Today we’d like to introduce you to Andrea Pate-Cazal.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Andrea. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I was born in the Czech Republic, my father is Czech, my mother German. At an early age, my parents separated and my father immigrated to the United States. When I was 9 years old, my mother took me from the Czech Republic to her homeland, East Germany.
I grew up behind the Iron Curtain. Being restricted to travel or even to study what I really wanted, was one the most painful issues I faced. At the time of my high school graduation, I spoke fluent German, Czech, English and Russian. Down the road I became a student at the Humboldt University in Berlin, studying Czech and Russian languages with the goal to become a teacher. I was not allowed to study the language combination of Czech and English to become a translator/ interpreter as I wanted to since there was a risk I might one day escape during an assignment, just like my father.
I faced the border every single day, as the city train that brought me to the university ended at the Station Friedrichstrasse – the last stop before West Berlin. My first apartment, ironically, was just steps away from the Berlin Wall. After 4 years of studying, I was about to start my practical year as a new teacher, when I decided not to go through with it, but to pursue my dream. I walked into the only two translation agencies which existed back then in East Berlin and asked to be hired as a translator. One agency refused, since I did not have my own place to live, the other one gave me a condition, under which they would hire me – to find myself a place to live.
At that time, my mother had moved back to the Czech Republic and I was living in the student dorm, with no further family in Berlin. I had no other choice than to simply walk into the City Hall, the office that was assigning apartments and to make my case – a mission nearly impossible at that time. Miraculously, I was granted a small, old place with no running warm water, a coal oven to heat the place and heat the water, but it was good enough.
I had my place and got the job at Interpret Übersetzungsdienst, GmbH. Working there allowed me to learn and grow, and eventually, I took my State Exam and became a court certified translator/ interpreter. My first job was in a single, last standing building at the east side of Check Point Charlie. As I looked out of the office window, I had thoughts of overcoming and crossing this border. It became one of the most powerful wishes I’ve ever had. This was in September 1989. As we all know, history was written little time later.
November 9th, 1989, the Berlin Wall came down. It was the day when I took my first walk from East to West Berlin. I went back and forth just to make sure the freedom was real. This night changed everything in my life. Just a few months later, I landed for the first time in Los Angeles to visit my father in San Diego. It took me a while to make the big decision to move permanently to the United States, but I came eventually and stayed. That was September 1996.
In San Diego, I tried out several language-related jobs before settling for what I thought I do best – to be a freelance translator/interpreter. I took and passed some tests for the main translation agencies and subtitling companies and worked on many interesting projects in the fields of marketing, the pharmaceutical industry, tourism, advertising, fashion and subtitling. In the past few years, I specialized in creative translation work for high-end clothing lines and tourism-related projects, as well as subtitling of countless TV series.
A big part of my career came by a phone call that I received one day in Spring 2003. It came from the owner of Precision Translating Services, asking me if I would be available to go to Panama in a couple of weeks and do the interpreting for Miss Czech Republic at the Miss Universe Pageant. At first, I thought it was a hoax, but it wasn’t. Since that call, the pageant had taken me to exotic places like Panama, Thailand, Vietnam, Bahamas and the Philippines, allowing me to meet some of the most beautiful and talented people around the world. It was just last year, January 2017, that I interpreted for Miss Czech and Miss Slovak republic for the last time, since the Organization entered a contract with a new language services provider.
When I look back at my professional life, I sometimes feel that I got incredibly lucky. But on the other hand, I know that I worked hard, took risks and made decisions that could have gone either way. I learned to believe that the worst thing you can do is to just go with the flow and not ask for anything because it seems impossible.
Has it been a smooth road?
It seems there has been nothing easy on my way to the profession and career which I ultimately had. I grew up mostly without family since I was 16, but had great support from friends, my language teachers, the director of the translation agency that believed in me and hired me when I did not want to follow the East German path that was lined up for me.
Having no financial support either, I worked summer jobs picking fruits, worked in the hospital with gravely ill patients and in a hotel kitchen for free food.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
I am a freelance English to German, Czech to German translator/ consecutive interpreter based in San Diego, California. My native languages are German and Czech. Before coming to the U.S., I have been working for several years as an in-house and freelance translator and court certified interpreter (German<>Czech) in Berlin, Germany.
With time, my working language pairs have changed due to my location and continued education, and English>German has become the most dominant combination. My specializations are Marketing and Advertising, Clinical Research Trials (Pharmaceutical Industry), Press Releases, Fashion, Tourism and Subtitling as well as Website Localization and Testing.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Speaking for my line of business only, I do believe that San Diego is a wonderful place to start out a language related business, since the city is diverse, multilingual and mainly because it is home to a vast amount of pharmaceutical, biotech and IT related companies with products that are relevant all over the world.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://www.mixxedaccent.com/
- Email: alukas@mixxedaccent.com
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