The Super-translator.

I met a real live superhero last week, no foolin'. This guy's super power was to brag about his job as a translator.

I've worked with a lot of translators since I started peemeistering, for just about any language you could name (and probably a few you couldn't). Foreign language collections basically fall into one of two categories: Spanish and Everything Else.

Everything Else is actually the easier of the two. These are the people who have recently immigrated here but haven't picked up the language yet. They cart around professional translators (which, except for Super-translator, are awesome) or at the very least family members who know what the score is. These collections are usually pretty easy because they don't harbor any illusions of knowing English and are used to talking through a third party pretty much all the time.

Spanish is much trickier because, in this part of Florida, it's totally possible to live your entire life in Spanish without ever learning word one of English. There's almost always a Spanish-speaker present anywhere you could think to go (two in our office) so many of them learn to just fake their way through whatever transactions they can and get really angry at the ones they can't. What's worse, when they actually do bring a translator along it's usually just a friend or family member who either doesn't know any more English than they do, or for some reason doesn't think the transaction is important enough to translate in full.

Many have been the times when I've asked the "translator" to translate two lines of English text into Spanish for the benefit of the Spanish-only donor, only to have them say two or three words. I don't know a lot of Spanish myself, but I do know that firma aqui does not mean "I certify that I have provided my urine specimen to the collector..."

Thankfully, ever since I've been working in this office, I can hand the Spanish collections over to one of the Spanish-speaking up-front girls. I still deal with the translators when it's practical though, which brings us (finally) to Super-translator.

First off, the donor did not speak any English. She didn't speak "a little" English, or even "un poquito" English. She flat out did not understand the language. Going out on a limb here, this might be why she came in with a translator. Not only was Super-translator a translator, but he was, well, a super translator. He said so himself!

Now, the translation process is pretty simple: I say something in English, you repeat it in Spanish. That's it. I usually make it clear that the translator needs to repeat everything I say, even if it doesn't sound very important, because usually I'm talking to the donor's friend or co-worker who (as previously mentioned) doesn't think the whole thing is a big deal. But since Super-translator was a super translator I assumed he knew what the score was and didn't bother going through the whole "repeat after me" rigamarole. Imagine my surprise when I open up with an instruction and Super-translator stays silent.

Getting him to actually repeat anything I said was a battle. He reprimanded me because I was "supposed to direct my instructions to her, not to him", and claimed he wasn't translating word-for-word because he was also trying to help her learn English. His Spanish was broken and mangled at best. He either didn't know how (or refused) to say "Don't flush the toilet!" so he resorted to pantomime for that part.

By the time we go the poor donor into the bathroom she looked as confused as I've ever seen anyone in my entire life.

The entire time I was trying to fill out paperwork Super-translator kept trying to strike up conversation. Did I know how much money he made? Did I know that if I wanted to make real money all I had to do was learn another language? Did I know that people from the northern US talk different than people in the south and isn't that interesting? Did I know that I could learn to speak English better myself if I learned how to speak Spanish first? Did I know that Florida had a lot of Spanish-speaking citzens and wasn't it interesting how many there are?

Did I know it was such a shame that I only spoke one language?

Eventually we stumbled our way to the end of the collection, where the donor has to sign the part of the form saying it's actually her urine and so on. I can't let her sign it without being sure she knows what she's signing (this is one of those legal loopholes that can come back and bite me later). I made it clear that he would have to read the form to her in Spanish before I could let her sign it. He read it to her in English -- poorly, I might add! -- and looked at me for approval.

I've dealt with cheaters, liars, bastards and primadonas in this job, but I think this is the first time I actually wanted to reach forward and wring someone's neck.

I let the donor sign the form, but kept her boss's copy of it. As I waved them back out to the lobby Super-translator had the audacity to more or less tell me to congratulate him on a job well done. All he got out of me was a "Just have a seat in the lobby, please."

I left one of our own Spanish-speakers with instructions to please call the lady back up and read the form to her before they were allowed to leave. It must have been a slap in the face to see someone who isn't even a translator by trade do his job for him, and do it better than he ever could hope to do. Alas, I was busy with the next customer at that point and never got to see the self-righteous look on his face.

