TED translator Khalid Marbou at work in the nanotechnology lab.

TED Talks are available in 100 languages, from Albanian to Vietnamese, thanks to the tireless work of our volunteer translators. So far, more than 10,000 volunteers have created upwards of 40,000 talk translations — and every week, the TED Blog brings you a Q&A with one of them. Today, meet Khalid Marbou.

1. Where do you live and what do you do by day?

I was born and raised in Tiznit, Morocco, and live in Cyberjaya, Malaysia, where I’m pursuing a bachelor’s degree in nanotechnology engineering. Aside from my studies, I spend most of my day online keeping in touch with friends and relatives — blogging, translating, reading and working on different projects in Malaysia and Morocco. 

2. What drew you to TED?

Many factors made me into a TED fanatic, but I would say that the most influential of them is my constant search for inspiration and intellectual stimulation. Before TED, I found small doses of inspiration reading novels and watching movies, but when I first discovered TED, it gave me a jolt. It’s never ceased to inspire me to this day.

3. What was the first talk you translated and how did you pick it?

Charles Fleischer insists: All things are MoleedsMy first talk was Charles Fleischer’s “All things are Moleeds.” Most of the other translators avoided the talk because of its complexity and richness – it has made-up words and expressions — but I liked Charles’ sense of humor and wanted to share it with my friends, so they could understand it. I picked it up both as a challenge and as a test to see how prepared I would be for complex translation tasks. I managed to finish it within a day, and picked up another talk right away.

4. What have been your favorite talks to translate? Why?

Beau Lotto + Amy O’Toole: Science is for everyone, kids includedI would say Beau Lotto + Amy O’Toole’s talk: “Science is for everyone, kids included.” First, because I am very passionate about science communication and involving kids in scientific activities. I’ve been working on implementing similar initiatives in Moroccan schools and raising awareness about the subject in general. And second, having attended TEDGlobal2012, I saw Beau and Amy onstage and was tremendously amazed and excited. I said to myself, “That’s a talk I want to spend hours translating.” And I did.

5. Which talk was the most difficult for you to translate and why?

The most challenging talk for me was indeed that first talk I translated, “All things are Moleeds.”

6. What’s a phrase in your language that you wish would catch on globally?

I’d like to share a quote from my native language, Tamazight:

“أورا تمون أبلا إيح ترعي”

Which translates into:

“It won’t get organized unless it first gets all messy.”

TED Talks are available in 97 languages, from Albanian to Vietnamese, thanks to the tireless work of our translators. So far, more than 8,800 volunteers have created the upwards of 34,000 translated talks. To celebrate this huge accomplishment, every week the TED Blog will be bringing you a Q&A with one of our most prolific translators. Today, meet

Where do you live? What do you do?

I live in a small village in Israel, and I’m a front end web developer.

What drew you to TED?

I’ve known TED since it only had a few dozen talks, and I was always drawn to the topics and the quality.

What was the first talk you translated and how did you pick it?

Beau Lotto: Optical illusions show how we see The first talk I translated was Beau Lotto’s “Optical illusions show how we see,” I picked it since my then 9-year-old daughter didn’t know English well enough and I was acting as an online translator. Then, I saw the translate button. Ever since then, I’ve been hooked.

What have been your favorite talks to translate? Why?

My favorite talk to translate was … actually all of Marco Tempest’s talks. They are so riveting.

Marco Tempest: A cyber-magic card trick like no otherWhich talk was the most difficult for you to translate and why?

The hardest talk was the TED-Ed lesson “Making sense of spelling” by Gina Cooke. It talks about spelling and grammar in English, and it’s very hard to pass on to other languages.

What’s a phrase in your language that you wish would catch on globally? 

I think the most known phrase is “eihiye beseder” which translates to “everything will be OK.” People use it here all the time. We have so many worries, we try at least to take everything easy.

TED Talks are available in 94 languages, from Albanian to Vietnamese, thanks to the tireless work of our translators. So far, more than 8,500 volunteers have created nearly 34,000 translated talks. To celebrate this huge accomplishment, every week the TED Blog will be bringing you a Q&A with one of our most prolific translators. Today, meet

Where do you live? And what do you do by day?

I’m from Bologna, Italy — yes, the place where the ham-like thing comes from. I’m trying to make photography my full-time job, and am sort of a little more than halfway there. I also teach English, translate, volunteer for an NGO, have fun and listen to a lot of music.

What drew you to TED?

Random internet browsing in late 2008 or early 2009, I think. All I can remember is that I was doing some research online and I stumbled on a video from TED.com and, after watching A LOT of videos — one after the other — I realized I was hooked. Then I read about the conferences, the Open Translation Project and the TEDx program. I started translating and have gotten the chance to meet a lot of wonderful and inspiring people. Here we are five years later.

David Deutsch: A new way to explain explanation

What was the first talk you translated and how did you pick it?

The one I stumbled on about five years ago: David Deutsch’s “A new way to explain explanation.” Halfway through watching it, I thought of some friends who would love it as well — but they didn’t speak English. So I actually started writing down the text and translating it on my own. Then I noticed a link on the page referring to translations, I clicked there and discovered the Open Translation Project. I signed up immediately and started translating all the talks I could get my hands on.

What have been your favorite talks to translate? Why?

I like the challenging ones — the ones that make me work hard and learn things in the process. Sometimes the things I learn are related to the topic, but more often they are related to transferring the talks into Italian — the mood, the concepts, the humor and the cultural references that are found in the talks. That being said, there is a special place in my heart for the final bit of the first talk I translated: “Take two stone tablets. On one of them carve ‘Problems are solvable,’ on the other one carve ‘Problems are inevitable.’”

Which talk was the most difficult for you to translate and why?

