zeus777

Well, just got another spam. This time this person wanted me to give him a job and he can help me out with my gigs because he can do "awesome translating." So just for the heck of it I replied "If you are really awesome at translations, you should create your own gig, I'm sure you will get an order very soon" in Japanese. He replied with something like "What I do not understand." REPORT, good bye. Also I just finished a strawberry cupcake, it was veeery nice. Snacks always makes you feel better especially after dealing with stupid spams...

For some reason I'm getting a lot ( and I mean a LOT) of spam messages. Spam is nothing new, but unlike some unlucky people my "spam frequency" was overall pretty low, I'd say 3~4 a month. I've read here at the forum that some people get over 10 everyday, that'll drive me nuts for sure. Luckily I'm not getting 10, but I am getting muuuch more for sure. On top of that the contents are longer and detailed. Usually my spam messages are quite short, they tell me they either A, they want a job, or B, they can be my assistant. Recently though they get into details about how poor their families are, how they have been searching for jobs and waiting for the jobs to come to them while they pray to god etc etc, and people on the forum are not being helpful and very unfriendly. Uh, excuse me, cough cough. The strangest one for today was the person asking me for a job, an he said "I can only speak one language but can translate multiple languages, any languages!" That's a copy/paste BTW, that's exactly what the person said. OK...so you can speak one language, but you can translate?? I hit report right away of course. I wasted 4 seconds of my life, how wonderful. Are other people getting more and more spam lately too? After I hit the report button, I decided to go out to lunch, and I bought myself those tasty steamed xiao long bao dumplings. And I burned my tongue. Duh. Guys, be careful when you eat them.

Interesting. I might try reporting that fake seller again then. ( the one I've been trying to report for the past every 3 months or so....for 2 years? More?) Currently a level 2 seller with overall very good reviews, but sadly the buyers don't know they are receiving garbage quality translations. Let's see what happens.

I'm feeling lazy tonight, so I'm just going to steam some veggies ( like onions and spinach, zucchini), with mushrooms and chicken and just mix it all together with pesto sauce. It works for me! I'll have it with some wine 🍷

Yup, so when I see that one-word "Hello" message, I do respond. At one point in my Fiverr years I assumed that it was spam and I blocked them right away. Still, I'd say a good 95% is spam. And oh, the cupcake was really nice. I think I've done that before as well... sometimes my mind will wander off and I'll get lost in this "what if" realm of Fiverrland. Ohhhhh washi tapes are a god-send! I buy a good number of them from Daiso! BTW I'm a bit curious to find out how in the heck did you break the key!? It looks like a pretty big hole.

So I wake up this morning and check my Fiverr messages. One says "Hola." OK, I don't speak Spanish but at least I know what that means. Problem is it was just that one word. So I respond, asking him/her if he has any questions. It is rare, but I HAVE had people who message me with a "Hi" "Hello" that did turn into an actual order. So far, no reply. OK, fine. Second message. It said "I want to work in the Japanese freelance business." That's it, no "Hello" not even a Hola. Hey, at least the first guy said hi. I replied just for the heck of it, saying something like "Do you understand Japanese at a native level?" He replies "not yet." Huh........good bye. Well, it was just 2 minutes that got wasted, not that bad. I was mildly annoyed, but it was OK. Besides my friend got me a tiramisu cupcake in the afternoon, so that was great. 😄 😄 😄 I hope you all had a good way with a nice snack.

I love to see other people's creation but I don't do cosplay myself. I do enjoy making jewelry and such to wear to cons though, you can't see in the this photo but I made a mushroom hairstick to match my kimono. You can always make your own outfit that isn't necessarily cosplay, but if you ever end up making anything I'd love to see it 😁 And here's me taking a photo with the most notorious serial killers in American cinema history and I somehow made it out alive🤣

If you've been on the Haunted Mansion in Disneyland, you've seen the stretching portraits at the very start. It's these guys:

