アイス(aisu)、ジュース(juusu)、ゼリー(zerii)

Three very simple terms that can be such a headache in translation lol especially if you can't see what they're talking about.

Random translation/bilingual thoughts thread.
(cont)

アイス
-Sounds like "ice" but is usually never actual ice. Usually ice cream or some variation of an ice pop, but it's just so commonly called Popsicle in the US which is a brand name. Sometimes, they'll differentiate between アイスキャンディ and アイスクリーム. (cont)

"Ice candy" vs "ice cream" but usually, is just "ice."

Side note, I remember being very confused when I was about 8 years old and moved back to Japan and my uncle offered me some アイス until I saw that he meant ice cream vs ice. (cont)

ジュース
-Sounds like "juice" and can mean actual juice, but is used for every soft drink under the sun in Japanese Another term where I try to look for what they're talking about when translating because they just say ジュースを買ってくる (Juusu wo kattekuru), (cont)

which sounds like they're saying "I'll go buy some juice," but they just generally mean, "I'll go buy some drinks" which can also include juice lol.

(cont)

ゼリー
-Sounds like "jelly" but means gelatin desserts of some sort, but can cause confusion anyway due to it also being commonly called by its popular brand name Jell-O(Jello) in the US. English dictionary definition for "jelly" does actually include gelatin desserts (cont)

but can also mean just strawberry jelly, which is a fruit spread.

The one phrase that I'm always not sure if I should use gelatin or jelly is コーヒーゼリー (coffee jelly) because it just looks bizarre as coffee gelatin or coffee jelly but (cont)

coffee jelly is one of my absolute favorite Japanese desserts of all time lol. It's so good.

I do wonder what people who want supposed direct translations only want us to do with those terms though, as they are loan words (cont)

Should we always just translate アイス as "ice" even though it's never "ice"? Only use "juice" for ジュース because it sounds like "juice" but the character is clearly holding a sports drink or soda/cola?

Some terms can be translated directly, some can't. (cont)

I mean, of course, we CAN translate everything literally or directly, but it won't always be right. I can translate 根掘り葉掘り as "digging roots and leaves" but it means "to be inquisitive/prying" lol. (cont)

I keep seeing people throw around "A translator's job is to..." so lightly lately but so many people sadly don't seem to actually realize what or how much work a translator's job entails. I'll still do my best to convey what's being said in Japanese to English regardless.

There is rarely just one right translation for anything. Japanese and English have so many possibilities, so it's bizarre to me when anyone tries to limit translation by saying, "You can't use slang(or anything else)" or "This is the only correct translation for x." (cont)

There are definitely valid mistakes that come up for whatever reason and need to be fixed, but there are so many times, it's just subjective vs objective. (Cont)

There are many factors that can lead to simple mistakes. But it's sorta terrifying that some people's first reaction now when they see a translation mistake, or more often, what they perceive to be a mistake, is to try to tell a whole company to "fire the translator." (cont)

I don't feel it's an actual threat. If I was constantly worried about negative comments about my work on a daily basis, I wouldn't last in this business It's the actual idea that someone's first thought over something like a typo is to strip someone of their livelihood. (cont)

If people have genuine questions about translation, translation choices, Japanese, Japanese culture, etc, I'd be more than happy to discuss them with people My answers will never be the only possible answer, but I can at least explain my thought processes (cont).

I'm gonna end this thread on a much lighter note, as I didn't mean it to get too serious. I just realize I laugh at Karamatsu or Nagi for inserting random English words into their Japanese like I don't actually do that in real life lol. (cont)

In anime, it's used more for comedy, but the more I think about it, I speak like that every day because I grew up in a household that commonly uses both Japanese and English. (cont)

So when I speak to my parents or friends that know both Japanese and English, I often speak in a mix of both languages like it's the most natural thing in the world but it probably sounds confusing af to other people *hobbles off soapbox*