Google is Your Friend, part 4: Google Translate

by Jim Thornhill

I am proud to say I am bi-lingual. I speak two languages, Texan and English. As English is my second language, sometimes I struggle but I do the best that I can. My ancestry is also from England and Ireland, where they speak English as well. Because of this, I haven’t had much need for Google Translate, until recently.

Recently I discovered that my dad’s first wife died while traveling in Spain. I found this information on Ancestry’s Reports of Deaths of American Citizens Abroad database, but it did not give any details of her death, only what the consulate did after she died. Naturally, I wanted to know the circumstances surrounding her death. Was she in a car accident? Was she the victim of foul play? Was she poisoned because she was a Nazi spy? So many questions that need answers!

I did some searching on Google to find out how to order a Spanish death certificate, and it led me to the right page. Fortunately, there was a link to convert the page into English. However, the form itself was still in Spanish. Enter Google Translate! A trip to translate.google.com was the beginning of my solution.

Google translate is a very simple looking site. All it has is two boxes for information, the one on the left for the foreign language and the one on the right for the translation. I need to warn you that Google translate is not perfect. I tried to translate a poem written in Russian, and it butchered it! Think of Google translate like a friend that has recently immigrated and English is their second language. They can speak English, but sometimes the nuances of our complicated language are lost. Google Translate is the same way, it gets the job done but it is not perfect.

Another nice thing about Google Translate is that it automatically detects which language you are translating. All you have to do is copy and paste or type the text in the box on the left, and Google does the rest!

By copying and pasting the questions on the form I was able to fill out my Spanish death certificate request. The next time you run into a foreign language document in your research, before you hire a translator, give Google Translate a try! You could same yourself some time and a little cash!