|
Reader question: I am Alice, a Chinese girl who only worked for more than one year. Right now, I’m planning to get a translation certificate, which requires an extensive grasp of expressions and sentences on economy, business, life-related or up-to-date news, a hard-to-get one. As I understand, this requires a large scope of knowledge and deep understanding both of Chinese and English, which is beyond me right now. I try to learn through other ways too, but it turns out improvements are coming in slow. I know translation is a process that takes patience and time, but the fact is, I’m desperate about improving my English ability or enlarge my English scope within one year. Could you give me some advice or guidance on this matter? My comments: Thanks, Alice, for writing. I don’t always reply to general-question letters such as yours because, one, general-question letters such as yours are too many – I won’t have a life if I attempt to answer all of them. Secondly, there’s not much interesting to say. For one thing, with general questions, one always feel one is somehow missing the target and failing to hit the bull’s eye, as they say, and as you know I prefer hitting the bull’s eye every time. In other words, I like to be direct and to the point. Besides, anything one says ceases to be interesting after you say it for the umpteenth time in reply to a general question on improving one’s English. | 
