The Son of A rat Catcher :: Powered by Subrion 3.1

Uganda is a country that was referred to as “The Pearl of
Africa” by Sir Winston Churchill in 1907 during his travel tours in Uganda. The
country has gone through many tremendous changes in economic, social and
political spheres of life. Uganda offers an experience that is as varied ranging
from colonial British colonial rule, dictatorial regimes, and a wide range of
civil wars as well as modern democracy. What you see and experience are only
limited by your imagination and sense of adventure. Jenkins Kiwanuka is one of
the people who have witnessed these changing situations in the country. In his
book titled “The Son of A rat Catcher”,
he does share his memoirs - memoirs of one of Uganda’s exceptionally talented
journalists who turned himself into a remarkable public relations officer and
diplomat in Uganda’s Foreign Service. A man with no full formal education, this
‘son of a rat catcher’ presents to us a story of great determination, hard work
and self-confidence, thereby fulfilling the advertiser’s remark that ‘when you
follow your passion, success follows you. In his words, Prof. Samwiri
Lwanga-Lunyiigo, describes these as memoirs of ‘a tailor, carpenter, builder,
clerk, journalist, politician, public relations practitioner, diplomat and
business executive’. “It’s that versatility,” says the Professor, “that enabled
Kiwanuka to seize.

Son of a Rat Catcher, although relatively small, is just
about everything in life. There are so many things to read and wonder about:
Kiwanuka’s very humble beginnings; how he missed out on higher education; how
he rose from working (as a clerk) in the King’s African Rifles to journalism,
foreign service, journalism again, then business as an executive and progress
from that phase to his present working life as a newspaper columnist and
author.

Whom didn’t he meet and where didn’t he visit in his long
service in both public and private services? He rubbed shoulders (literally)
with such figures as Prime Ministers Harold Wilson of Britain, Holyoake of New
Zealand and Indira Ghandi of India (who served him a glass of water when he
dozed off in a conference), Pope John Paul II (now a Saint), Sir Andrew Cohen
(a former Governor of Uganda whom he gave a lift in his car), Chairman Mao Tse
Tung of China and many others.

As for his foreign service exploits, apart from serving at
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at home, he served at our missions in London,
Washington D.C., New York, Ottawa, Bonn and the Vatican. He wrote tributes to a
host of people who have passed on and those of Pope John Paul II, Abubakar
Mayanja, Daudi Taliwaku, Dan Zirimenya and James Namakajjo form part of the
book.

Kiwanuka ends his book with 20 ‘Reflections,’ which are
fascinating to read. In fact, if there is a section of the memoirs the reader
should re-read, this is surely the one. There are lots of lessons to learn from
these memoirs, the outstanding one being that if you have passion for your life
and determination and self-confidence, the blue sky is your limit.

This is an extraordinary story of an extraordinary life told
by a man with an extraordinary pen at his disposal. I have read many memoirs in
my life, but these are among the best I have come across. 

Advantages of Bilingualism -

As Frank Smith Quotes that "One language sets you in a corridor for life. Two languages open every door along the way", It is therefore seen that speaking two languages rather than just one has  practical benefits in an increasingly globalized world. Of recent research  has shown that the advantages of bilingualism are even more fundamental than being able to converse with a wider range of people. Being bilingual opens up your way to the global world and makes you smarter in every thing you do. 

In contrast to the early research on bilingualism which indicated  a second language to be an interference that hindered a child’s academic and intellectual development, Recent studies have shown that bilingualism helps children to develop their abilities in two or more languages throughout their school years and they gain deeper comprehension of language and how to use it explicitly

Bilingualism is therefore of cognitive and social-emotional advantage. In the research of (Zelasko and Antunez, 2000) that individuals who are bilingual switch between two different language systems. Their brains are very active and flexible. They also showed that bilingual people have an easier time in understanding math concepts, solving word problems more easily and developing strong thinking skills 

Bilingual people can therefore communicate more easily with a wide range of people within families and across communities and generations of different social contexts. They are able to read and write in more than one language and therefore exposed to new literature, traditions, ideas and culture and this fosters them to tolerate other cultural groups.

The bilingual experience appears to influence the brain from infancy to old age.  The study conducted by Tamar Gollan  found that the elderly individuals with a higher degree of bilingualism — measured through a comparative evaluation of proficiency in each language — were more resistant than others to the onset of dementia and other symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease: the higher the degree of bilingualism, the later the age of onset.  

Global Marketing.

The sales volumes of any company depend entirely on the marketing technique employed in promoting the business. Marketing is an activity or processes of communicating the value of a commodity or service to the customers with the intention of selling such a commodity or service. For any marketer to be more successful, he needs to widen the audience base of his marketing campaigns. This therefore necessitates not only targeting the home markers but also global markets.

As the essence of marketing is to disseminate information about the existence and the value of the products and services, it has become very vital to consider marketing translation as it is the only link between one’s product or service and the global market. It helps companies cross barriers that would otherwise be impenetrable difficult to surpass.  In some case, it is a bridge between consumers and producers in different nations. Communicating to your customers in the language their language makes them fill proud in the first place and it minimizes the level of misinterpretation of the information

Learning a foreign language

Learning a foreign language can be more difficult and challenging! Especially if one is attempting it at an old age.

When I was learning Mandarin, it gave me a very hard time to learn and master the language. I thought of quitting the process but a friend encouraged me to persist, Thanks to him that am an expert in Mandarin now. I have therefore learned that holding into something with an interest and determination makes it achievable.

My advice to anybody learning a foreign language is to have courage, determination and patience for it takes some time to learn a language which is not your mother tongue.

What is your advice to someone learning a foreign language

A professional translation agency

A translation agency in particular acts as a link between a client and a translator. Just like any other middle man, a translation agency has to bear ethical and legal obligations towards the clients. This is of vast importance for the development of language industry at a global scale. For the protection of the client, the agency and the translator, standards have to be followed that spell out the mutual duties between the three parties.

The ethical standards, documentation and quality are of much importance while choosing a translation agency. As interest has grown in quality management, then specific standards have to be followed for translation services

There is, however, a view within the translation industry that, while not doing any actual harm, an over-reliance on such standards can give a false sense of security. Blindly following translation standards does not on its own provide real assurance regarding translation quality. The argument is that the path to quality in translation is by focusing more on using mother tongue translators who are have passion in the language, experienced, specialized in the subject, excellent project management, have good research skills, with professional translation qualification and self discipline 

Business Networking - EasyBlog - BDS Translation

Running a business in the dynamic world today has proves to be more challenging. With competitors emerging day and night every day, looking at the local market only does not help realize the goals of the business. It has therefore become necessary to penetrate into the global markets for one to maximize the sales volumes and profitability. But to achieve this you will need a professional translation agency to build networks and spread your messages in different languages to the target markets have your business penetrate into the new markets globally

Machines vs Human translation

The history of machine translation dates back to the early 17th century. Many institutions and organizations used machines to automatically translate research abstracts, Mormon texts, technical manuals among others.  For example
The French Textile Institute also used Machine Translation to translate abstracts from and into French, English, German and Spanish. Today the progress and the potential of machine translation is questionable. With the great number of qualified translators of different languages today the use of machine translation to me seem not necessary. Well much as machines would be considered accurate, human beings can still do the same as machines, further the operation of machines still need human input to perform a particular task, so to that effect humans seem more superior than machines.  Of recent the machine translation has become more expensive due to high costs of operation such energy/electricity and other operating expenses. I would therefore recommend human translation other than machines. any way this is my personal opinion I do not know yours?.
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