Thanks for your honest opinions, kraemder and PMotte.
Honestly, I'm not dead-set on becoming a translator, but it is something I'm still very interested in segueing into eventually. My passion is writing, and in a perfect world I'd write fiction for a living, but that's a business which is 1.) difficult to break into and 2.) pretty insecure in so far as making a good wage even after having broken into it.
So I'm looking at stuff like copywriting, technical communication, and, going hand-in-hand with my fascination with Japanese culture and language, translation. Whether or not I'll enjoy it as much as I think I might is of course debatable at this point, but it's currently at the top of my list of real world jobs that I can actually work towards, whereas successful author is more of a pipe dream, no matter how much effort I might otherwise put into it.
Right now, then, I'm moving forward with the goal of getting to Japan as an English teacher (ideally with the JET Program, but we'll see) and honing my Japanese language skills while I'm over there. In the process, I expect I'll at least become a better writer overall, under the assumption that having experienced another culture on a firsthand basis will help broaden my worldview. Maybe I'll go on to have a successful, enjoyable career as a translator from there, or maybe I'll hate it and end up being something I never even thought of. But at the very least it's a goal I can work towards with experiences that will have some lasting effects on my life, be they directly related to my career or not.
It's a plan, anyway, which is something I've needed in my life for a long time now. We'll see how it all pans out in the next few years.
Thanks again for your thoughts, everyone!
Honestly, I'm not dead-set on becoming a translator, but it is something I'm still very interested in segueing into eventually. My passion is writing, and in a perfect world I'd write fiction for a living, but that's a business which is 1.) difficult to break into and 2.) pretty insecure in so far as making a good wage even after having broken into it.
So I'm looking at stuff like copywriting, technical communication, and, going hand-in-hand with my fascination with Japanese culture and language, translation. Whether or not I'll enjoy it as much as I think I might is of course debatable at this point, but it's currently at the top of my list of real world jobs that I can actually work towards, whereas successful author is more of a pipe dream, no matter how much effort I might otherwise put into it.
Right now, then, I'm moving forward with the goal of getting to Japan as an English teacher (ideally with the JET Program, but we'll see) and honing my Japanese language skills while I'm over there. In the process, I expect I'll at least become a better writer overall, under the assumption that having experienced another culture on a firsthand basis will help broaden my worldview. Maybe I'll go on to have a successful, enjoyable career as a translator from there, or maybe I'll hate it and end up being something I never even thought of. But at the very least it's a goal I can work towards with experiences that will have some lasting effects on my life, be they directly related to my career or not.
It's a plan, anyway, which is something I've needed in my life for a long time now. We'll see how it all pans out in the next few years.
Thanks again for your thoughts, everyone!