The entire time we were fumbling our way through this hapless collection, Super-translator was gently bopping his head along to whatever song was playing on his iPod. This was my first indicator that maybe he was going to do a terrible job. I should have followed my gut on this one.

The Two-Story Translator.

At about 9am a young lady walks into my office requiring a pre-employment drug test for a landscaping company. She does not speak English.

This particular landscaping company has a long, sordid history of being very much against the idea of providing translators for their new-hires. The fact that I speak no Spanish is not unknown to them. I don't know why they refuse to send translators; it's not like they don't have any on-hand. Many of the Mexican workers who come in for a drug test are bilingual already, how hard would it be to call one over and send him out with a new-hire to make sure the drug test goes down properly.

Any way you slice it, I can't do the collection. I have no choice but to turn the young lady away.

She returns after lunch with an employee of the same company. I ask him if he is going to serve as translator. He nods and says "okay".

"Okay" is a red-flag word. It's deceptively easy to get through a conversation by just nodding and saying "okay" whenever the person you're listening to pauses in their speech. I lob a couple lowball questions at the translator to test his English capabilities. As it turns out he knows precious little English at all. not even enough to help the young lady tell me her phone number. Again I have no choice but to turn them away.

Ten minutes before closing time they return, this time accompanied by a white woman who very obviously works in the air-conditioned part of the company's dealings. "Hi," she says impatiently, "is there some problem here?"

I explain to the woman, just like I have to various other members of her company, over and over again, that I do not speak Spanish and I can not conduct a collection unless the donor speaks English.

"Well all she has to do is pee in a cup right?"

Sigh. It's the "only a drug test" argument. I wonder how this woman would react if one of their landscaping crews uprooted someone's flower bed. Somehow I doubt she'd respond with "Well it's only your front lawn right?"

I briefly explain the process, the do-not-flush thing, the empty-your-pockets thing, and I show her the block on the form the donor needs to sign.

Now, I have no illusions that everyone who comes in for a drug test actually reads the form before signing it. Most people are so jaded that they just sign anything and everything you point to. My personal take on the issue is that if you have the ability to read it, and decide not to, that is your thing. But if you do not have the ability to read it, it's my job to ensure you know what it says before you sign. I meet a lot of people who are illiterate, or who don't have their glasses, or speak English perfectly well but can't read it, and to those people I cheerfully read the two lines of text aloud. But in the case of foreign language translations, nothing short of an actual bilingual translator can get the job done. This solution, while painfully obvious to me, continues to elude the landscaping company in question and specifically the increasingly-irritated woman standing before me.

"Well, why can't he translate?"

I shrug, and look at the translator again, and ask him in plain English, "Sir, are you able to translate for me?"

He blinks a few times and then looks at the supervisor woman, helplessly.

She repeats what I said, except louder and slower. When that doesn't work, she rewords it as "Can you talk English? To him? Like this?" She holds up one hand and pantomimes a mouth opening and closing, while pointing to her own mouth with the other hand.

He nods and says "okay."

"There," says the supervisor, "what's the problem?"

The problem is that I'm not fooled. The problem is that I'm not a complete retard. The problem is that your goddamned company wants to capitalize on the cheap labor offered by a Mexican work force (illegal or otherwise) and the tax benefits of getting them all drug tested without accepting the responsibility to get it done properly.

The part of the form the young lady is eventually going to have to sign, I ask the translator to read to me in English. He can't get passed the second word (the first word is "I"). It is so painfully obvious that this man, excellent landscaper though he may be, simply does not speak English and simply can not serve as a translator. A five-year-old could see it.

"Ma'am," I tell the supervisor, "unless you speak Spanish and can translate, I am going to have to discontinue this collection process." That's a polite way of saying "get the hell out of my office, it's after five and I want to go home."

"What if I help him with the things he doesn't understand?"

"What do you mean?"

"I can translate for him."

"You're going to translate for the translator?"

"He'll listen to me."

I envision in my mind the kind of work environment this woman deals with. She is probably highly skilled at getting a crew of Spanish-speaking workers where they need to be, doing what they need to get done, and doing it very efficiently. But outside of her little landscaping world, things don't work like that. It's easy to hand a rake to someone, point them at a pile of leaves, and let them figure it out. What I do at my office is something different entirely.

