Taylor Swift was at the United Nations headquarters in New York for a special event focused on global education and the power of language. She’d been invited to perform and speak about how music transcends linguistic barriers, bringing people together regardless of what language they speak. During the reception before her performance, she was introduced to various translators and interpreters who worked for the UN.

These were people who spent their lives converting words from one language to another. ensuring the communication happened across cultural divides. One woman in particular caught Taylor’s attention. She was standing alone near a window overlooking the East River, holding a glass of wine she wasn’t drinking, staring out at the water with an expression of profound sadness.

 “Are you okay?” Taylor asked, approaching her. The woman startled, then composed herself quickly. “Yes, I’m fine. I apologize. I shouldn’t be melancholy at an event like this. Sometimes events like this are exactly when we feel most alone, Taylor said gently. I’m Taylor. I know everyone knows. I’m Yuki Tanaka. I’ve been a translator here for 30 years.

 Japanese to English, English to Japanese. I’ve translated speeches by world leaders, peace treaties, declarations of war, millions of words in my career. That’s incredible. You must be very skilled. Yuki smiled sadly. I can translate anything except the one sentence that mattered most. Taylor waited, sensing there was more. My husband Kenji died two weeks ago.

 Heart attack. We were married for 35 years and in all that time we never spoke the same language fluently. I mean we communicated. He learned some English. I learned more Japanese but we were never truly fluent in each other’s native tongue. That must have been challenging. It was beautiful actually.

 When he said IU in Japanese I love you. It meant something different than when I said I love you in English. Each language carries its own weight, its own cultural meaning. We had to work harder to understand each other and that made our understanding deeper. Yuki’s voice broke. But when he was dying, he spoke only in Japanese.

 He was in pain, frightened, and he reverted to his first language. His last words were in Japanese. Rapid, emotional, desperate, and I I couldn’t translate them fast enough. I was his wife holding his hand, watching him die, and I couldn’t fully understand what he was trying to tell me. Taylor felt tears burning in her eyes.

 What did you catch? Any of it? Fragments. Yuki, my name. Thank you, Itsumo. Always. But the rest was too fast, too emotional, too much for me to process while watching him die. And now he’s gone. And I’ll never know exactly what he said. I’ve spent 30 years translating for world leaders, but I couldn’t translate my own husband’s last words. Yuki, I’m so sorry.

The worst part is knowing those words exist somewhere. The hospital room had recording equipment for medical purposes. Kenji’s last moments were recorded for the doctors to review his vital signs, which means his last words were captured. They exist, but I can’t listen to them. Every time I try, I break down before I can understand what he’s saying.

Yuki pulled a small USB drive from her purse. This is the recording. 2 minutes and 47 seconds, his last words. And I’ve carried it for 2 weeks. Unable to listen, unable to not listen, unable to translate the most important sentence my husband ever said to me. Taylor looked at this woman who’d spent her life bridging language barriers but couldn’t bridge the final one between her and her husband.

 What if I helped you? Taylor said, “What if we found someone who could translate it for you? A professional who could handle the emotional weight. I am a professional translator. If I can’t do it, I don’t know who can. Someone who isn’t grieving. Someone who can be objective. Would you let me help you find that person? Yuki looked at the USB drive in her hand, then at Taylor.

 I’ve been carrying this for two weeks. Maybe, maybe it’s time to finally understand what he said. Yuki Chen was a 23-year-old graduate student at Colombia University studying linguistics and translation theory. She was American-born but raised in a bilingual household. Her parents were Chinese immigrants who insisted she maintained fluency in Mandarin even as she grew up speaking English.

 Kenji Tanaka was a 25-year-old exchange student from Tokyo studying engineering. His English was functional but heavily accented and he struggled with the cultural aspects of American university life. They met in the library. Kenji was frustrated, trying to understand a technical manual that used idioms and colloquialisms that weren’t in his English textbooks.

Yuki overheard him muttering to himself in Japanese and offered to help. “I speak some Japanese,” she said. “Not fluently, but enough to help with translation if you’re stuck.” Kenji looked up at her with relief. “You speak Japanese?” “Hi, Sukoshi,” Yuki replied. “Yes, a little.” They spent that afternoon working through the technical manual together.

 Yuki translating the confusing English passages into simpler language. Kenji explaining the engineering concepts. It was the beginning of everything. Their courtship was conducted in three languages. English Yuki’s native tongue, Japanese, Kenji’s native tongue, and a hybrid they created together, switching between languages mids sentence based on which words best expressed what they meant.

