Well, it now appears that many sectors of the economy are finally waking up to the need for English, what with the Confederations Cup this year and the World Cup next year. Besides taxi drivers, hotel employees and restaurant staff, it is the turn of somewhat less obvious professional categories, like the prostitutes in Belo Horizonte, to learn their "survival English". I'm even thinking about creating a glossary.

Veja magazine and the "Jobs and Careers" supplement of the "Estado de São Paulo" newspaper recently carried good articles about the whole question of English language teaching/learning in Brazil. I also recently read an interesting comment by another English teacher and blogger who referred to English language schools as his sworn enemies, saying that they are only interested in charging too much for a service of questionable quality, showing little concern for the students, their progress and so on. I feel it takes all sorts, and like interpreting and translation, you get what you pay for. Someone once said that you can have something done quickly, cheaply and well, but never all three at the same time. One of the three will always be sacrificed. And as their is an old addage: "If you pay peanuts you get monkeys." There is no miracle solution, which is why the translation market in Brazil is so price-elastic. You see, those who quote translation work are quite often the same people who quote for office material or whatever. To them it's just another "insumo" (Portuguese for 'input'). Even today, with few exceptions, there is still little understanding of the skill and the work involved in producing top-quality translations, yet the agencies are fighting a tooth-and-nail war to get/hold on to their customers. And when prices begin to dictate the rules of the game, quality gets sacrificed on the altar of saving a few Reais.

In the case of English language teaching I am always wary of claims like "English in 18 months" and sometimes even less. Also, I often ask myself whether companies that invest in English language courses for their employees actually monitor the return on their investment. There are consultants who provide a good service here, but I am convinced that many companies treat this like a "fire and forget" missile. The employee is entitled to a course, so he gets one. And of course, when the company's finances get squeezed in hard times, one of the first victims of the cuts is English classes. Once again because corporate myopia sees this kind of spending as  an expense, rather than an investment. I've lost account of the number of students I've met whose experience of English language classes has been "stop-go-stop-go" throughout their career. And I could go on all day, but I'll be back soon with other ideas.

Hi folks,

After just over two years of inactivity I'm back. I hope to use the blog to deal with subjects involving interpreting, translation and Business English. Of course from time to time I'll comment on matters affecting by beloved Northern Ireland, where I hope to be in April.

For those of you who don't know, in June last year I graduated in Interpreting from PUC São Paulo and was quite active last year in several events organised by UKTI, the commercial wing of the British Consul-General in São Paulo. I am working with a colleague, Beatriz Rose. UKTI also arranged for me to accompany groups of UK visitors to Brazil as part of the increasing Brazil-UK bilateral relations. September 2012-March 2013 is the Brazil-UK season, so there should be lots of other events to come.

And still on interpreting, I have also been active accompanying visitors at the request of Enterprise Ireland, the commercial arm in São Paulo of the Irish Embassy in Brasilia.

Like I said when I began this blog 2 years ago, I will try as far as possible to keep the posts bilingual. So watch this space.

I'm back

Faz mais de dois anos que eu não atualizo meu blog. Agora, voltei. Pretendo usar o blog para tratar, principalmente, de assuntos ligados a meu trabalho - tradução, interpretação (sim, me formei na PUC em julho do ano passado) e aulas de inglês. De lá para cá, já trabalhei em alguns eventos com minha colega, Beatriz Rose, todos eles organizados pelo braço comercial do Consulado-Geral Britânico em São Paulo. Também  a pedido do consulado, venho acompanhando grupos de executivos ingleses em visita ao Brasil (na maioria das vezes, missões comerciais). Também já fiz esse tipo de trabalho a pedido da Enterprise Ireland, o braço comercial em São Paulo da Embaixada da Irlanda. Espero estar muito atuante nessa área ao longo dos próximos meses.

De tempos em tempos, talvez publique também umas palavras sobre a terrinha querida para onde espero estar por alguns dias em abril. Abraços.