TRT in Greek

Of course my immediate reaction was to check the Greek page of TRT World. I must admit that although I have been a member of the, now closed, Greek Service of BBC World for 15 years, I had never listened to the Greek-language program of TRT. However, having had some contact with the program output of Greek-language programs of Deutsche Welle and Voice of America and their Web sites, I eagerly clicked on the ????????  command of TRT.world yesterday to check out the content.

First of all, I checked the news and current affairs column. Yesterday, the editor of the Greek page placed a story, “Missile attack on Afghanistan by American forces,” as the first item; although the literal translation of the first line “Five people were neutralized by missiles launched by unmanned airplanes,” in Greek, sounded somehow funny, as the use of “neutralize” is primarily used together with the word “enemy" and not with “people.” But that was not serious.  The second item was, "Erdogan in India," no problem with the wording of that.

The third item, "Aliyef: Nagorno is a threat to security.”  Everything was fine except Aliyev did not sign a "communique" in Moscow with the presidents of Russia and Armenia but a “declaration!” Admittedly, however, a common mistake in Greek. The fourth item, “Clinton in the White House," was fine, although when we read that new president Obama is, “of the tendency to announce” Hillary as the next head of the State Department, we would probably smile as we could think of simpler ways of saying the same thing. On the next item, "PKK under close surveillance” I noticed that the “security authorities of Denmark and Austria took PKK’s activities under close surveillance,” even in Greek, the idiomatic use of the verb is the same and you "place" somebody under close surveillance; plus you certainly do not put the close surveillance in a genitive declension.

Next in line comes TRT’s own announcement about their new Web site followed by a Greek interest story, “Karamanlis’s mentioned the issue of early elections to his Parliamentary Group.” That is fine too, but probably he did not "give a signal" for early elections like in automobile use but he “signaled” early elections; and to say that his statement, “sent away the black clouds,” by bringing the deputies closer together, might sound a little bit too poetic for a news item.

Then I turned to the thematic column “Culture and Art” whose choice subjects and line of priority are sometimes more interesting than the political news proper. First item, "Concerts took place in Kommotini (Gumulcine) and Thessalonica,” where we learn that the Ankara TRT choir gave concerts of Turkish classical music and that the, "concert in Thessalonica signaled the end to the nostalgia of the Turks and the Greeks for melodies of classical Turkish music," and also that there was, "a wish of the Greeks who immigrated after the exchange of populations and who know the Turkish language to have such concerts to take place more often.” Next in line, there is another item about TRT, but this time it is about the visit of the director of the Russian Military Academy Choir to TRT, and the possibility of the further development of cooperation in the live broadcasting of music concerts. One small detail; the director of the Russian choir has Mr. Yelesef translated as “chef Yelesef” into Greek, which unfortunately makes more of a good cook than a good musician!

But I should not be so grumpy. On the TRT Web page, in Greek one can find also an audio file with an interview with the new ambassador of Greece to Ankara taken back in May when Mr. Fotios Xydas came back to Turkey as head of the Greek diplomatic delegation in Ankara. And there is also a “listen again” facility by which you can listen to the Greek program of TRT any time.

OK, I should not be grumpy but I could not leave out the following sentence about VOT, Voice of Turkey, which:

“With the guiding principles of impartiality, accuracy and instantaneous, VOT is improving its broadcasts with colorful and fascinating programs, targeting general public regardless of age and status, and strengthens its status as a forthcoming, reliable source of information,” whose translation into Greek runs roughly as follows:

“The Voice of Turkey has adopted as its principle the objective, trustworthy and fast news coverage, it develops its colored and interesting transmissions aiming at listeners from every group and age, it enforces its position as the most trustworthy source of information in the world?” I admit, I am a grumpy, tedious radio journalist who happens to speak a bit of English and a bit of Greek. But let us not allow “teething problems” blur the fact that this new-look TRT will be a new and very useful tool for information about Turkey and for us to see how Turkey views the world.