ROM Hack Some quick translation walkthrough

[MaK11-12]

Hi,
Okay, i'm not such a noob or anything, but i tried to translate pokemon Heart Gold to English using the Doki doki majo shinpan translation thread (the abandoned one). But when i open a file in a hex editor (windhex or XVI32) in the rom (like: \data\a\1\1\1 ) it come up with a load of junk. I have changed it to unicode.
Have i done something wrong?
Have i opened the wrong file?
Is it the right hex editors?
Am i stupid?
Help.......

MaK