Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Lost In Translation


I take an interpretation class on Wednesday. Today's material was a press conference of former PM Koizumi. The teacher played the tape, and there came a famous line....he said "The closer Japan-U.S. relationship is, the better Japan's relationship with China, Korea, other Asian countries, and the international community at large will be."

Are there any problems in this sentence? I don't think so.

It was November 2005, and I remember that there was a huge discussion regarding his comment. Some argued that he said as long as Japan-U.S. relationship is fine, Japan's relationship with China and Korea will be just OK." Some others even claimed that he said as far as Japan-U.S. relationship is close, that will automatically make Japan-China and Japan-Korea relationship good."

That's not what he said at all. I wondered how this spin occurred.......

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