Ottawa was in for another Trekker surprise on Tuesday, April 26, as the front page of popular commuter newspaper Metro Ottawa was published in glorious Klingon!
This was, of course, another surprise element of our advance buzz campaign for Canada Aviation and Space Museum’s Star Trek: The Starfleet Academy Experience.
The Klingon front page, with our campaign poster on the back, generated tonnes of buzz on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Reddit and elsewhere:
The single greatest thing I will see all day @metroottawa pic.twitter.com/peuCTW4vCJ
— Alison Sandor (@CFRA_Alison) April 26, 2016
Now this is some geeky marketing: https://t.co/RTYCuLuhfg https://t.co/3JyidWlZZy
🙂@avspacemuseum— J. Lepp (@lepp) April 27, 2016
Welcome to my home town Ottawa, the only city with a daily newspaper featuring articles in Klingon. #StarTrek #dnd pic.twitter.com/0uPPLHL7yZ
— Erik Waddell (@ErikWaddell) April 26, 2016
One Redditor, kahless62003, even managed to quite successfully translate the Klingon back to English.
As with other “trilingual” campaign elements, our copy was specially translated into Klingon by qurgh lungqIj (AKA Chris Lipscombe) from the Klingon Language Institute. In fact, he didn’t just translate, he adapted it fully into Klingon idiom.
The story is “in-universe,” as if a Klingon journalist was corresponding on a 21st Century event: The crash of a Federation shuttle from the future. (Including our experiential “away team” at the crash site.)
If you’re interested, this is what the Klingon literally says:
Federation Shuttle mislands on 21st century Terra
Terran month 4 day 25: The Klingon High Council have received new data. In order to create a Starfleet Academy recruiter location, Starfleet have sent emissaries to 2100 year old Terra.
A Federation shuttlecraft had left the space tunnel however while it was entering the Terran atmosphere the shuttlecraft began to destabilized and its hull disintegrated. The Human captain did not die. In order to escape from the shuttlecraft he used an emergency transporter unit.
Subsequently, a shuttlecraft nacelle has been located in a human merchant site. Starfleet has sent additional personnel and Starfleet security and science personally quickly arrived. They have contained the location and they have caused the site’s people to follow the first law. The primitive Terrans are very confused.
Starfleet Academy has hailed the High Council and their representative has given the High Council this information. Starfleet Academy intends to build a training computer in Ottawa, the Capital of Canada. They will build it at the Terran building that contains ancient atmosphere ships and ships that don’t have warp cores.
In Canada’s First City, when month 5 happens, the Starfleet Academy Experience begins and when month nine is finished, it ends. It is permitted that Klingons can participate. Weapons are not permitted. In order to travel into the past, you can use their sun’s gravity.
Special thanks to our Media team of Sue, Kevin, and Olga, who helped make this happen.