 I love you in English felt different than Aisheru in Japanese. Miss you had different weight than Sabishia. They learned that language wasn’t just about words. It was about culture, context, emotion. Kenji proposed in Japanese. Yuki said yes in English. They got married in a bilingual ceremony where half the vows were in each language, requiring translation for many of the guests.

 For 35 years, they navigated life in two languages. Their children grew up triilingual, English, Japanese, and Mandarin from Yuki’s parents. Their home was filled with the music of multiple languages, the beauty of switching between tongues to find exactly the right word for what they meant, but they were never perfectly fluent in each other’s language.

 Yuki’s Japanese remained good, but not native. Kenji’s English improved, but never lost its accent. There were always moments where they had to ask for clarification, had to explain cultural context, had to work slightly harder to understand each other. And that effort, that constant work to bridge the linguistic gap, made their understanding deeper.

 They couldn’t take each other for granted. They had to actively translate, actively listen, actively work to connect until the very end when Kenji’s heart gave out and he spent his last moments speaking only in Japanese. and Yuki’s grief made it impossible to translate fast enough to capture what he was saying.

 Taylor made arrangements for them to use a private conference room in the UN building. She contacted the head of the translation department and explained the situation. A translator who needed someone else to translate her husband’s dying words because she was too griefstricken to do it herself. Within an hour, they’d found someone willing to help.

 A senior Japanese translator named Hiroshi, who’d worked at the UN for 40 years and had translated some of the most emotional, difficult content imaginable. I can do this, Hiroshi said when he met Yuki. But I need you to understand whatever he said, it will be emotional. Are you ready to know? I’ve been carrying these words for 2 weeks. I need to know even if it breaks me.

 They set up in the conference room. Yuki, Taylor, and Hiroshi. Yuki handed over the USB drive with trembling hands. Hiroshi loaded the audio file onto a laptop. Do you want to hear it while I translate or should I listen first and tell you what he said? I want to hear it. I want to hear his voice. Just tell me what the words mean.

 Hiroshi pressed play. The audio started with medical equipment beeping in the background. Then Kenji’s voice strained and weak. Yuki, Yuki, Kikoy Masuka. Hiroshi translated immediately. Yuki, can you hear me? Yuki’s voice on the recording tearful. I hear you, Kenji. I’m here. Kenji spoke rapidly in Japanese, his voice urgent.

 Hiroshi listened carefully, then translated. I don’t have much time. There’s so much I want to say and I don’t know how to say it in English right now. I’m scared, Yuki. I’m so scared. On the recording, Yuki was crying, trying to respond in Japanese, but her words were fractured by grief. Kenji continued, his breathing labored.

Sanjugo Nen, 35 years. Every day with you was a translation. I tried to convert my love into words you could understand. But love isn’t translatable, is it? It exists beyond language. Hiroshi’s voice was thick with emotion as he translated. Taylor was openly crying. Yuki was frozen listening to her husband’s last words finally made comprehensible.

 Kenjis voice grew weaker. Anatashi noyakuhita. Hiroshi translated, “You were my translator. You made my life meaningful.” Kenji coughed, struggled, then continued in Japanese. I’m sorry I never learned English well enough to tell you everything I wanted to say. I’m sorry you had to work so hard to understand me. But Yuki, you always did.

You always understood. Even when I couldn’t find the words, you knew what I meant. Yuki was sobbing now, hearing these words for the first time, understanding her husband’s final message. Kenji’s breathing became more ragged. This is my last translation. My last message, Hiroshi said quietly. Kenji’s final words spoken with the last of his strength and subetto.

Hiroshi’s voice broke as he translated, “I love you forever in every language, in every word. You were my everything.” The recording ended with the sound of Kenji’s heart monitor flatlining with Yuki screaming his name with medical staff rushing in. Then silence. The three of them sat in the conference room devastated by what they just heard.

Finally, Yuki spoke. “For two weeks, I’ve been tormented by not knowing what he said. I thought maybe he was in pain and crying out for help. Or maybe he was angry that I couldn’t save him. Or maybe he was scared and I failed to comfort him. But he was saying goodbye. He was thanking me.

 He was telling me that our whole life was a translation. Taking his Japanese love and my English love and creating something new that belonged to both of us. She looked at Taylor. I’m a translator. I’ve spent my life believing that everything can be translated, that every word has an equivalent in another language. But Kenji was right.

 Love isn’t translatable. It’s not au equals I love you. It’s something that exists beyond the words we use to describe it. Kenji’s memorial service was held the following week. It was a bilingual ceremony, half in English, half in Japanese, with Yuki translating between the two languages. But when it came time for Yuki to speak about Kenji, she did something unexpected.

