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My Return to China—After 18 Years

美国老人回到阔别十八年之久的中国!

I spent three weeks, September 9th to 29th, in China with my wife Rosie (who was born and raised in China, of Chinese ancestry). This month’s diary consists of random observations I made during the trip.

【9月9日至9月29日,我和妻子罗西在中国待了三周。罗西在中国出生和长大,拥有华人血统。九月的日记就写我在中国旅途中的随机观察。

This was my first visit to mainland China since 2001, eighteen years ago. By coincidence, that 2001 visit was my first since 1983, also a span of eighteen years.

自从2001年来中国大陆已经过了18年了,这是18年来我第一次再来中国大陆。巧合的是,2001年距离我1983年第一次来大陆,正好也是18年。

Although I intended to enjoy myself in the proper vacation spirit, and did so, this jaunt was really for Rosie. She wanted to visit her relatives over there, and her old classmates from school and college. They are scattered across China, so we boxed the compass on this trip: north (Peking, Siping), east (Suzhou, Hangzhou, Shaoxing), west (Chongqing), and south (Zhuhai).

虽然我打定主意,要以度假的心态好好享受这次旅行,当然确实也是这么做的,不过这次旅行其实是为罗西准备的。她想去看看中国大陆的亲戚,顺便与小时候和大学的老同学一起聚聚。由于这些人分散在中国各地,所以我们这次旅行其实是兜了一大圈:北(北京、四平)、东(苏州、杭州、绍兴)、西(重庆)、南(珠海)。】

Monday, September 9th: Leaving New York.

9月9日,周一:离开纽约。
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Rating Air China

评价一下国航
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We fly Air China from New York to Peking, a single 13½-hour flight.

我们乘坐国航航班从纽约飞到北京,单程13.5小时。
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There is no way an economy-class flight that long can be enjoyable, but Air China don’t do anything to make it worse. The food is average airline food. The cabin staff are friendly and efficient. Also young and skinny; and in the case of the males, noticably tall—in the top decile for Chinese men, I think.

坐这么长时间的经济舱,感受肯定不会很美妙,还好中国国际航空公司没有做什么雪上加霜的事。食物在飞机餐里面也算是一般的。机组工作人员友好,工作效率高。而且既年轻又苗条;男性机组人员呢,个子相当高,我认为位于中国男性身高前十分之一的位置。

I brought a nice fat book to read: Robert Merry’s account of the Polk presidency. Got sixty pages in but dozed off.

为了打发时间,我带了本很厚的书:罗伯特·梅里对波尔克总统任期的描述。看了60页,我开始打瞌睡。
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Tuesday, September 10th: Arrive in Peking.

9月10日,周二:抵达北京。

One less minor travel chore

旅行中一件微不足道的小事

At half past six in the Peking evening, actually. On Eastern Daylight Time, New York is twelve hours behind Peking, so no need to adjust watch. Cool … except that we are looking at maximum jet lag.

实际上是北京时间晚上6点半。东部夏令时,纽约比北京晚12个小时,所以不需要调整手表。好酷呀,不过要考虑最大时差。

Laoyi and Yifu

老姨和姨夫

Rosie’s aunt and uncle are our hosts in Peking, as in 2001. Uncle has checked us into a good upmarket hotel less than two miles south of Tiananmen Square. He and aunt live in a small apartment a few blocks away.

和2001年一样,北京接待我们的主人是罗西的姨妈和姨夫。姨夫把我们安顿在天安门广场以南不到两英里的一家高档旅馆里。他和姨妈住在几个街区外的一间小公寓里。
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Neither of them speaks any English, so my Chinese is going to get a stress test. The first thing is forms of address, which I’d forgotten and had to be reminded about.

两人都不会说英语,这对我的中文来说是个不小的考验。第一件事就是如何称呼,我早就忘光了,他们得提醒我。

Eskimos have twenty words for snow; the Chinese have eight each for “uncle” (father’s older brother, father’s younger brother, father’s older sister’s husband, father’s younger sister’s husband, mother’s older brother, mother’s younger brother, mother’s older sister’s husband, mother’s younger sister’s husband) and “aunt” (you get the idea). That’s just the formal nouns; there are some colloquial variants you have to be told.

爱斯基摩人形容雪的单词多达二十个;英语里面的“uncle”中国有八种叫法:父亲的哥哥、父亲的弟弟、父亲的姐姐的丈夫、父亲的妹妹的丈夫、母亲的哥哥、母亲的弟弟、母亲的姐姐的丈夫、母亲的妹妹的丈夫,同样的还有“aunt”的称呼,你懂的!这只是正式的称呼;当然还有一些口语化的称呼。

We settle on me addressing this aunt as laoyi and uncle as yifu.

最后大家决定让我称呼aunt“老姨”,称呼uncle“姨夫”。

Wednesday, September 11th: Peking, then Peking to Siping.

9月11日,星期三:北京,从北京到四平。

Impressions of Peking

北京印象

Peking’s a big modern city, spacious and clean. I’ve read all the scare stories about air pollution, but there’s nothing I can notice and the sky is clear blue.