"So you want to translate for me, and then have this man translate for you."

"Can we hurry this up please?"

"But he doesn't speak English."

"He does, you say he doesn't, whatever."

"And you don't speak Spanish."

"He'll listen to me."

I walk out, take my OPEN sign off the window, and turn off the lobby lights. "Okay," I tell her, "we'll give it one shot. If it doesn't work you're going to have to send her back tomorrow with a proper translator." I realize that statement is meaningless to her, so I follow up by explaining that a translator is someone who is bilingual, and can hold conversations in two different languages (in this case English and Spanish) be they verbal or written.

I give all my instructions. The supervisor repeats them louder, leaving out verbs, the way one would talk to a dog. The translator stumbles around with some clumsy Spanish. The donor looks very confused. Eventually the supervisor snaps the cup from my hand, gives it to the donor and points to the bathroom.

As she's going in, I remind her not to flush the toilet. The helpful supervisor sums this up as "No this," with a hand gesture that tries to mimic water circling a toilet bowl. To me it looks like she's stirring soup.

Even through the language barrier, handing someone an empty cup and pointing them at a bathroom is a pretty easy message to get across. The donor emerges with a full cup, the sound of a freshly flushed toilet echoing through the hallway.

The supervisor is angry when I tell her it's a botched collection. The donor did not follow my instructions because, despite having two translators at hand, she did not understand what they were. The supervisor barks at the donor to "drink aqua" as fast as she could so she could go again.

"No, ma'am, she will have to come back tomorrow with a proper translator."

"She'll get it right next time, she just--"

"It's after five. I'm closed. She doesn't speak English. You aren't a translator. He isn't a translator. This collection is over."

I throw away the cup and break eye contact. The supervisor tries to protest but eventually just stomps out with her Mexican underlings in tow.

As for me, I still don't speak Spanish.

The very next day the same man came in, supposedly sent to translate for a completely different new-hire. Something is seriously wrong with that company.

In writing...?

A woman walks in to do a pre-employment drug test for a company I only see infrequently. The woman does not speak any English, so I get on the phone with the company to request a translator.

While I'm on hold she whips out a cell phone and makes an irate call to her husband. She comes up and thrusts the cell phone at me, even as I'm still holding the receiver. I hold up one finger, the international sign for "Hold on a minute," not wanting to deal with two phone conversations at once. I can hear the man at the other end of the cell phone barking, "Hello!? Hello!?"

I get transferred around a bit at the lady's company, and I figure there's not much hope of getting a translator out of them. So I hang up on the Muzak and finally take the woman's cell phone.

"Hello. This is Richard at [my company name]. Who am I speaking with please?"

"I'm Mr. Busybody. I'm her husband. She tells me you won't let her take a drug test."

Well, he at least speaks fluent English.

"That isn't true, sir. The problem is that we cannot understand each other. Without a translator I cannot do a collection."

"Tell me what she needs to know, and I'll tell her."

"Unfortunately that won't work. A translator must be present in person, in order to clear up any problems that may arise during the collection."

"Problems like what!?" he belches in a tone of voice meant to be accusatory. I rattle off a quick list of things that could come up during a urine collection.

"She won't do anything like that," he assures me.

"Be that as it may, I cannot take a collection without a translator present. I'm going to call the company right now and request one."

"No. Don't do that. I can translate. I'm coming down there."

And he hangs up.

I explain what just transpired to the woman, which I'm aware is a futile endeavor, but it's something I do anyway. I sit back down at the computer, and she starts to go slowly insane. She examines the sign-in sheet, which she's filled out incorrectly, and begins asking questions about it. She wants this collection done and I don't blame her. I tell her to be patient and wait for the translator.

She fills up her enormous 7-11 cup with water from my cooler.

Ten minutes go by before the husband shows up. Well-dressed, wearing dark sunglasses, and practically chewing on his cell phone. This is a man who wants everybody to know how very, very important he is. He throws his cigarette down on the sidewalk outside my door but doesn't bother exhaling his last drag before entering. The entire lobby is going to stink of cigarettes for hours.

Without even acknowledging his wife, Mr. Busybody says, "I'm here to translate for her. And we need to make this fast. I had to leave work for this."

