Hey I'm getting a tattoo Saturday in memory of a friend that passed recently and I'm thinking on getting it in Gaelic. I can't find anything at all online to help me, but came across this site so if you could help me out, I'd really appreciate it.

I wanna get "We are the company we keep."

If possible, could you help me with it's pronunciation?

Thank you!

That’s a bit tricky to translate into Irish. You could say something like níl ionainn ach ár gcuideachta (féin) ‘we are only our (own) company’, but that’s not quite the same as your English version.

If you translate it directly, as is muid ár gcuideachta (féin) ‘we are our (own) company’, it sounds more like you’re saying that we’re alone, and that we only have ourselves as company.

Perhaps someone (whose head isn’t clogged up from having a cold) has a brighter idea?

_________________
Not a native speaker.

Always wait for at least three people to agree on a translation, especially if it’s for something permanent.

My translations are usually GU (Ulster Irish), unless CO (Standard Orthography) is requested.

Basically what I'm trying to say with it is that I am him as much as he was me, and as long as I stay true to myself and be myself, he'll never really be gone. I'm taking the particular quote from a song, and I'm trying to give it my own meaning so I can switch it around it's all good.

I'm open to ideas.

There's an Irish proverb which is along the lines of what you're looking for. Inis dom do chomhluadar agus inseoidh mé duit cé thú féin which means, roughly "Tell me your company and I'll tell you who you are" ie one can judge a person based on the company they keep.

Would just "The company we keep" work?

Or something similar?

Google has this translation thing.. didn't know this before.

"The Company We Keep" comes out as "Manteña a Compañía Nós" for Galician.

Can anyone confirm this as correct in any way?

Don't ever trust Google Translate. Btw, I hope you know Galician is a language spoken in Spain.

Stupid google translate highlighted Irish and Galician. Trying to confuse me.

This is correct if you want to say ‘keep the company us’ in an Iberian language intermediate between Spanish and Portuguese.

Since you’re looking for (Irish) Gaelic, though, not Galician, I’d go with Gumbi’s suggestion: never trust Google Translate (or any other automated translation service)!


‘The company we keep’ can be said very simply:

Ár gcomhluadar (or ár gcuideachta, though the former is more common)
‘our company’

_________________
Not a native speaker.

Always wait for at least three people to agree on a translation, especially if it’s for something permanent.

My translations are usually GU (Ulster Irish), unless CO (Standard Orthography) is requested.

I like that one. Could you show me how to pronounce it??

Ár gcomhluada