联合国大楼里活跃着一支同声翻译的队伍。一名口译员除自己母语外，必须懂联合国 6 种正式语言中的至少 2 种。联合国的一场会议一般为时 3 个小时。中文和阿拉伯文每场会安排 3 位口译员，每人每小时工作 20 分钟。其他几种语言每场只有两位口译员，每人每小时工作 30 分钟。因为说英、法、西语的国家很多，每轮到发言人说这 3 门语言中的一种时，该语种的译员就可以休息，不用开口。中文和阿拉伯文口译员则不然，发言人用除自己母语外的任何其他 4 种语言时，他们要翻成中文或阿拉伯文，遇到中国或阿拉伯国家代表发言时，他们还要把它们翻成英文或法文。所以一场会如果开 3 个小时，他们就要工作 3 个小时，没有片刻闲的时候。 因为是同声传译，口译员的日子好过不好过完全操纵在发言人的手里。语速的快慢、口音的轻重和内容的难易决定了口译的质量。赶上一位快嘴，口译员翻得上气不接下气。遇到口音重的，口译员的脸苦得像个窝瓜。不幸撞上一个口音重、速度快、内容又难的，口译员翻得咬牙切齿，恨不得撞墙自杀。甭管遇到什么样的发言者，甭管他们讲什么，怎么讲，口译员出于职业道德都要竭尽全力把听到的忠实地翻译成自己的工作语言。有时候发言人讲得云遮雾罩，你也不能自作聪明，把他的发言改得清清楚楚，没准他就不想让别人听懂。外交上这叫 “ 建设性模糊 ”。
译文:
Oral Interpretors Behind the Curtains
In the United Nations Building, a group of interpretors are busily engaged in various international conferences. Besides their mother tongues, each oral interpretor must grasp at least two out of six UN formal languages. Usually, every UN conference lasts three hours. For conferences using Chinese and Arabic, three oral interpretors will be in place and twenty-minute interpretation assigned to each one in an hours. Since there are many countries speaking English, French or Spanish, when spokespersons speak any of the three languages, interpretors working in the same language may take a short break. But it is not the case for oral interpretors with Chinese or Arabic. When spokespersons use any of the four languages other than their mother tongues, oral interpretors need to translate the speech into Chinese or Arabic, or in the event that Chinese or Arabian representatives gives their speeches, interpretors should translate them into English or French. Therefore, they have to work through the three-hour conference without any break. As oral interpretors, their life is completely in the hand of those spokespersons. The speed, accent of spokespersons and difficulty of contents determine the quality of oral interpretion. If encountered with a fast-speaking one, interpretors may do it out of breath. When coming across those speakers with heavy accent, interpretors have to suffer from the working period. If, unfortunately, the spokesperson is of heavy accent, fast speaking, and delivers contents that hard to interprete, interpretors have to grind their teeth to make it anyway. No matter what kind of spokespersons, what contents they deliver and how they deliver, oral interpretors must try their utmost interpreting what they hear into their working languages. Sometimes, spokespersons speak in a very ambiguous way, interpretors cannot make decisions themselves to change it into a clear manner. Perhaps the objective of the unclear speech is not to make it understood by others, which is called "constructive ambiguity" in the diplomatical sense.