I reach for my can of air freshener and consider pointing out that no, he didn't, because the company would have sent one eventually, but I think better of it. "Please ask her to print her name, employer's name, and the current time on the sign-in sheet."

He disregards, and starts filling it all in himself.

"Sir, she is the one giving the sample. She has to write her own name." This is just a technicality, and it's really not a big deal. But I want to feel this guy out. I want to see what kind of problems to expect before we get to the important parts of the collection.

Mr. Busybody calls his wife up and says something to her. As she fills out the sign-in sheet, I ask him, "Now, are you able to translate for me?"

He is taken aback. "I am her husband."

Fine and dandy but not what I asked. "Yes, but are you able to translate for me?"

"Yes."

We finish the paperwork and go back to do the collection. I tell him the three instructions every woman must be told before the collection: fill the cup above the line, do not flush the toilet, bring the cap back to me when she's done.

She flushes the toilet. Twice, actually.

I explain to Mr. Busybody that we now have to do a second collection. Either he didn't translate properly or she just decided to ignore the instructions, but whatever the case now everyone has to wait.

"She knows what to do now, so I can go," he declares.

"If you leave, I will be unable to make another collection attempt until the company sends a translator."

"But she knows what to do now!"

I point out that no, she does not know what to do, judging from her apparent lack of understanding of the instructions.

"You don't need a translator," he spits out. "And you can't force her to have one here."

Before I can even point out the high hogwash content of his statement, he's on the phone with someone else. I have no idea who he has called, but he explains the entire situation to this third party -- or at least his version of it. "He's making her have a translator!" he exclaims. "Is that good? Is that legal?"

Whomever Mr. Busybody is talking to must have told him that no, it is not legal to request a translator when attempting to take a urine sample from somebody who doesn't speak your language. The next words out of his mouth are, "Well I don't know what his problem is, I don't know if he's a racist or what."

Yeah, that must be it.

He covers up the mouthpiece of his cell phone and looks back at me. "He told me that you have to have something in writing," says Mr. Busybody without bothering to explain who he's talking to. "He says if you don't have something in writing saying a translator has to be here, you don't need one."

My patience is officially shot with this jerk, and fortunately in my business I don't have to be polite with people if I don't want to. "I don't have anything in writing pertaining to translators, but I don't need anything. Your wife and I do not speak the same language. We can not understand each other. I can not complete this collection unless I'm convinced she has understood the instructions, which she didn't, and understands every word on the form she will have to sign."

"Go get the form, I'll make her sign it."

"Wait, you want me to have her sign the paperwork before she gives me a sample? And you're the one worried about what's 'good and legal'?"

"If you don't have anything in writing, we're leaving."

"That's fine. I'll simply get a hold of Company X and explain the situation--"

"Just show me something in writing!"

The "in writing" thing finally gnaws into my skull. I grab a pen and a post-it under the counter where he can't see, and jot down "She needs a translator in person." I slide it across the counter to him.

He reads it and is not happy. Mr. Busybody grabs his wife by the arm and hauls her out, spewing naughty words as he does so.

Sighing, I pick up the phone and try to get a hold of so-and-so over at Company X. While listening to the Muzak drone on, I notice the lady has left her gigantic 7-11 cup still sitting on my magazine table.

She never comes back.

I don't have anything in writing stating that Mr. Busybody could use my parking lot either, but he didn't have any problems parking. Imagine that.

¡Yo quiero una prueba de la droga!

It's not in my nature to be racist, but this job makes it very hard sometimes.

Many of the companies that do pre-employment drug testing are huge, faceless companies that hire scores of unskilled workers. In Florida, that means Mexicans immigrants.

Landscaping, roofing, aluminum siding, factories... all these companies hire armies of Mexicans to work for them. People who, just like the rest of us, are talented and hard-working people, most of them fairly educated, who just happen to lack proficiency in the English language. As you can imagine, this in turn hampers their ability to do simple things like provide a urine sample.

The collection procedure isn't inherently complicated, although it does assume that the donor can understand the simple instructions I give them. I take my job seriously and do everything in my power to ensure there is nothing wrong with the collection. After all, this is someone's job; if I screw up, this person doesn't work.

