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My name is Vira, I like to translate [br]articles in Wikipedia very much.

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I think the more information there is in [br]Ukrainian the better it is for everyone.

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Better for me, because I will be[br]able to go back later

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and read something I've never seen[br]or something I read five years ago,

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and then I come back[br]and it's still present in Wikipedia,

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because articles in Wikipedia are saved [br]as soon as you write them.

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And even if I don't have enough skills [br]to write an article from scratch

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because to write certain articles[br]one needs to conduct a real research,

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to write something like [br]"Art of Mozambique"

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one would need to read a pile of books[br]and write a detailed text.

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This is not something I can do,[br]I'm not educated enough for it,

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but I can translate an article [br]about some well-known person,

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contemporary or from previous epochs,

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who is famous in their country and has[br]an article about them in another language.

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I work with English, I translate articles[br]from English to Ukrainian.

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And it is, indeed, very interesting.

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It requires much less effort[br]but has absolutely no less impact.

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And I know that I can check [br]the statistics of views for my articles

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and see how many people[br]come and read them every day.

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And even if it's one person every two days

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I know for sure that my work[br]was useful to the person who viewed,

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who read my article.

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Wikipedia readers likely don't read [br]the whole article from top to bottom.

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Very often, when you'd like[br]to know what a certain thing is,

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the first paragraph is enough [br]to get the general idea.

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But even so, when I know[br]that my work was useful to people,

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it is really a very pleasant feeling.

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And to make it more interesting to work[br]in Wikipedia for those who write articles,

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I also translate the interface.

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I started doing it rather[br]long time ago because…

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Actually, for writing articles[br]to be a comfortable process,

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one has to understand[br]all the features of Wikipedia.

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There are indeed a lot of them:[br]there are special pages,

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there are different gadgets,

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tools for writing articles,[br]for translation, for further formatting,

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so that everything looking nice[br]and pretty, and so on.

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And I really wanted that those[br]who don't know English could do it, too.

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And because translating interface [br]is much easier, in general,

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than literary translation, right --[br]at least, that's what I believe --

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so I decided to start doing it.

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And there are things which I do regularly.

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For example, every week I translate [br]tech news from the developers

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about changes in Wikipedia [br]during the week.

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There are likely some new things that[br]will be definitely interesting to people,

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and they could miss those if not for the [br]chance to read about them in Ukrainian.

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This is true in a broad sense, as well:

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the more information[br]in Ukrainian is on the internet,

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the cooler it is.

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Because, I believe that everyone came [br]across a bad machine translation

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from another language[br]from time to time.

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This gives bad impression of the Internet,[br]as a stockpile of information,

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where there are no combed texts,[br]but only some bad stuff.

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There more you encounter such things,[br]the weaker your faith in humanity becomes.

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This is why I believe that good texts,[br]made by good translators,

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are indeed useful.

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The more diverse information a speaker of [br]any language can read in their language,

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the better, the easier it is for everyone,[br]the less time this person will waste

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again, on translating, for example,[br]or on looking for the information.

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It will be easier for them to spend their [br]time in good mood for something else.

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This is why I believe that those who make[br]translations are indeed very good people.

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Those who make literary translations,[br]who translate fiction books,

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poetry and prose --[br]they are simply my heroes.

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And I am very pleased when I can [br]translate an article, for example,

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about a male or female writer[br]from another country

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and not only translate the existing [br]content of the article, say, in English,

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but also add a line about the Ukrainian [br]translation of this person's works.

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This is actually a great pleasure --

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to know that my compatriots can also[br]read this definitely worthy literature.

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And it is definitely worthy:[br]if an author gets into Wikipedia

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it means that they are known[br]and notable for something.

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And when it's available[br]to read in Ukrainian --

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it's very pleasant, indeed.

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There is a speculation that the English [br]language will conquer the world.

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Or, that it will be not English,[br]or another language after it.

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This may be Spanish or Chinese [br]depending on how events unfold.

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But whether it will happen[br]or not -- we don't know,

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and saving the languages[br]that exist in the world

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today is actually no less important.

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Cultural diversity is feature of humanity

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that cannot be overstated.

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The fact of how different we are [br]is very interesting.

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Sometimes it's hard for translators[br]to find an equivalent

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to a word or a phrase[br]in different languages

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because there might not be some[br]cultural concept in history of one nation

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which is present in the other one,[br]and it is very hard to be passed then.

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But at the same time these cases are very[br]interesting because you understand

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how different people are, how different [br]their backgrounds, their stories can be,

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nations as well as individuals.

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Sometimes when it comes to idioms,

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every word combination can hide[br]almost bottomless deposits of meanings,

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of some historical phenomena,

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that every idiom can be essentially viewed

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as a sort of very concentrated[br]little history textbook.

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I know that not all people[br]like to talk about language

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and follow these phenomena[br]as much as I do, and this is okay.

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Each person has their own hobby,

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each person, in my opinion,[br]has to do what they can do best.

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And if they fail a little bit[br]but really want to do it,

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they have to learn and learn more.

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And if everyone worked[br]on what they want and can do,

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and if at least some fraction[br]of this work was useful for all,

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then everything would be[br]great and wonderful.

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And also if every person in the world[br]wrote at least one article in Wikipedia

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we'd really have [br]the sum of all human knowledge.