Isabel Gómez Baraibar |
Translator & Founder
Ever since I finished my college studies, I always combined my professional experience with numerous translation projects in different areas (financial translations for consultancy firms and securities agencies, legal translations for law firms and different businesses, translations of résumés, websites, software tools, etc.). Translating is a great passion of mine and, in my view, it is a most delicate task. It takes a great amount of patience and long proofreading hours to find the exact term, the correct syntax or the accurate grammar structure in a different language when you are translating. I consider myself as a perfectionist, and I love that feeling when you read afterwards the text you have translated and everything fits just right.
After working for several years in different law firms as a legal assistant, I realized that there was a common element in each one of them. The number of translations requested every month was very high, due to a large number of international clients, as well as to the requirements established by certain authorities.
There are excellent legal translators. However, there are not so many of them. When they cannot take on more projects, clients are forced to send out their translations to non-specialized translators.
The result is an extremely literal translation, with terminology that, while not quite incorrect, is simply not used in a legal context. The professionals of the law firm must then review and correct those translations, investing additional time after having paid the high rates that a translation of a legal text entails.
Legal texts are very sensitive and must be translated by someone with deep knowledge of the legal sector and academic training in this regard. This is why I decided to specialize in this field.
I have a degree in English Philology by the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. A few years ago, I also completed a master's degree in EU Law, since I wanted to get a better understanding of the legal sector. After working for several years in different law firms in Belgium and Madrid as a legal assistant, I decided to start my own freelance translation business due to the high number of translation requests. Currently, I continue with my training as a translator thanks to different courses. The most recent one is the course on Legal Translation by Cálamo & Cran. I am also a member of the Spanish Association of Translators, Proofreaders and Interpreters (Asetrad).
If you are wondering what does "Baraibar" mean, please note that, apart from being a town located in Larraún (Navarra), it is also my second last name. And for those of you wondering about its spelling (theoretically, there should be a written accent above the "a" to encourage a correct pronunciation), just know that I have decided to use the original term in Euskera (Basque) because there are certain words that do not need to be translated.