Consider the verb
to assist.
In Australia, the average individual feels comfortable saying,
How Can I Assist You Today?
In Brazil, the average individual feels comfortable saying,
How Can I Help You Today?, instead.
This is again about
Cultural Translation:
frequency in discourse, and
lexicon proximity are important factors, and those could be mathematically measured.
It is nice hearing,
How Can I Help You.
Somehow,
To Assist makes us wonder about things.
It takes resources away.
To Help, however, comes almost instinctively to mind.
Maybe the native Australian would think the interpreter is better if they hear
Assisti-lo instead of
Ajuda-lo, since
to assist holds more proximity to
assistir in terms of shape, sound, and all else than to
ajudar, but righter is the heart: the average Brazilian connects much more comfortably to
ajudar than to
assistir.
Language must target communication: simplifying must be chosen over keeping it literally equivalent.
Voce Tem Cartao de Concessao? is not a good choice because things are more easily communicated by means of
Voce Tem Cartao do Governo Australiano?
In the first case, we are being literal, but there is no such a thing in Brazil, so that the NES cannot connect to that in an immediate manner; in the second case, we are going for culture, since who gives concession cards is the Australian government.
Interpreting cannot be the same as translating: more speed in understanding, and more effectiveness in communication are a necessity.
In translation: a printed document is not something the human mind associates with speed.
Interpretation is something completely different from translation, and therefore the techniques of the trades should be different.
With the persistent, and historic denial of the differences between one trade, and another, human kind crawls in what comes to interpreting, and pilots supersonics in what comes to translating.
Australia