The problem arises when a company won't send translators with their Spanish-speaking employees. This is a collection I cannot do. And what's worse, I can't explain to the would-be donor why I can't do it, since they don't understand me. This leads to a lot of irritated and downright angry Mexicans throughout my work-week.

So when a pickup truck pulls up and five Hispanic guys jump out, each holding his own drug test form, please forgive me if I groan or curse under my breath.

There are, of course, various degrees of fluency in the English language. The bottom rung of course is the person who speaks no English at all. In this case, the person won't even be able to sign in. When I ask for ID, he doesn't know what I'm talking about. And when I shake my head, hand him his form and point to the door he assumes that the collection was a success. Attached to his form is a note telling the employer to send him back with a translator, but the employer will either ignore it or never see it. I once received an angry phone call from a landscaping company because they found out seventeen of their Hispanic employees had been turned away from the collection site in as many months. This company apparently never checks the results they receive, because it took them almost six months to realize they had a whole gaggle of immigrants working for them who had never, ever been drug tested. When I informed them to pack them all up and send them back with a proper translator they told me that fourteen of them didn't work for them anymore.

Now, that's the best case scenario. The real horror stories happen with the guys who speak either a small amount of English, or at least know how to fake it really well.

I've developed a nervous tick that causes a shooting pain down my spine whenever I hear the word "okay". "Okay" is the very first English word a Mexican immigrant learns. It's absolutely stunning how far you can get in a typical American transaction just by nodding and saying "okay" when the person behind the counter pauses and looks at you. I've gotten all the way to the end of a collection, after the urination has already taken place, before realizing that the person I'm speaking to has no idea what I'm saying. I've learned over time how to avoid this trap; throwing a few softball questions during the sign-in process, or asking about his employer, or asking him his birthdate (instead of just copying it off his ID) will do the trick. Again, a note to the employer, and someone who has to be turned away with no clear understanding why.

After the "okay" crowd are the people who speak a little English, but not well. These are the most irritating of all, since not only can they not complete their own collections, but they can't act as translators for others. Nonetheless, I see it all the time. People who speak enough English to understand me when I ask for a transltor are people who become angry since, essentially, I'm telling them their English sucks. I mean, I'd probably be a little frustrated and defensive too. As an added bonus, people who speak no English often come in with a friend or family member who speaks very, very little English, expecting them to translate. So I have to tell the translator that her English sucks, and then the translator tells the donor (in Spanish) that I told her her English sucks, and now they're both angry with me.

I distinctly remember one case when I turned a donor away only to have him returned the next day with a proper translator. His collection was completed without a hitch. The very next day the company sent a second donor, but instead of a translator sent the gentleman from the previous day, assuming he could process all the information. They both got turned away, and then came back with the original translator several hours later, all very angry.

I am embroiled in an ongoing war with one company in particular who adamantly refuses to send translators. Their excuses would be amusing if they didn't cause me so much grief. Their "it's just a drug test" excuse doesn't float because it would only take one positive result to blow up in their face. Take someone I can't understand, fake their way through a drug test, then have them sign a form they can't read? What does that say about me and my company? What does it say about the employer who allows it to happen?

I finally had one of my supervisors contact this company to explain to them the importance of translators and, very politely of course, assert that if they wanted to do collections at my office they would, in fact, have to send a bilingual employee to facilitate communication between the collector and the donor. The supervisor was told that the reason I'd been sending people away is because I just didn't want to do any collections. That's right, the company's response was to call me lazy. "He's even got a PlayStation up there!" said the man from the company... which, while true enough, doesn't really further his case since (a) my supervisor knows full well that I bring a PlayStation (and a DVD player, and a laptop) to work, and in fact encourages the practice, and (b) it actually takes longer to explain to someone why I can't do a collection than it takes to just do the stupid collection.

So, I tell myself not to hate these Mexican people, these hard-working immigrants who are trying to scrape out a living for themselves just like everyone else. I tell myself none of this is their fault; it's their stupid bosses who don't care enough to make sure they can communicate with the people they're dealing with. But despite myself, I die a little every time the van from the roofing company pulls up with this week's batch, fresh off of a ten-hour workday. I try to imagine what it must be like to work in the sun all day long only to have a scrawny white boy tell you your English sucks.

I took six semesters of Spanish in high school, and don't speak a word of it.