北京是现代化的大都市,宽敞而干净。我读过所有有关北京空气污染有多吓人的故事,但是我一点儿也没感受到,北京的天空蔚蓝蔚蓝的。

If you walk north half an hour from our hotel you hit Chang-an Avenue, the main east-west drag through central Peking. If you then hang a right and walk east a few hundred yards you’re opposite the entrance to Zhongnanhai, the big park-compound where China’s senior leaders live. Keep walking east and the avenue goes right across the front of Tiananmen, the “Gate of Heavenly Peace,” with Tiananmen Square at your right.

从我们住的酒店往北走半小时,就到长安街了,这条东西走向的主干道贯穿北京市中心。右转,再向东走几百码,就到了中南海大门的对面。中南海是大型园区。沿着长安街再往东走,经过天安门,天安门广场就在你的右手边。
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We decide to take this walk. When we get to Chang-an and hang the right onto the avenue, however, we come to a security checkpoint. October 1st is National Day, and it’s a big one this year: the 70th anniversary of the People’s Republic. There are to be huge parades and displays, and this whole central area is being secured in preparation.

我们决定就这么走。当我们到了长安街,右转后一直往前走,不一会就碰到了一个安全检查站。10月1日是中国国庆节,今年的国庆节很重要:庆祝中华人民共和国成立70周年。这里将举行盛大的游行和展示,整个中心区域都被保护起来,紧张地筹备。

The checkpoint guard wants to see our passports. We didn’t bring them; but Rosie turns on the charm and he lets us through. We walk east along Chang-an and take pictures outside the Zhongnanhai entrance gate. At this point we decide we’re tired of walking. We have to catch a train mid-afternoon, too. So we pass on Tiananmen and head back to the hotel.

检查站的警卫要看我们的护照。我们没带在身上;但是罗西施展了魔法,他就让我们通过了。我们沿着长安街往东走,在中南海大门外拍了照片。这个时候,我们决定不再往下走了。我们还得赶今天下午三点左右的火车。于是我们穿过天安门,回到了酒店。


On this outing I’m pleased to see that a lot of the old hutongs—narrow alleys characteristic of the old city—have been landmarked and preserved.

在这次远足中,我很高兴地看到许多老 胡同——具有旧城特色的狭窄小巷——都被标记并保存了下来。

The Installed Base problem

用户群问题


Mid-afternoon we go to the railroad station for a six-hour ride up to Siping in northeast China. It’s 470 miles as the crow flies, so six hours is not bad. This is in fact a gaotie, a high-speed train, that can reach, depending on the line, over 200 mph … but there are a lot of stops.

下午,我们去火车站,要坐6个小时的车才能到东北的四平。北京到四平的直线距离是470英里,所以6个小时不算久。实际上我们坐的是高铁,高铁是高速列车,根据线路的不同,时速可以达到200英里每小时,不过中间要停很多站。

The gaotie is a nice ride. To get on it, though, you have to go through Transportation Security Theater, like at an American airport but less of a trial: you don’t have to take shoes or belt off and the security people, while brisk and unsmiling, at least don’t snarl or shout.

高铁是不错的交通工具。不过要想坐高铁,必须经过安全检查,就像在美国机场那样,不过比审讯差远了:你不必脱鞋或解下腰带,安检人员表情严肃、不苟言笑,不过至少不会咆哮或大喊。

The railroad station itself is agreeable, too—clean and efficient. Likewise the Peking subways, which put New York’s to shame. Why can’t America have stuff this nice?

火车站本身很舒适,既干净又高效。同样北京地铁也让纽约相形见绌。为什么美国就不能有这么好的东西?

Peking’s not having a big resentful and antisocial underclass helps a lot, of course. The fundamental problem, however, is the Installed Base. New York city’s subway system is 115 years old. It’s dirty, unreliable, and badly maintained, but everybody’s used to it. New Yorkers put up with it from habit.

当然,北京没有充满愤恨、反社会的下层阶级,这对北京有很大帮助。然而,根本的问题是用户群问题。纽约的地铁系统已经有115年历史了。脏乱、不可靠、维护差,不过所有人习以为常了。纽约人也习惯了。
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There’s a unxized workforce and an entrenched management/patronage bureaucracy—a lot of iron rice-bowls that can’t be broken. The Installed Base.........
For thin consolation, we can reflect that a hundred years from now all these spiffy gleaming Chinese transit systems will be Installed Base. They will be as crappy, ill-maintained, and ill-managed as today’s New York subway or La Guardia airport. Probably a lot worse, in fact, given what we know about Chinese quality control.

.........聊以自慰的是,我们可以想象100年后,中国这些光鲜亮丽的交通系统都会出现用户群问题。这些地铁会像今天的纽约地铁或拉瓜迪亚机场一样糟糕、维护不善、管理不善。事实上,考虑到我们对中国质量控制的了解,这里的情况可能更X。
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Everything looks great when it’s new, duh.

咄,什么东西都是新的看着好。