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A few paragraphs from the children's book I'm translating awkwardly from German, with the help of Google Translate, one semester of German, and squinting a lot at cognates.
[For Ben, the little pirate, and Anna, who should sometimes protect him.]
Everyone on Butterfly Island knew Fat Sven and his boat with the green sail. Sven lived with Pit, his cabin boy, in a small hut on the beach, under trees, where the sweetest fruit of the whole island grew. But one cannot live only on fruits. Therefore a sign hung on Sven's hut: ISLAND TRANSPORT was on it.
Pit had written it. Fat Sven had watched him meanwhile, full of admiration, and hummed: "By thunder*, boy, but those are a few devilishly tricky words that you're writing there."
The two really had enough to do. Even when it stormed so much that the jellyfish crawled ashore, they sailed out and brought coconuts from one island to another, kegs of rum or boxes of dried fish. And in the evenings they returned to their hut satisfied and lay down in their hammocks. It was a peaceful life and they liked it.
But one morning the two decided to take a walk on the beach before work. Fat Sven looked out to sea and Pit searched in the sand for mussels. Then suddenly the waves washed a barrel in front of their feet.
---
* The word is "Donnerlottchen" and I can't find a useful translation of it, so I'm approximating based on context and the one word in there that I recognize.
[For Ben, the little pirate, and Anna, who should sometimes protect him.]
Everyone on Butterfly Island knew Fat Sven and his boat with the green sail. Sven lived with Pit, his cabin boy, in a small hut on the beach, under trees, where the sweetest fruit of the whole island grew. But one cannot live only on fruits. Therefore a sign hung on Sven's hut: ISLAND TRANSPORT was on it.
Pit had written it. Fat Sven had watched him meanwhile, full of admiration, and hummed: "By thunder*, boy, but those are a few devilishly tricky words that you're writing there."
The two really had enough to do. Even when it stormed so much that the jellyfish crawled ashore, they sailed out and brought coconuts from one island to another, kegs of rum or boxes of dried fish. And in the evenings they returned to their hut satisfied and lay down in their hammocks. It was a peaceful life and they liked it.
But one morning the two decided to take a walk on the beach before work. Fat Sven looked out to sea and Pit searched in the sand for mussels. Then suddenly the waves washed a barrel in front of their feet.
---
* The word is "Donnerlottchen" and I can't find a useful translation of it, so I'm approximating based on context and the one word in there that I recognize.