In 2017, I got involved with a Russian journalist. Russia very much wanted me to be on their side apparently and they were sending me quite a few people. You can always tell people who are on a mission to be with me and people who actually want to improve their English. You might not believe this but it’s funny how many of the first kind they’re actually are. If it means anything, nobody’s a good student anymore. That’s symptom number one of the Russian occupation. Everybody gets really stupid and aggressive very fast.

They found The Barents Independent Observer, an online journal of border News from Norway, who was translating Russian independent journalists in the Murmansk region in Western Russia.

I’ll be honest with you, it was a very strange job. The folks at the journal were extremely professional about paying the bill. In fact, they would remind me not to work for free. But I think the original intention was to get me out of here. This would be either to transport me to Russia or to Kirkeness, where are the journal is published. And though it was extremely off-putting, I refused invitations to travel. I really didn’t want to travel. I was very comfortable in my apartment. I thought I was the luckiest guy in the world. My market had dried up but I had plenty of money, an easy lifestyle, I could ride my bike for extended loops everyday and I got to study anything I wanted. There was no way I was going to risk my situation for anything.

Eventually the program settled in on translating Tatiana Britskaya. I was the specialist called in to cover all of her reports for Novaya Gazetta, published in Moscow. The association became suddenly very relevant as the publisher of Novaya Gazetta was nominated for the Nobel prize.

As for my abilities as a translator, A lot of it had to do with how much leeway I could take with the text in order to make it understandable. Tanya writes often with innuendo and only mentions first names for local politicians. Of course if you are local and in the know, this makes perfect sense or at least you’re made to feel this way. But if we are writing for outsiders to read, these names need to be written out and often a little bit added in as to their title and what organization they are representing. I think I got it right most of the time. I did carry on with some blunders for a long time until I found them and had to go back and rewrite it. Like anything you practice, you get better at it. And by the time I started daily writing for the upcoming elections books, I was on fire for these translations.

I learned about how the state operates. It is basically a political organization with zero to no legitimate opposition or any reason to listen to the opposition. There are no environmental regulations that can hold water and it seems that the taste for corruption from their politics is endless. Feeding the needs and desires of Moscow is destroying the rest of the country. Damages to the lake systems, to indigenous species and to the indigenous people of the region has absolutely no retort. There is no political power outside of the party and party members often parcel themselves off great tracks of land to use as personal hunting grounds. Illegal to the commoners. Don’t talk to them. They are above the law.

They won the Nobel prize. I felt good being a part of the team. No, I didn’t get any of the money. I also didn’t apply for a job translating Tatiana in Moscow. I really was living my own life but I was very happy to contribute to a cause I believed in very much and still do.

All of the stories in this book are online at the observer. I was given the right to even copy some of the style of the paper in the book. If this was something I wanted to do, it was up to me.

I don’t claim to be the journalist in these stories. My only journalism was making sure I understood all of the backstories for all of the articles. I also don’t claim to be a great activist although I do try where I can to be on the side of right. Or at least the side of ecology which I consider the most right thing that anyone could possibly do. Making these translations got my blood up. I wrote with venom. I wrote with anger even though it’s possible the original writing was more sarcastic. 

I believe I brought out A very good variation on Tanya’s work. True, it is incredibly difficult to imitate the subtlety of a woman. But then again, if we have to replace some of the innuendo with actual names and titles, you lose the femininity in favor of generic journalism. It happens. And probably I got angrier than she would have been. I’m sure she was enjoying a lot of the experiences of driving through the tundra to see them miserable conditions left behind by the uncaring party from Moscow.

I enjoyed the experience. It was a nice paycheck. It amounted to a decent amount of money. I’m not sure I ever needed it but it ended up getting tossed on the pile and it was nice to have a pile. This was also part of my ability to not worry too much if the Russians were squeezing my market dry.

Incidentally, I’ve never been able to figure out how to make the cover on the book on Amazon better. I really wanted the other names on the front but they only offer these vanity operations. I mean, it’s all my translations but still, you have to give the credit to the original authors. I’m just trying to make their work clear to English speakers in the hopes that Justice might exist somewhere.