How I became a UN interpreter

“My working life four years on is, well, complicated! I have an 18-month-old daughter, and I started back at work when she was five months old. My husband came out to Geneva with me to look after her at that point. We’re back in Gloucestershire now, and I mostly try to arrange bookings so I’m away for a few days at a time. Fortunately it’s well paid, and I aim to work 10 days in a month. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there are a lot of single interpreters, but for our family it works well – I like the flexibility of being freelance, I love the stimulation of the work and I like being able to have time at home with my daughter. Luckily, I’ve never liked planning too far ahead: in this job, my language skills have taken me to Bali, Nairobi, Vienna, around Europe, and I may soon be off to Copenhagen and Moscow. I never know what’s next, and that’s the fun of it.”

By Helen Reynolds-Brown, Russian and French interpreter, works for the UN and other international organisations –  from The Guardian 

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