 She spoke in both languages simultaneously. Switching mids sentence using Japanese words when English failed her and English words when Japanese wasn’t enough. Kenji, I met Sanjug Nenmai 35 years ago. We spoke different languages, grew up in different cultures, saw the world through different linguistic frameworks, but we created something new together.

 a hybrid language that belonged only to us. She switched seamlessly. He would say IU and I would say I love you. And somehow we both knew we meant the same impossible to translate feeling. Language was both the barrier between us and the bridge that connected us. The audience, half Japanese speakaking, half English-speaking didn’t need translation.

 The emotion transcended language. Kenji’s last words to me were in Japanese. For two weeks, I couldn’t understand them fully. But yesterday, with help, I finally translated his final message. And I want to share it with you in both languages because that’s how Kenji and I lived, always in both languages. She recited Kenji’s last words in Japanese, then translated them herself into English.

 The act of translation, taking his words and making them accessible, was its own form of honoring him. When she finished, she said, “Kenji taught me that some things lose meaning in translation, but other things, love, commitment, partnership, they gain meaning in translation because the work of translating forces you to really understand what you’re trying to say.

” I translated Kenji’s life into English so my family could understand him. He translated my life into Japanese so his family could understand me. And together we translated our love into something that belonged to both languages and neither language. Something that could only exist in the space between words. Taylor stayed in touch with Yuki.

 6 months after Kenji’s death, Yuki reached out with a request. I want to do something with Kenji’s last words. I want to turn them into something beautiful. Would you help me? Taylor met with Yuki at a recording studio in New York. Yuki had transcribed Kenji’s final message, both the original Japanese and her translation into English.

 I want to create a piece of music that uses both versions. Kenji’s words in Japanese and my translation in English layered together so people can hear what it sounds like when love exists in two languages simultaneously. Taylor worked with Yuki to create a composition. They used the original audio of Kenji speaking his last words preserved in his own voice and layered it with Yuki speaking the English translation.

 The two languages played simultaneously creating a harmony of meaning. The music underneath was simple piano and strings, emotional but not overwhelming. The focus was on the words, on the two languages intertwining, on the beauty of translation and the impossibility of perfect translation coexisting. The piece was called Two Languages, One Love.

 When they finished, Yuki cried listening to it. This is what our marriage sounded like. Two people speaking different languages, but saying the same thing. Never perfectly synchronized, never completely understood, but always working to bridge the gap. Two languages, one love became part of a larger project Yuki created called Lost in Translation: Finding Meaning in the Gap.

 The project collected audio from multilingual couples. Moments where language barriers created either beauty or confusion or both. Some were funny misunderstandings that became inside jokes. Some were poignant like Kenji’s last words. But all of them celebrated the idea that language barriers don’t have to be obstacles.

 They can be opportunities for deeper understanding, for working harder to connect, for creating hybrid meanings that belong to both languages. Yuki gave talks at universities, at translation conferences, at multilingual community centers. She shared her story of 35 years with Kenji, of their bilingual life, of the last words she couldn’t immediately translate.

 “People ask me if I regret marrying someone who didn’t speak my language fluently,” she’d say. “But I don’t because speaking different languages forced us to really communicate. We couldn’t rely on linguistic shortcuts or cultural assumptions. We had to work at it every single day.” When Kenji said, “Asheru and I said I love you,” we both knew those phrases weren’t exactly equivalent.

 Aisheru carries different cultural weight, different emotional resonance. But that difference wasn’t a problem. It was an opportunity to understand love in two different frameworks simultaneously. At one university lecture, a student asked, “Do you wish you’d been able to translate his last words in the moment? Do you wish you’d understood immediately what he was saying? Yuki thought carefully.

 Part of me does, but another part of me thinks the delay was meaningful. I carried his words for 2 weeks before understanding them. And in that time, I thought about all the words we’d ever exchanged, all the translations we’d ever made for each other. When I finally heard the translation, it wasn’t just his last words. It was a summation of 35 years.

He said I was his translator that I made his life meaningful. And in a way that’s what love is, isn’t it? Taking someone’s existence and translating it into meaning. Making sense of another person even when they speak a different language than you do. Taylor wrote in her journal on the anniversary of meeting Yuki.

 A year ago, I met Yuki Tanaka at a UN event. She’d just lost her husband and she was carrying the weight of his last words. words she’d been unable to translate in the moment. Words that haunted her for two weeks. I helped her find someone who could translate those words. And what we discovered was beautiful and heartbreaking.

