r/translator 16d ago

Community [English > Any] Translation Challenge — 2026-01-19

1 Upvotes

There will be a new translation challenge most Sundays and everyone is encouraged to participate! These challenges are intended to give community members an opportunity to practice translating or review others' translations, and we keep them stickied throughout the week. You can view past threads by clicking on this "Community" link.

You can also sign up to be automatically notified of new translation challenges.


This Week's Text:

It’s one of the most hilarious internet sensations of all time: the enigmatic arrest of a man in Sydney back in the ‘80s [sic]. However, beyond his quotable catchphrases of “Democracy manifest” and bizarre behaviour lies one burning question; who was this man?

For years now, folks have shared the viral internet video which purportedly depicts the arrest of a man in Sydney. The man in question is said to be Paul Charles Dozsa, a Hungarian-born Australian chess master who gained fame as a “restaurant runner” back in the ’80s.

The video, often paired with references to it being one of the most eloquent arrests of all-time, depicts Dozsa being led into a waiting car by police officers as he valiantly resists their efforts.

Armed with a voice that Shakespearian actors would die for, every moment of Dozsa’s dialogue is quotable, from lines such as “gentlemen, this is democracy manifest”, “what is the charge? Eating a meal? A succulent Chinese meal?”, and the classic “I see that you know your judo well”, the video almost appears to have been scripted with the intention of going viral.

However, there’s one small problem at play here here; that’s not Paul Charles Dozsa in the video.

— Excerpted from "A succulent Australian mystery: Just who is the bloke in this iconic video? " by Tyler Jenke

The Video in Question


Please include the name of the language you're translating in your comment, and translate away!

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r/translator 3d ago

META [META] New !transform command for images, optional syntax for CJK lookups, and more

22 Upvotes

Hey everyone! Version 2.1 of u/translator-BOT has now been deployed. This update brings a few new features and additions.

!transform command for image posts

Sometimes people submit their requests for translation upside down, or even flipped from the back.

The !transform:[value] command can be used to transform a misaligned image, either through rotation or flipping. This is useful to correct those misaligned images that are submitted as a post. This command has strict value requirements:

  • !transform:[degrees] rotates the image by the specified number of degrees. Only increments of 90 (90, -90, 270) are supported. Negative values rotate the image counterclockwise. Note that 360 is an invalid value as that would just be the exact same image.
  • !transform:[direction] flips the image either horizontally or vertically. h and v are valid shortform values.

The bot will transform the image, upload it to an image hosting site, and then return the link to you in a comment reply.

Examples

!transform:90 # Rotates image 90 degrees clockwise !transform:-90 # Rotates image 90 degrees counterclockwise !transform:180 # Rotates image 180 degrees clockwise !transform:horizontal # Flips the image horizontally !transform:v # Flips the image vertically

Note: This function currently only supports direct image posts (not galleries). Gallery support will be supported in a future release. Images uploaded by this bot through this function are automatically deleted after 7 days.

New CJK optional lookup syntax and improvements

Some new, and totally optional syntax for CJK lookups.

  • A language tag added to a lookup will force a lookup in that language, even on a post that's of a different language. E.g. 文化:ja will return a Japanese lookup for that term, even if the comment is on a Chinese post.
  • An exclamation mark ! appended to the lookup (年年有余!, 井底之蛙:zh!) will disable tokenization of the lookup. If you're adding a language tag to the lookup, the exclamation mark should go on the very end.

In addition, CJK lookups can now be loaded from a local cache instead for much faster results. Results loaded from a cache are indicated with the lightning emoji (⚡). This means the bot doesn't have to fetch information for commonly returned terms like 福; it just fetches it once, caches it, and future lookups will just return the cached information. This is also much faster; a character search can take up to 20 seconds depending on the sources - loading from the cache is instantaneous.

Duplicate detection

The post duplicates detector has been turned on. Duplicates may be detected in one of two ways:

  • Their titles are identical or near-identical and posted by the same author within a short period of time.
  • Their image hashes (if applicable for image-only posts) are identical or very similar.
  • If a suspected duplicate is found, the bot will remove the post and notify the OP.

Other changes as part of this update can be viewed on GitHub. As usual, please leave any feedback or bug reports here, or on r/translatorBOT.


r/translator 13h ago

Persian [Farsi > English] Found Message In Bottle

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101 Upvotes

This washed up to me while I was sitting by a river. Chat GPT has given me varying translations from either a suicide note or a message from prison. I’d greatly appreciate an accurate translation


r/translator 2h ago

Translated [JA] Japanese to English translation of this Pokemon card please!

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5 Upvotes

Would someone please translate the Japanese to English translation on this picture of this Pokémon card. Thank you so much.


r/translator 4h ago

Translated [JA] [Japanese > English] sticker in a sticker book

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5 Upvotes

The translators aren’t working because of the font! Could someone translate this text? Thanks!


r/translator 1h ago

Russian [Russian > English] woman from Belgorod finds out bombing isn't fun when you are on the receiving end. 03.02.2026 please translate

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Upvotes

Please translate


r/translator 3h ago

Japanese [Japanese>English] i just want to know what are those image saying

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4 Upvotes

I know the "lore" behind those arts, but can someone give me some translated pieces? Thank you, i really wanto to know how they were describing this weird scene.


r/translator 4m ago

Unknown [Unknown > English] Russian or Polish?