The dress and the woman is beautiful right? I believe the fabric patterns were all embroidery, and I'm guessing it was done by a machine. She still did make the dress though, so hats off to her!! So my friend showed me this photo, and according to this lady a lot of people did not recognize who she was and was thrilled when my friend guessed correctly. I looked at the photo for a few minutes and then got it. Anyone else get it? 😉

OK so I had an amazing 4 days at San Diego Comic Con, I ran around in my Totoro kimono, met people, went to panels, and took photos. I came across this beautiful lady in this gorgeous dress, and I had to take a photo of her. I wasn't sure which character she was, and she told me it was her version of Miss Frizzle. @vickiespencer, the moment I hear that name I thought about you 😁 I know I need to go back to work....but I don't want toooooooooooooo.

If I had to choose between summer and winter, it's winter. In Tokyo, it's humid. I can take the heat, but the humidity is just......annoying. I can wear a tanktop, I can drink ice cold water, but it will never cool me down unless I turn on the AC. If it's cold on the other hand, I just need to wear an extra layer of heat-tech and drink hot tea and that will keep me warm. (I'm talking about Tokyo winter BTW) In other words, I have SOME control. Having that said, I guess autumn is the best season. Not too hot, not too cold, juuuuuust right.

July's been pretty slow for me, but no complaints. I've been in an out of OOO mode a few times, and this week I'm going to San Diego Comic Con so there's another OOO mode for me. I guess I'll be spending the money I earned last month during the convention 🤣🤣

OH MY GOD HAHAHAHAHAHA The correct word will be 強い, not even close!!

I am quite curious...WHAT WAS the kanji!!??

I came across this video a while, it's quite entertaining. I'm sure there is a similar video in ALL languages though!

For some reason I'm getting a good number of requests recently to translate short sentences/phrases, and each time I get those my spider senses start to tingle. I ask the buyer if it's for a tattoo, and in most cases they say yes. They are usually surprised and impressed 😅 Just the other day I got another request, and the person sent me this short sentence. I asked him the same-old-same question and he said yes, Dang, I knew it. I told him that I can indeed translate it, but also added that it would be better if I "tweak" the translation a little rather than just translating it directly. The buyer was confused and asked me why, and I told him that just because the translation itself is correct doesn't mean it will work as a tattoo. In other words, if I translated it directly and he had that slapped onto his arm or back, it will look stupid as HELL. Correct grammar / sentence structure doesn't automatically make the tattoo look cool. Just because it sounds cool in one language doesn't mean it sounds equally cool in other languages. I added that if he doesn't mind a Japanese person laughing inside their heads when they saw the tattoo, I'll go ahead and work on the direct translated version. I also gave him an example that "flying monkey" sounds cool in Japanese and is often used for ninja-like hero names, but it CAN sound rather silly in English, especially for people who has seen the movie Wizard of Oz. He thought "flying monkey" was a lame hero name, so good, I think I got my point across. (Believe me, it does sound cool in Japanese though!!) He asked me if I would laugh if I saw a person with that directly-translated tattoo. I said abso-freaking-lutely yes. I did say that if he is 100000% sure that he will never encounter a Japanese or a person who understands Japanese at a native level, he'd be OK. It was up to him. We decided to go with the slightly tweaked version. I'm very, very glad.

I've been a TRS for quite a while, and to be honest I don't remember how long, and how it happened. I think you're supposed to get a notification from Fiverr but clearly I missed it. I'm guessing since the message from Fiverr didn't say "You got an order," I just deleted it without reading it?? 😅 One day I just noticed that I was TRS and I have nooooooooo idea who long it has been when I finally realized that. It could have been weeks, even months. In other words I haven't really noticed any changes when it comes to number of orders. Some months are busier, other months are slower, it's been like that for years.

Hi there, I've used the out of office option many times, and so far it has worked very well for me. You can message your clients, but using the OOO won't hurt.

I've been away from the forum for the past few days since I was so busy.... And I come back to this. Boy oh boy, what a joke.

