Most of our clients are located in Germany and Switzerland, so it’s always nice to encounter an Austria-focused text or client when the occasion arises. Team member Catherine, a keen traveller, also found herself face to face with some choice Austrian German words and general translation conundrums in her recent trip to Vienna with her mum, which she talks about here:
“Moments after arriving, it became clear that it would be almost impossible to switch off my translator brain, as I listened to announcements and read signage and adverts in German with interest. While waiting for the train, I learnt that ‘Öffis’ is the colloquial Austrian short form of ‘öffentliche Verkehrsmittel’ (public transport), and pondered over a skincare advert that used the verb ‘umsteigen’ – commonly used to mean changing from one mode of transport to another – to describe how a certain percentage of users would make the switch to the advertised product, according to a survey.
Our first priority was to boost our energy levels with the obligatory coffee and cake in a traditional Vienna coffee house. As my mum doesn’t speak German, I found that translating menus was a good way to test my skills and reminded me of all the things I do know – for example, that ‘Kaiserschmarrn’ are shredded sweet pancakes with raisins served with a fruit compote and icing sugar, or that a ‘Mokka’ is a strong black coffee, not one with chocolate! By contrast, I haven’t (yet) mastered all the intricate differences between coffee types, such as the ‘Melange’, ‘Verlängerter’ and ‘Grosser Brauner’, and I’ve found the best way to decipher extensive cake menus is simply to stand in front of the cake counter, then match up the names and descriptions!
On our first full day, we headed out to the Schönbrunn Palace Gardens – a highlight of any visit to Vienna – having visited the apartments and grand halls on our last trip. The Palm House and Desert House, two huge glasshouses, contain a vast array of plants, trees, birds, reptiles and fish, under varying temperature and humidity conditions. Here, too, I was tasked with translating many of the information boards, while my mum passed on her vastly superior plant knowledge to me. I also enjoyed coming across a number of familiar topics from LKT’s translation work during the tour, such as biomimetic solutions – innovations that use or mimic systems or structures found in nature to solve problems in fields such as engineering and medicine.
Visits to the Albertina art gallery and the Sisi Museum, which explores the life of 19th century Empress Elisabeth, also provided opportunities for me to refresh my vocabulary relating to shape and form, materials and artistic techniques, which regularly appear in projects involving construction products, domestic appliances and interior design.
I still feel I have only scratched the surface of this beautiful city – and I’ve yet to work my way to the end of the coffee and cake menu either!”
