My elective class started their project for the semester. We're having them translate Japanese songs into English. They already know the melody, so they can focus on arranging the words. They're working in groups of about 5 or 6 on one song. There are 5 groups. After they finish the translation, we'll choose the best one (as a class) and preform it at the school festival in September. I hope they can finish in time. In about half an hour they only finished about 2 lines a piece. Looking at the Japanese lyrics, I realized that Japanese songs often use very casual words and no subject. For example：
百万回の「愛してる」なんかよりも ずっとずっと大切にするものがある。
Hyakumankai no "aishiteiru"nanka yorimo zutto zutto taisetsu ni suru mono ga aru.
Literally it means: Hyakumankai=One million times, no=of, aishiteiru=loving, nanka=uh, yorimo=(more) than, zutto zutto=much more, taisetsu ni suru=carefully keep, mono=thing, ga aru=have.

The 'I' and 'you' are inferred, so it makes it hard to figure out who they're talking about sometimes. This phrase would read something like "I have something, uh, much more important to me than saying 'I love you'" in English. Also, the ideas and way of thinking if of course not the same. I guess translators always run in to these problems. In the songs though, we're going to have to work it the students to fit the translated lyrics into the melody. That will probably be one of the more difficult parts.