"Don't cheat, but be sure to work smart." (My art teacher back in college) "Money isn't everything but it sure does cover a LOT" ( My mother) "Thank you and I'm sorry are the two most powerful words in the world" (Some random sign I saw in a restaurant bar in Tokyo, not sure who said it) "Admiring and understanding are the most opposite emotions" (Sosuke Aizen ) "Just eat and take a nap." (Me)

I'd go with this. You can scream and shout, yell into a microphone and tell people to JUST F*CKING READ and DO YOUR RESEARCH before asking the same question... but here at the forum, nobody can hear you scream...

YES, it had to be at 3 am! My very first driving lesson was with my friend in the empty school parking lot during the summer break. After several lessons there, my friend suggested we go out in the public road, but he said we should do it very late or early so there won't be any cars around. I thought it was a good idea and we went with it. It was dark but there were plenty of lights so no problem. Still since it was not the parking lot anymore, it was enough to make me nervous. I think we did the 3-am-lesson two more times and then I started driving during daytime, but in a quiet residential area. I did pass the test on my first try, so I need to thank my friend for that! Funny thing is, when I retook the test in Japan to get a Japanese license, I failed twice. Everything was on the opposite side, and the very first time I sat inside the car I knew I was going to fail, even before I started the engine. BTW years ago when I was shopping at Safeway, some old lady smashed her car into the side of my car. I told her to move the car so I can take a look at the damage, she kept saying oh no, oh my, blah blah blah. I told her again to please move the damn car so I take a look at my own car, and all she did was stand there saying oh no oh no. I know I know, I get it, she was worried and was in shock, and I should be nicer to an old lady, but hey, I'M the one whose car got damaged!! I was quite annoyed, but in the end the staff moved her car for me. I could have done it myself but I only knew how to drive an automatic. There was a mid-size dent on the side of my car, lady goes into bigger panic, she could have at least say sorry but she was too busy panicking. I really was annoyed at this point and just told her to forget it and drove away. And nope, I never fixed the dent. It didn't bother me.

I never got into an accident, thank god. However I did get stopped by the police. I was practicing driving with my friend at 3 am, and since I was so nervous I was driving veeeeeeery slowly plus I was not going in a straight line. The officer thought I was a drunk driver. I showed him my temporary driving permit and explained the situation, he chuckled and let me go after reminding me I need to go a biiiiiiiit faster and also in a straight line. Oh, good memories.

HI there 😄 I joined Fiverr over 10 years ago, so luckily for me there were much fewer competitors back then. Having that said, there were still several hundred other people who were offering the same service as me. I didn't feel overwhelmed at all though, I think it's because I was thinking "Huh, sure, let's give this a try and see how it goes" and I thought I'd be lucky if I can male $50 a month just so I can get Starbucks. I did of course spend a good amount of time setting up my gig and made sure it looked good and stood out, but since I wasn't trying to make a living off Fiverr or anything, I was overall quite relaxed. As long as you know what you are doing and know how to reach out to the right people you will get orders in the end. You read posts about people's Fiverr journeys and making their first 1000 dollars here and when you go check their gig, it's no surprise that they became successful even with all the competition going on. Good luck! 😄

So we all encounter a "difficult" buyer every now and then, and yes, the word "difficult" can cover a very wide area. A while ago I posted about this buyer who asked for a translation, and lemme just sum everything up into one sentence: He was difficult. I did end up doing maybe 3 or 4 orders with this person, but I knew that I did not enjoy working with this guy and I was thinking of asking him to go find another seller. Politely, of course. Then this morning I get a message and he asked me for a translation. I give him a quote. He did not like the quote and asked for a discount. His claim was the file he sent me was very similar to another file I worked on before and since he is a repeat buyer he should get a discount. I politely explained why he cannot get a discount. We went back and forth a few times and each time the messages sounded more and more demanding. His response: Alright!! Send me the offer when you are ready. Wow, I've seen people sound childish at Fiverr, but I've never seen some type "Alright!!" in a message. That was when I knew I no longer wanted to work with this guy. Well I guess I'll be sending him a polite message telling him that for blah-blah reason I cannot work on the file ( and I DO have another big file I need to finish anyways ) and I'll just move on. But wow, seriously, that "Alright!" was quite something.