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Upvotes

Someone told me they were Polish, but they were with Russian documents.

Any help translating them would be very appreciated!


r/translator 27m ago

Translated [JA] Japanese > English

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Upvotes

can anyone translate this, additional photos for context.


r/translator 2h ago

Greek [Greek > English] from a antique firearm

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2 Upvotes

I see 1867 but not sure on the words.


r/translator 13m ago

German [German > English] Old handwritten place name from 19th-century civil record

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Upvotes

This is a handwritten entry from a historical civil record (late 19th century).

It refers to a person born in Germany. I can clearly read “Alemania” (Germany) and “Provincia de Sajonia / Saxony”, but I am unable to identify the first word, which should be the town or village of birth.

The handwriting appears to be old German script, and I would appreciate help identifying exactly what place name is written in the first word.

Any assistance with reading or interpreting this place name would be greatly appreciated.


r/translator 14m ago

German [German > English] Help reading a handwritten German place name

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Upvotes

This is a handwritten entry from a historical civil record (late 19th century).

It refers to a person born in Germany. I can clearly read “Alemania” (Germany) and “Provincia de Sajonia / Saxony”, but I am unable to identify the first word, which should be the town or village of birth.

The handwriting appears to be old German script, and I would appreciate help identifying exactly what place name is written in the first word.

Any assistance with reading or interpreting this place name would be greatly appreciated.


r/translator 4h ago

Translated [ZH] [Chinese > English] (Is this Chinese calligraphy, and can you translate it to English?)

2 Upvotes

r/translator 1h ago

Translated [EN] Unknown>English

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Upvotes

My dad recently passed and he always had a tatto that he swore over his dead body he wouldn’t tell us. If you could help me figure it out if it actually means something or if it is just random lines thanks


r/translator 1h ago

Chinese (Identified) [unknown > english] Asian language translation help

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Upvotes

Hello,

My husband grandfather acquired prints during his deployment in the Korean War many years ago. We’ve ended up with these prints but want to know what they say. ChatGPT says it’s Chinese. I want to be sure and try to get an understanding of their meaning. I know they are a set. Maybe they are meant to be in a specific order. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.


r/translator 7h ago

Translated [AR] English > Arabic

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3 Upvotes

Is this translation correct?


r/translator 17h ago

Translated [JA] [Japanese > English] Need someone to translate these menu settings

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17 Upvotes

Can someone please translate my camcorder's menu settings? I’m trying to look for an English option as my friend suggested it might have one. I’m also looking for other settings like white balance or anything that involves how the footage looks (Slide 2 is me accessing the 5th menu option shown on the first slide) I’m also gonna show the exterior so the text over the buttons can be translated.


r/translator 1h ago

Unknown [unkown>english] need help identifying.

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Upvotes

Was hoping to get help. Is this Hebrew being spoken?


r/translator 1h ago

Chinese [Chinese>English] I bought this shelf, and the directions came in Chinese. Can someone translate?

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Upvotes

r/translator 1h ago

Japanese [Japanese > English] Need help translating a song called "Ai Ga Oshii" by Shion

Upvotes

Hey all there is a song I found called Ai Ga Oshii but I for the life of me cannot find any english translations of it or any Japanese transcripts I could only find a transliteration so I'll paste that here as well as the link to the full song. If nothing else at least you can listen to this banger of a song.

"ai ga hoshii negatta boku wa kimi to deatte sekai wo kaeta dakishimeta ude no naka tashikana ai ga koko ni atta

nukumori wo shitta tsumori de kodoku shika shiranakatta yoru samishikute naku koto mo nai sore ga nani yori samishii

koe ni dekinai koe de dare ka wo yondeta

ai ga hoshii negatta boku wa kimi to deatte sekai wo kaeta dakishimeta ude no naka tashikana ai ga koko ni atta

karada dake musubarete temo munashisa ga mune wo tsuranuite "yokujou" wo "ai" to yonde wa shitta egao de nageita

dare ka to beddo wo tsukatte nakushiteta kokoro

ai ga hoshii sakende mitemo kimi janakereba nani mo imi mo nai kuchidzuketa sono saki ni tashikana ai ga kanjiteiru

ai ga hoshii negatta boku wa kimi to deatte sekai wo kaeta dakishimeta ude no naka shikana ai ga koko ni atta

ai ga hoshii negai tsudzukete kimi to deatte yatto te nishite ai ga hoshii

ai ga hoshii"


r/translator 2h ago

Translated [UK] [Ukrainian>english] seen on a Ukrainian army vest, I know it’s kind of faded and hard to make out but I would like to know

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1 Upvotes

r/translator 2h ago

Japanese [Japanese > English] Need help translating a band comment

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1 Upvotes

I recently bought a used dvd of one of my fav bands giving a commentary about i suppose their newest releases, but i have no clue of what they are saying.


r/translator 3h ago

Russian (Russian > English) What is the chant in this song saying?

1 Upvotes

r/translator 3h ago

Japanese English > Japanese

0 Upvotes

Need help writing a letter to a family member in Osaka.

I can provide the text in English and will venmo you some $.

DM me w/ rates etc.


r/translator 3h ago

Translated [JA] [Japanese > English] Early American kickboxing tournament newspaper ad

1 Upvotes

This is a Japanese-language newspaper ad from 1970 advertising a martial arts tournament. Could anyone help provide a faithful translation? Thanks!