Bio / education / professional background

  • Born in Udine, northeastern Italy, on July 29, 1968.
  • Lived near Udine, then in San Daniele del Friuli (same area) until 2002.
  • Currently living in La Marina, Alicante, Spain.
  • High school diploma in Electrical engineering, Malignani Institute, Udine, 1989.
  • Studies in Economy, University of Trieste, Italy, 1989-1991.
  • BA in Mathematics, University of Udine, 1995-2000.
  • Scholarship in Computer Science, Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain, 1999-2000.
  • Logistic Manager, AMB Packaging srl (chemicals/plastics), Italy, 2000-2002.
  • Sales Area Manager, Bellota Herramientas SA (hardware tools), Spain/Italy, 2002-2004.
  • Western European Sales & Marketing Director, Goldenbaby srl (furniture), Italy, 2004-2005.
  • Started working as a part-time freelance translator and typesetter in the early 1990s, full-time translator since 2006.

Languages

  • Italian is my "official" and written native language. I was born and raised near Udine, northeastern Italy, near the borders with Austria and Slovenia.
  • Friulian is my spoken native language. It is the language I was raised with, and I still speak it with my family, old friends, and anybody who is a Friulian native. Friulian belongs to the Rhaetian language family, which also includes Ladin (northern Italy) and Romansh (eastern Switzerland).
  • I started learning English at the age of 11 at secondary school, and since then I have been steadily improving my knowledge of the language, practicing it through travels, personal contacts, and professional activity. I obtained the Cambridge University CPE, equivalent to the highest level (European C2 level) for a non-native English speaker. I have a solid and long (15-year) experience in translating into English.
  • In the mid 1990s I started learning Spanish, quickly achieving a near-native proficiency of the language, partly thanks to its strong affinity with Italian. I have been spending long periods of time in Spain (Valencia, Alicante, Bilbao), first as a student, then for professional purposes, and now I have my main residence near Elche, on the Mediterranean coast. As a by-product, this has also given me a solid knowledge of Catalan. I regularly translate into Spanish. I obtained the DELE Superior certificate from Instituto Cervantes, again equivalent to the C2 level.
  • Through the years I have been studying and practicing French and German for my various professional activities, first as a Sales & Marketing Director for Western Europe, then as a translator. I regularly translate form French and German into Italian, English and Spanish.
  • I also translate easily from Portuguese (both Brazilian and Iberian).
  • I have been studying and practicing the Russian language for a few years. I translate without much difficulty from Russian.

Favourite translation fields

  • Technical/industrial/engineering. This is my favourite field of work. My high school education in electricity and mechanics helps me quite a bit here, as well as my professional experience in industrial companies (chemicals/plastics, hardware tools, furniture). User manuals, patents and catalogues are probably on the top of my list for translation experience.
  • Scientific/medical. After all, I have a BA in Mathematics applied to computer science. I find myself comfortable when translating texts dealing with mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, biochemistry and medicine. This usually includes academic research papers or dissertation theses, as well as manuals and specifications for medical devices.
  • Tourism/leisure/sports. One of my preferred fields. I have regularly been working on tourist guides, design books and other related material for well-known international publishers.
  • Financial. Experience in translating balance sheets, bank audition reports, presentations.
  • Economy and social sciences. Mostly academic papers.
  • Legal. Contracts, patents, police reports, as well as the usual paperwork stuff (certificates, adoption papers, diplomas, etc.).
  • Arts/music/architecture. Another of my favourite areas.
  • Other fields with minor translation experience: photography, psychology, religion, agriculture and breeding, gastronomy.

Hardware/Software

  • Linux (SuSE distribution) and Windows Vista OS's.
  • MS Office and OpenOffice.org suites.
  • Adobe Acrobat Pro for PDFs.
  • Quark XPress for DTP.
  • Macromedia Dreamweaver for HTML files.
  • LaTeX for typesetting maths and such.
  • Whenever possible, I do not use Trados or other CAT tools. I am against semi-automatic translation. I believe any good translator should be able to stay consistent and accurate through short or long projects without the aid of TMs, build specific glossaries when appropriate/needed, and contribute with flexibility, common sense and a bit of "human touch" (none of which are included in any CAT tool).

Main interests and hobbies

  • Sports: American football, cycling, swimming, triathlon, yoga are (or have been) my active sports.
  • Music: I listen to blues, soul and traditional. E. Clapton, B. Dylan, T. Snider are among my favourite artists. Also enjoy classical, particularly piano pieces by F. Chopin and F. Liszt, and G. Rossini's opera works. I play rock guitar, harmonica and some piano.
  • Reading: my favourite authors are J. Steinbeck, D. Chopra, I. Asimov, J. Irving, M. Crichton, E. Dickinson, R. Tagore in English, G. García Márquez and I. Allende in Spanish, E. Mendoza in Spanish and Catalan, S. Benni and A. Camilleri in Italian, D. Pennac and J.M.G. Le Clézio in French, H. Hesse and G. Hauptmann in German.
  • Arts & architecture: interested and fascinated by the surrealists (S. Dalí, J. Miró, M. Ernst) and by the architectural works of S. Calatrava, L. Mies van der Rohe, A Gaudí, F. L. Wright.