Jackie MacMullan writes about Daisuke Matsuzaka in Translation will take some time:
Matsuzaka was accompanied by an interpreter, but clearly most of his comments were lost in translation.I've got a question.
Consider this sampling:
Q: I'd like to get your impression of Fenway Park, after pitching off the mound, your initial impression of the park.
A: When the season starts, I'm looking forward to the game.
Now, I don't speak Japanese, but I know Matsuzaka said something more than that. His smile, his hand gestures, and his voice inflection suggested as much. The young pitcher appears to be animated, congenial, even playful."
There's a link to a video of the press conference right under the story.
Can we get a translation of what was actually said, so we can see how accurate the translation actually was?
If you watch the video, you'll see that the translator actually said a lot more than Jackie reports. She calls her reporting of the questions and answers a 'sampling', and they are not in quotes, and MacMullan is a 'columnist', so you have to take anything in her column with a grain of salt.
I'd find an additional translation interesting.
Update
My friend Takeshi from Japan translates:
Hi, Steve-
Thank you for your e-mail.
He basically answered that he saw the park on TV and the fenway park was now fixing when he was visited. But, he was very impressed and moved and he thought how the fenway park was beautiful and clean. he heard that the constraction would be completed before starting the season. So, He is looking forwad to seeing the park.
Translater is a bit strange, anyway.... He got terrible translator and I'm sorry about it ; )
-Takeshi