Possibly even better than the tri-colored mountains, though, was the intense culture change that we witnessed. In general, the farther north you go in this country, the more poor and Catholic the people become. We were in the Northwest corner, and things were quite different. Take, for example, this cemetery in the tiny town of Humahuaca, and compare it with the grand mausoleums in my post about the Recoleta cemetery.
I'm back in my old routine - we had a fun soccer game this week. Our coach, Julio, clumsily made his way to the field (cancha) at the last second. He really wasn't much help this match. Vir (Virginia) asked him, "Juli, estás drogado?" (Juli, are you high?) and he wasn't even able to answer. He fell asleep sitting on the sideline during the game. I suppose it's a relatively casual league.
I've been really bothered lately by problems caused by translation. So now I'm going to complain about it.
The long-distance buses always show really horrendous action movies (i.e. Jumper and Knight Rider, both 2008.) When Jen was here, we were lucky enough to be shown Rush Hour 3 on our way back to the city, and it got me thinking... As I said in an earlier post, I was really disappointed with the subtitles in Charlie Wilson's War, because they did not at all capture the thoughtful script or quick witty banter that, for me, made the movie great. In Rush Hour 3, not only was the brilliant script completely lost through the subtitles, but Jen and I were the only ones laughing on the bus since so much of the movie is made up of jokes specific to American culture. I can't imagine being raised in a (cinematic) environment where most of the movies I watch, at least on television, are based so heavily on concepts to which I can't even relate!
A recent occurrence that demonstrated this weird problem involves the current Argentine/Latin American obsession with The Simpsons (or: Los Simpson.) It's one of the most popular shows here, and until recently, I had assumed that their love for it stemmed from Homer's idiocy and (therefore) direct representation of Americans. For me, his character was always an effective mocker of US culture and the people that sustain it. However, Homer recently had a disparaging line about Juan Perón, former leader of Argentina, where called him a dictator. (Here's an article, in Spanish, about the peoples' reaction.) Now, if the viewers really watched Homer for his stupidity and portrayal of the US, don't you think they would take this comment as just another example of our ignorance of international politics, rather than be offended? This lack of recognition of the irony and the writer's assumed/supposed intention with this ignorance and stupidity on Homer's part leads me to believe (actually, to be certain,) that translation runs much deeper, beyond words and even actions, than I could have thought, and permeates into the darkest corners of our subconscious and pours into our incorrigible developed and cultured being.
Also, my neverending thoughts about the art and pain of translation have helped me a bit in writing papers and being understood in general. Now, before using almost any non-noun word, I have to consider whether it is used the same way here. Even words that we are taught in Spanish to be translatable, like "individual" is translated to "individuo," but colloquially, "individuo" is not often used in the same context as "individual." etc. I imagine this is situation takes place in every language and can only really be discovered during the (hopefully) becoming fluent process.
Okay, that's over now, sorry. I'll end this post with a picture of some graffiti that I saw.
(top: "I decide." bottom R: "My life has worth, my body doesn't have a price" and bottom L: "not one more victim in the prostitution webs"
1 comment:
Somehow I think you will figure our a way to make more trips.
Be safe....
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