Jokes are the hardest things to translate, in my opinion, and cultural-specific references are a very close second. We need to find an equivalent in the target language that maintains the tone, the general sense and often the specific meaning of the joke. Trust me on this: from a translator’s point of view, stand-up comedy is much, much harder than rocket science.

What’s a phrase in your language that you wish would catch on globally?

“Let’s talk about this over coffee/lunch/dinner.”

The idea is that to properly address important issues, people require a comfortable and relaxed environment, something a large number of Italians would not find in formal settings like an office or a meeting. I think you could roughly translate that phrase as: “I think the issue is important and I value your opinion, so it will be worthwhile to invest our free time in discussing this where we can both feel comfortable and speak our minds freely.”

Meet more of our TED translators »

Pagani snaps a photo on the TEDGlobal 2012 stage.

Where do you live? And what do you do by day?

I come from Barcelona, Spain, and I am living in Cologne, Germany. I am an assistant professor for Applied Linguistics at Cologne University.

What drew you to TED?

My first contact with TED was by chance. Or perhaps it was not just by chance…

I wanted to find appealing multimedia material to use in my scientific translation classes. I was looking for something to motivate my students not only to get more involved in translations, but to encourage them to pursue knowledge on the cutting-edge of science and technology. I came across Jill Bolte Taylor’s stroke of insight. I was excited and overwhelmed by her passion, and the powerful way she connected science with emotion. I didn’t sleep that night. I went on watching one TED Talk after another. A new perspective of the world came into my house, and I could take advantage of it without leaving my comfort zone.

What was the first talk you translated and how did you pick it?

After my first experience with TED Talks, I realized there was an Open Translation Project!!! The first TED Talk I translated was: Kevin Kelly: How technology evolves. It might have been another one, but this one was my first translation among more than 100 so far. I wanted to translate anything related to science and technology. I was very pleased with the possibility of translating subtitles into my language.

What have been your favorite talks to translate? Why?

I am crazy about neuroscience and these are some talks I was especially pleased to translate:

• Annie Murphy Paul: What we learn before we’re born
• Paul Zak: Trust, morality — and oxytocin
• Pawan Sinha on how brains learn to see
• Allan Jones: A map of the brain
• Antonio Damasio: The quest to understand consciousness
• Oliver Sacks: What hallucination reveals about our minds

These TED Talks tackle the brain from very different angles.

Which talk was the most difficult for you to translate and why?

Each talk has its specificities and difficulties.

What’s a phrase in your language that you wish would catch on globally?

“Confieso que he vivido” (I confess that I lived.)

“Vale la pena haber luchado y cantado, vale la pena haber vivido porque he amado” (It is worthwhile to have struggled and sung, it is worthwhile to have lived because I have loved.)

Both sentences were written by Pablo Neruda, the incredible poet, diplomat and politician from Chile. In 1971, he won the Nobel Prize for Literature. I love both sentences because I identify with them. They express the way I really want to live — with intensity.

TED Talks are available in 94 languages, from Albanian to Vietnamese, thanks to the tireless work of our translators. So far, more than 8,500 volunteers have created the upwards of 33,000 translated talks. To celebrate this huge accomplishment, every week the TED Blog will be bringing you a Q&A with one of our most prolific translators. Today, meet Matti Jääaro.

Where do you live? And what do you do by day?

I’m from Stockholm and live half time in Hong Kong where my wife works as technical designer for a Swedish fashion company. When I don’t run my small IT consulting company I try my best to live according to the Holstee manifesto.

What drew you to TED?

I ended up in a conversation with two friends at a party — they were both sleep-deprived from watching too many TED Talks and could not believe I had never heard of it. I thought that being addicted to online lectures might be taking the whole geek pride thing a step too far. But, I had to see what it was all about, and few days later I had watched 30 talks myself. Open Source software, sharing ideas and participating in global collaborations around computer software is something I have always taken for granted —- but I kind of assumed was a concept that only worked for a certain type of person in the high-tech community. However, here I saw all kinds of people; students, artists, business leaders, ex presidents. They all shared this same urge to run out and tell as many people as possible about their new ideas, rather than locking them in a safe. I realized this was something bigger, and that I had to be a part of it.

What was the first talk you translated and how did you pick it?

It was Renny Gleeson’s talk on antisocial phone tricks, and I have to admit that the main reason was that it was short. (It’s a three-minute talk.) I had no idea back then how much work a translation would be, or if I would have a hard time meeting deadlines. It turned out that a month is plenty of time in most cases to finish a translation.

What have been your favorite talks to translate? Why?

Dan Gilbert: The surprising science of happiness.This is my all-time favorite TED Talk. The beauty of doing a translation is that you really have to take in and understand every single sentence in a text. You don’t just do a direct translation of the words, you really need to sit down and think about where the speaker is coming from and what he is trying to convey. I must have watched this one at least five times before I started translating it but still learned so much that I had previously missed or not fully grasped.

Which talk was the most difficult for you to translate and why? 

Lucy McRae: How can technology transform the human body? When June Cohen from TED Media said that “All of our speakers are on the edge of their fields, and therefore on the edge of language”, she couldn’t have been more correct. This was one of those talks where some of the terms don’t even exist in my language. Sometimes Lucy also uses a poetic way of expressing herself — which meant I had to break apart those sentences, find the inner meaning, and then reconstruct them in Swedish. It took a lot of teamwork between me and my reviewer before we were finally satisfied with the result.

What’s a phrase in your language that you wish would catch on globally?

The English phrase “Speak of the devil, and he shall appear” is “Tala om trollen så står de I farstun” in Swedish. It translates to, “Speak of the trolls, and they’ll be on the porch”, making it much better adapted to modern day chat rooms where trolls outnumber devils five to one.

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Interested in getting to know more TED translators? Check out more Q&As we these global wordsmiths.