 Kenji’s last message wasn’t a cry for help or an expression of pain. It was a love letter, a thank you, an acknowledgement that their whole marriage had been an act of translation. What I’ve learned from Yuki, language barriers don’t separate people. They create opportunities for deeper connection. Yuki and Kenji spent 35 years translating for each other.

 Not just words, but cultures, perspectives, ways of seeing the world. When he said, “Aishu,” in Japanese, it meant something slightly different than when she said, “I love you,” in English. But those differences made their understanding richer, not poorer. The Lost in Translation project exists now because Yuki realized that her experience loving someone in two languages was something millions of people could relate to.

Multilingual couples, immigrant families, international relationships, all of them navigate the space between languages. All of them work harder to understand each other because perfect translation is impossible. And that hard work, that’s where real connection happens. I think about Kenji’s last words sometimes. You were my translator.

You made my life meaningful. What a beautiful way to describe a partner. As someone who translates your existence into meaning, that’s what love is, isn’t it? Even when you speak the same language, you’re still translating, still working to understand what the other person really means beneath their words.

 Yuki spent two weeks not knowing what Kenji’s last words meant. And she was tormented by that unknowing, convinced she’d failed him in his final moments. But when she finally heard the translation, she realized she hadn’t failed. She’d spent 35 years successfully translating Kenji’s life, his love, his meaning. Two weeks of not understanding didn’t erase 35 years of perfect translation.

 The piece we created, Two Languages, One Love, is one of my favorite things I’ve ever worked on. Not because it’s musically complex, but because it captures something true. Love exists in the space between languages. When you hear Kenji speaking Japanese and Yuki speaking English simultaneously, it’s not confusing.

 It’s harmonious. Two people saying the same thing in different ways. And somehow that doubling makes the meaning stronger, not weaker. Yuki is 59 now. She’s retired from the UN, but still works as a translator for the Lost in Translation Project. She helps other multilingual couples preserve their bilingual love stories, and she carries that USB drive with her always.

 Kenji’s last words, finally translated, finally understood. She told me recently, “I used to think translation was about finding equivalent words, but Kenji taught me that translation is about finding equivalent meaning, which isn’t the same thing at all. Aisheru doesn’t equal I love you.” But they both translate to the same impossible to express feeling.

 That’s what Yuki and Kenji had. Not a perfect linguistic match, but a perfect translation of love across two languages. And now, even though Kenji is gone, Yuki still translates for him. She takes his Japanese words and gives them English meaning, she bridges the gap between what he said and what he meant. That’s love. That’s partnership.

 That’s what it means to truly understand someone. Not just speaking their language, but translating their heart. This story reminds us that language barriers aren’t just challenges, they’re opportunities. Yuki and Kenji could have chosen partners who spoke their native languages fluently. It would have been easier.

 But it wouldn’t have been richer. Their 35 years together required constant translation, constant work, constant effort to understand each other across linguistic and cultural divides. And that work created depth that might not have existed if communication had been effortless. When Kenji died speaking only Japanese, Yuki initially saw it as a failure.

 She couldn’t translate fast enough, couldn’t understand his last words in the moment. But what she eventually realized was that those two weeks of carrying untransated words were themselves meaningful. They forced her to think about their entire history of translation, about how they’d spent a lifetime bridging gaps.

 The lesson is this. Perfect understanding isn’t always immediate. Sometimes we need time to translate what someone meant. Sometimes we need help from others to make meaning clear. And sometimes the work of translating the effort of understanding is where the real connection happens. If you’re in a relationship where you feel like you’re speaking different languages, literally or metaphorically, that’s not necessarily a problem.

 It’s an opportunity to work harder at understanding, to not take communication for granted, to actively translate what your partner means beneath their words. Yuki spent 35 years translating Kenji’s Japanese love into English meaning, and he spent 35 years translating her English love into Japanese meaning. Neither translation was perfect, but both were beautiful.

 When Kenji said, “You were my translator. You made my life meaningful. He was acknowledging that Yuki had spent decades making sense of him, understanding him, bridging the linguistic gap between who he was and how he could express himself. That’s what partners do. They translate for each other.

 They take what you’re trying to say and help make it understandable. They bridge the gap between intention and expression. Even when you speak the same native language, you’re still translating, still working to understand what your partner really means, still navigating the space between what’s said and what’s meant.

 Yuki and Kenji just had to do it in two languages, which made it harder, but also more beautiful because nothing worth understanding comes easily. Kenji’s last words weren’t immediately translated, but they were eventually understood. And that understanding delayed but profound honored 35 years of translation of love existing in two languages of meaning created in the space between words that’s not lost in translation that’s found in it.