It was summer of 2019 when I received an email informing me of an opportunity for a terminology fellowship with WIPO’s PCT Terminology Unit. I had just graduated with a Master’s Degree from ETIB, and the world was opening its gates to me. It was an exciting feeling, but a very scary one as well. I applied for the fellowship wholeheartedly believing that I would not get it, that it would perhaps go to someone else with more experience in terminology. A few weeks later, I had an interview with my future supervisors, and I was able to confidently have a conversation with them about the test they gave me because I had actually learned all this during my studies at ETIB. Fast forward a year from then, I am here in Geneva, just about to finish my fellowship, and the world is once again open for me. However, this time, it doesn’t seem so scary anymore. Throughout my fellowship, I was able to gain so much experience in terminology and, by default, in translation. I have contributed thousands of terms into the PCT term base, I established a number of concept relations in fields I had never thought of working in, and, perhaps the thing I am most proud of, I contributed most of the Arabic terms in the PCT’s Glossary for COVID-19 related terms, a resource that will help many translators and researchers around the world. It has truly been a great journey, not an easy one by all means, but definitely a rewarding path that taught me so much. Thanks to my fellowship with WIPO’s PCT Terminology Unit, I am now a better translator and a more confident person, and I cannot wait to see what the future holds.

Rim Diab Marzouk

ETIB Graduate

Master's in Conference Translation