PROOOFREADING (sic)
What goes on in the final days of a translation project? Proofreading and editing.
This week 4 Palawanos are up to do final proofreading. We’re thanking for the diligence of these men, reading 7,954 verses, one word at a time, to find typos, spelling errors, incorrect pronouns, etc.
Team A reads a book and Bill enters the changes on the computer. Then Team B reads the same book and finds just a few more. Donna reads the book and finds a couple more.
The Paratext software helps so much. If the men find a spelling error, Bill can search for that same error throughout the entire New Testament and fix all the instances in a few seconds, even the ones the guys might have missed. The software also lets him find duplicate words, inconsistent punctuation, you name it. Amazing.
SOME FUN MISTAKES
You can imagine how easy it might be to mistype words like mengungumana. Or how we might not catch a misspelling if we weren’t careful. It’s been a crazy week.
But some mistakes made us laugh:
“God will hold each one accountable for their own deeds.”
“Own deeds” should be kendiring keradya, but we have KENDIROng keradya. Well, kendiro means “rice pot” so is this saying that God will be criticizing people’s cooking?
“Not right”
Should be diki sugat, but we had diki SUGAR. Okay, so it’s not sweet. Is that a problem?
“Testimony”
Should be pekubanar but once we had pekuBABAR. Yes, we’re looking forward to reading stories to our grandchildren in a couple of months, but… there is no Babar in the New Testament.
“The Little Sea of Galilea”
Should be dagat-dagat (literally sea-sea, or “little sea”), but we had dagat-DATAG which sort of means, “a floor which is an ocean.” And you surfers know what a drag it is when the ocean is flat.
“The Apostle Paul”
Should be Pablo, but we had PABO, which as you Spanish-speakers know, means “turkey”!
We even had a few random vehicles like KIA and SEGWAY (maybe because we’re thinking about our upcoming furlough and needing a vehicle?)
WHAT’S NEXT?
We need to finish all this proofreading by the end of next week. Grammar, typos, spelling, capitalization, punctuation, subtitles, footnotes, cross-references… all need to be checked and rechecked.
Then we will head to the city of Davao on the island of Mindanao for the whole month of September. There some missionaries with SIL (Wycliffe Bible Translators) will help us do the digital typesetting of the New Testament.
PLEASE PRAY WITH US NOW AND LOOKING AHEAD:
- Health and energy in these last weeks
- Finding all mistakes and getting them fixed
- Everything involved in packing up here and setting up in the USA
- A car for our Home Assignment (beginning Nov 5)
Reaching Palawanos together with you,
-Bill and Donna
JOIN US ON FACEBOOK
Bill and Donna on Facebook