mMK

sometimes, I rather be my own project's designer and do things by myself, for I like to have the curatorial logic (not just such as the "key image") to back up the whole design. Once one work without the logic, people could easily treat the designer as just layouter. and even worst, everyone then suddenly is a designer! Tonight, I shifted again and became the translator and editor. If I have the time, and budget remain as the one I am working on now, I am sure the publication at hand could be way way better. Even as a one man band. I have had high hopes, for it will include a translation of Longtin comissioned article on Hong Kong post-97 (or post-post97 really), and you know how rare his writings on these topics got translated. but I have so far only worked on Johnson's article and translation, for the Chi. translation is so horribly done that I feel I have the duty to prevent a disaster from happening. Just finished and I guess there was not one sentence (or one phrase really) without retouched (or correction, to be more precise). As for the English version, which Johnson happened to choose to write in, I thought too his english original is actually the most perfect version to me before it was passed through so many hands. just one example from the first line, he used "the utopian state", while the one all others left behind for me to edit was "a utopian state"!

Again, like last night, despite that I am having not enough sleep for some days already, I found I have the urge to share. The highlight tonight is the one single line from Johnson that made me feel it made all troubles worth it:


The forced removal of the clock tower of the Star Ferry Pier is an example of unforgivable political insensitivity.


And my final settled translation is:


強行移走天星碼頭鐘樓，無疑就是一個政治觸覺上麻木不仁而不能被原諒的例子。