
Events 201 in 26 sports
BUDGET: U$284 million
Only youths aged between 14 and 18 years
participated in August 2010 Youth Olympics
Interpreters are just a small part of the total budget…

46. Asian Games…..
The Asian Games, officially known
as Asiad, is a multi-sport event held
every four years among athletes from
all over the Asia
• Aquatics – Diving
• Aquatics – Swimming
• Aquatics – Synchronized
swimming
• Aquatics – Water polo
• Archery
• Athletics
• Badminton
• Baseball
• Basketball
• Board games
• Bowling
• Boxing
• Canoeing
• Cricket
• Cue sports
• Bowling
• Boxing
• Canoeing
• Cricket
• Cycling
• Dancesport
• Dragon boat
• Equestrian
• Fencing
• Football
• Golf
• Gymnastics
• Handball
• Hockey
• Judo
• Kabaddi
• Karate
• Modern pentathlon
• Roller sports
• Rowing
• Rugby union
• Sailing
• Sepaktakraw
• Shooting
• Softball
• Soft tennis
• Squash
• Table tennis
• Taekwondo
• Tennis
• Triathlon
• Volleyball
• Weightlifting
• Wrestling
• Wushu
One has to learn about some pretty strange new sports …
Kabaddi match

47. You get lots of fireworks…
China Olympics 2008
The “real world” is never too far away …
a tank at the Beijing Games Main Press Centre
The Beijing egg-shell stadium

48. Paralympics
Beijing 2010
People who really overcame huge obstacles in
their life… I am in awe of them…

49. Michael Phelps - a swimming sensation
As a former swimmer I particularly
enjoyed interpreting for Phelps and I
was present at the pool at each event,
watching him win his 8 gold medals... in
Beijing in 2008.

50. Looking at this… interpreter’s life
seems like endless fun…

51. Working in the desert during
the Doha Asian Games. Read
my story of this truly gruelling
job
An interpreter’s story

52. The secret of success in the interpreting
business…
You cannot get grateful clients unless you have good colleagues to work with…
And just as importantly, you will not get decent jobs unless
you are working with a good professional conference
organiser (PCO). They are the “real estate agents” in the
Tower of Babel. The good ones are to be truly cherished –
they are your guardian angels that will look after your
fees and conditions. The best are themselves practising
interpreters.

53. I love the old
Macao…
I worked in Macao
with a casino tycoon
and a Kazakh
oligarch…

54. But I never forget where I came from…
An old water pump in the Siberian city
of Kolpashevo that has not changed during
many decades of my absence

55. One still tries to have some fun
in-between jobs…
In Bangkok, braving 45
degrees Celsius heat…

56. Observing the contrasts
in the world we live in…

57. But at the end, you just want to get home…
To be with nature…

58. © Pyotr Patrushev
www.russiantranslate.org
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