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11th ProZ.com translation contest: "Contemporary society" » English to Afrikaans » Entry #13432


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Translation #13432

We're accustomed to glamour in London SE26: Kelly Brook and Jason Statham used to live above the dentist. But when Anouska Hempel's heels hit the cracked cement of the parking space outside my flat, it's hard not to think of those Picture Post photographs of royalty visiting bombed-out families during the second world war. Her mission in my modest tract of suburbia is, however, about more than offering sympathy. Hempel—the woman who invented the boutique hotel before it bore any such proprietary name—has come to give me information for which, judging by the spreads in interiors magazines and anxious postings on online DIY forums, half the property-owners in the Western world seem desperate: how to give an ordinary home the look and the vibe of a five-star, £750-a-night hotel suite. To Hem­pelise, in this case, a modest conversion flat formed from the middle slice of a three-storey Victorian semi.

"You could do it," she says, casting an eye around my kitchen. "Anyone could do it. Absolutely no reason why not. But there has to be continuity between the rooms. A single idea must be followed through." She looks out wistfully over the fire escape. "And you'd have to buy the house next door, of course." That's a joke. I think.

...

It's worth pausing, though, to consider the oddness of this impulse. The hotel room is an amnesiac space. We would be troubled if it bore any sign of a previous occupant, particularly as many of us go to hotels in order to do things we would not do at home. We expect a hotel room to be cleaned as thoroughly as if a corpse had just been hauled from the bed. (In some cases, this will actually have happened.) The domestic interior embodies the opposite idea: it is a repository of memories. The story of its inhabitants ought to be there in the photos on the mantelpiece, the pictures on the wall, the books on the shelves. If hotel rooms were people, they would be smiling lobotomy patients or plausible psychopaths.
Ons is gewoond aan glans in Londen SE26: Kelly Brooke en Jason Stratham het bo die tandarts gebly. Maar toe Anouska se hakke die gebarste sement van die parkeerruimte buite my woonstel tref, was dit moeilik om nie te dink aan daardie Picture Post fotos van koninklikes op besoek aan die uitgebombardeerde gesinne gedurende die tweede wêreldoorlog nie. Haar sending in my beskeie voorstedelike area gaan egter oor meer as om meelewing te toon. Hempel – wat die boetiekhotel uitgevind het nog voordat dit so ‘n patentregtelike naam gedra het – het vir my inligting gebring waarvoor, te oordeel aan die uitgebreide artikels in tydskrifte oor binnenshuisversiering en gretige aanlynpublikasies op doen-dit-self forums, die helfte van die Westerse wêreld se eiendomsbesitters desperaat blyk te wees: hoe om aan ‘n gewone huis die voorkoms en stemming van ‘n vyfster, £750-per -nag hotel suite te gee. Om te Hempaliseer, in hierdie geval ‘n beskeie omskepte woonstel gevorm van die middelste deel van ‘n drieverdieping Victoriaanse skakelhuis.

“Jy kan dit doen,” sê sy, en gooi haar oog oor my kombuis. “Enigeen kan dit doen. Absoluut geen rede hoekom nie. Maar daar moet kontinuïteit wees tussen die kamers. ‘n Enkele idee moet deurgevoer word.” Sy kyk peinsend uit oor die brandtrap. “En jy sal natuurlik ook die huis langsaan moet koop.” Dis ‘n grap. Dink ek.

…

Maar dis die moeite werd om stil te word en oor die vreemdheid van hierdie impuls na te dink. Die hotelkamer is ’n ruimte sonder geheue. Ons sou besorgd gewees het as daar enige teken was van ‘n vorige bewoner. Veral aangesien baie van ons na ‘n hotel toe gaan ten einde goed te doen wat ons nie by die huis sou doen nie. Ons verwag dat ‘n hotelkamer so deeglik skoongemaak moet word asof daar pas ‘n lyk van die bed af verwyder is. (In sommige gevalle sou dit wel gebeur het). Die huislike interieur vergestalt die teenoorgestelde idee: dit is ‘n stoorplek vir herinneringe. Die verhaal van sy inwoners behoort daar te wees in die fotos op die kaggel, die prente teen die muur, die boeke op die boekrakke. As hotelkamers mense sou wees, sou hulle glimlaggende lobotomiepasiënte of gladdemond psigopate wees.


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