it’s pretty similar to trying to strip a heavily-armed snake mecha of all its armaments and augmentations, and then trying to fit that same shit into a humanoid base.
And then making sure it still walks and runs and doesn’t look like a drunkard put it together during a stroll in a junk-yard.
お兄ちゃん、やめてぇ！ 
Ganbatte Onii-Chan!
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Hmmm then is chinese to english more easy?
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I don’t speak Mandarin, but if it’s anything like Cantonese, then it’s more like fitting a bear mecha’s gear onto a humanoid mecha.
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It’s much harder than that… try creating a dragon from tiny cogwheels that all link together and spin, and then shove that into Eric Cartman’s ass to turn it into an alien satellite probe… EARTH IS JUST A REALITY TV SHOW!!! (south park reference)
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Cantonese and Mandarin have the same talk interaction rules, as in if you wrote everything you say what’s right and what’s wrong will be painfully evident (I know cuz I know cantonese but i have to learn Mandarin). The only difference is in speech, and there things gets a bit tricky. It’s alot easier to mechanically translate a piece of chinese that’s mandarin than it is Cantonese, if you’re foreign to both, since the chinese phonic system of “pin yin” is used only for mandarin, and not at all for Canto. WIth enough time and enough help even a foreigner with little knowledge can translate a line of Chinese pretty accurately, though if you’re talking paragraph that makes things alot harder (Cuz of interations between sentences). If you’re familiar to both, then it’s just which one you favor, and if you only know one personally, that’s the one you’ll prefer.
That said, you usually wouldn’t be translating cantonese or mandarin over the Chinese word itself. And by that point, it’s really like placing down a line of humanoid mecha but when it’s time to strap people on the biggest problem is that they all have the same paint job.
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Chinese is similar hard to get it into read able English which can be understood
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It’s easier, except for the slang which sometimes doesn’t really have any equivalents in English, but that’s not really a problem.
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Mandarin to English is definitely much more easier(for me) since they both use pretty much the same grammar and sentence structure. Cantonese would be (a little bit) harder only because it has more tones compared to Mandarin but they both use the same Chinese moon runes when written so the meaning would be pretty much the same.
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I’ll say it’ll be a humanoid mecha but with an operational language the pilot doesn’t know.
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It’s the difference between a language made with simplicity as its base and a language made with the intention of conveying as much as possible in as few words as possible.
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Which one is english? Because english is often both verbose and complicated.
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true. they just work different than each other. while english is flexible japanese is deep.
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like taking ON Metal Ge*r w/ just a m-16?
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Drunkard…junk-yard. I see what you did there.
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if english isn’t deep enough maybe spanish?
it probably would be like fitting a gundam’s gear into a zaku’s gear though….
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Objectively speaking, I’m not sure which one is weirder, Japanese or English.
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if it’s modern Japanese and modern English, I would say English by far
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English by far. With English it’s not even the main grammar or vocabulary rules you need to watch out for. It’s all the *exceptions* to those rules that can drive you to drink.
Oh and then even better when we throw in borrowed usage and words from other languages. The fun never ends!
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I’m glad English is my first language because I sure as fuck wouldn’t want to learn it.
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‘x ‘ You think English is annoying? Try Thai.
Tonations, short-long vowel, difference between R and L (the tongue roll :x ), and some exceptions in reading (like karma in Thai)
And I think they’ve cut it down some what, but there’s 40 or so alphabets and about 25? vowels.
Not Chinese level remembering of letters, but all the other rules make it far more annoying.
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But if you speak Thai native, the tones are a non-issue.
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For me as a beginner, it is like assembling 10 different gunpla where the parts removed from the plastic container and placed in a single box without manual, and will just say “f*ck this shit” in the end.
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I somehow understand that I actually study how to translate Japanesse to French in my Highschool and yeah that’s a pain in the eye.
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how about translating from japanese to javanese?
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I would like to see it. Seriously.
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100% accurate comparison.
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The really difficult part about learning English is the discrepancy between pronounciation and spelling. Just think about row, sew and few, for example.
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“it’s pretty similar to trying to strip a heavily-armed snake mecha of all its armaments and augmentations, and then trying to fit that same shit into a humanoid base.”
I won’t ask how you end up with experience trying to strip snake mecha. :P
Male or female snake?
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You know what? The thing is, your analogy makes it harder to understand… It’s not like everyone build a snake mecha in their spare time like you ausies (and nips) do… After all, I can’t even read the manual, as it’s in moon runes…
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With a manual in latin telling you how to make a pizza
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*nods towards the original post* Fumu, you are absolutely right. However it is the same for every translation where you cross the borders of cultural and historical similarity. Well, that’s what translators are for though, to be the bridge that connects the differing spheres making it understandable for either side. :)
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nothing difficult for those who want to learn…
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but when you get that humanoid mecha to operate the snake Gatling gun… ah the joy?
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i’m glad to only be worried about translating from English to Spanish, no is the same structure but i’m learned since i was a child.
the conversational part is hard in my case.
go ahead and don’t worry “if you do a effort you can do it”
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