The ATA Chronicle - January/February 2021 - 18

were now working from

are now even more essential

call at 10:00 p.m. on a

some of these churches

home-like me-dealing with

for my clients to serve

Friday night. One of the

became extremely active.

their own pandemic situations

their Spanish-speaking

five school districts for

They wrote and translated

and adjusting to remote

communities motivates me to

which I work needed some

messages of hope and

working and unconventional

stay committed to providing

documents translated

calm and distributed them

schedules. They contacted

high-quality services.

before an emergency board

to followers around the

me around the clock.

meeting the following night.

world. From February

It started with a phone

Was I available? I was and
continued to remain so.
For the next several
months, school-related
translation requests arrived
every workday and at least
once on weekends. Deadlines
were tight as districts tried
to keep worried parents
informed. While the pandemic
forced clients in other fields
to slow down, I was still
working seven days a week.
I had to learn to interpret
online for my schools-
and teach their staff how
to do so. This triggered
greater involvement in the
Interpreters and Translators
in Education Workgroup
(www.iteworkgroup.org) and
other interpreter forums.
By late summer, school
requests were nearly back to
normal and business picked
up for other translation
clients. But I'm accepting
more remote depositions
assignments now. I'm also

When the pandemic hit,

through August, I had very
little time off. I translated
articles, workshops,
lectures, correspondence,
recommendations on how to
conduct services online or
by phone, etc. Things slowed
down a little in October
and November, but due to
Christmas and the new year
I'm very busy again.
Another ATA member and
I have been translating books
for an organization, handled
by a translation agency,
and the client decided to
use the current situation to
translate two books nearly
simultaneously. I'm the
editor on this project, which
will last into 2021.
Work from other agencies,
however, decreased
significantly. I had to turn
down some jobs due to tight
deadlines that didn't fit into
my workload, but overall
much less has come in
from agencies.

taking advantage of every

Rosario
Charo Welle

online conference time allows.

Mesquite, Texas

Susanne
van Eyl
Richmond, Texas
I spent years
working in

2020 did not
spare me.
Upon the initial shock of the

While adjusting to the
new work-normal,
I'm fortunate to
be able to rely on
exceptional colleagues
to help with some
of my projects, to
discuss the translation
of the emerging
terminology, and to
find emotional and
professional support.

Amanda
Williams
Marietta,
Georgia
If I had to
describe 2020 as succinctly
as possible, it would be:
dumpster fire.
It started with a bang in
January with emergency
spinal surgery, continued
in March with my mom and
uncle contracting COVID-19
(my mom made it-barely-
but my uncle wasn't so
lucky). My grandmother
fought cancer not once, but
twice last year. When she
needed our hugs the most,
it was dangerous for us to
give them to her. We also
pulled our son out of school

Since March, I've

and started homeschooling

translated and edited

him on top of our jobs last

thousands of words related

fall. My husband was laid

to COVID-19 or resulting

off in October. So, it's fair

from the pandemic.

to say we got the full 2020

Consequently, my normal

experience. (My husband

workload increased

found another job pretty

significantly, even requiring

fast, so don't worry.)

me to work 12-hour days to

But despite all the personal

meet the surge. Very quickly,

struggles we endured, the one

I had to draw resilience

constant I had was work. I

to face the challenges the

made significant strides in

pandemic was creating for

my unending quest to work

the world and me.

smarter, not harder. I doubled

While adjusting to the

my direct client portfolio. I

pandemic declaration and

new work-normal, I'm

worked in translator/reviser

the stay-at-home orders

fortunate to be able to rely on

partnerships more often, and

back in March, some of my

but then a niche formed

exceptional colleagues to help

I received numerous referrals.

direct clients' services turned

with some of my projects,

June and August were slower

that I was happy to explore.

essential and so did my

to discuss the translation of

than normal, but overall I'm

Religious organizations

freelance translation services.

the emerging terminology,

proud of how I've weathered

and to find emotional

this storm so far. When

the legal and business field,

asked me to do translations

I was hardly prepared for

for them and eventually this

the flood of rushed projects

and professional support.

things get tough, you have to

became a meaningful portion

that arrived in my inbox

Furthermore, recognizing

hold your head up high and

of my income.

overnight. Project managers

that my translation services

keep moving forward.

18

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