The Manchurian Mandate_文学文化

    东北,曾经是新中国荣耀的象征;东北人,曾经是一个洋溢着自豪、激情的名字。而那一度是年轻人向往之地的东北工业基地,改革开放后却慢慢成了颓败萧条之地。带着对美好生活的渴望,力图改变自己命运的新东北人正在试图恢复自己昔日的荣耀和尊严。
    china is gearing up to turn its northeastern rust belt, once the centerpiece of chairman mao's planned economy, into the country's next engine of growth.
    东北曾经是毛泽东时期经济的龙头。而如今,中国正准备将这块“铁锈地带”转型成为下一个国家经济增长引擎。
    there is no turning back. that much, iron man knows.
    自己面前的是一条不归路。这点,铁人心里很清楚。
    the bus is starting to roll down the rutted dirt road in dongfa village, carrying the young worker and his wife away from this ghost town near the russian border. the couple squeeze into the backseat, she carrying a bright blue gym bag, he the dull burden of history. twenty-six years ago, his parents named him wang tieren, or iron man wang. it was a tribute to the communist icon whose selfless toil symbolized the industrial muscle of china's northeast, a region whose state-run factories and furnaces fueled the communist dreams of the people's republic. the new iron man on the bus—silent, gaunt, a look of worry wrinkling his freckled brow—embodies the same region but in a challenging new era: even as other parts of china flourish in the mad rush toward a market economy, once proud manchuria (as the area is known abroad) has fallen on hard times; it, like iron man wang himself, is desperately searching for salvation.
    中巴车开上东发村印满车辙的泥土路,载着这位年轻工人和他的太太离开这个靠近俄罗斯边界的穷乡僻壤。夫妻俩挤在后座,太太带着一个鲜蓝色的旅行袋,铁人则背着沉重的包袱。26年前,父母为他取名王铁人,向知名的共产党劳动楷模“铁人”王进喜致意;王进喜的无私苦干象征了中国东北的工业实力,东北地区的国有企业和熔炉,炼就了新中国的“社会主义梦想”。然而,巴士上的这位新铁人却沉默、憔悴,忧虑的神情让长满雀斑的额头起了皱纹。他依旧体现着东北的命运,但所处的却是个充满挑战的新时代:正当中国其它地方都在往市场经济发展的狂潮中欣欣向荣,一度叱咤风云的东北却陷入萧条。整个东北就像王铁人一样,正拼命寻找脱困之路。
    as the bus pulls away, wang stares ahead into the middle distance while his wife, sun jing, buries her head in her arms. neither dare glance out the rear window at what they are leaving behind: their two-year-old daughter, named siting, nestled in the arms of wang's father. it was barely a year ago, just ten days after sun had finished nursing, that they first left their daughter. when the couple returned home two weeks ago, they proudly unrolled a thick wad of cash—their annual savings of nearly $2,000. the money will feed their parents and daughter for another year, but siting didn't comprehend. recoiling from the two strangers standing in front of her, she scrambled over to her grandmother and peered out anxiously from between her legs. for two weeks, wang and sun have used hugs and sweet biscuits to win their daughter's trust. she has finally learned to call them "mama" and "baba," but when they boarded the bus to leave for another year, the girl showed no emotion. "it's hard to bear," says wang, laying a hand on his wife's arm as she wiped a tear off her cheek. "but there's no other way for us to give our daughter a future."
    巴士开出去时,铁人呆呆凝视前方,他的太太孙静两手抱着头,两人都没有勇气往后车窗外看。被他们抛在脑后的,是两岁的女儿思婷,抱在爷爷的手上。不到一年前,就在思婷断奶后十天,他们第一次离开女儿。两周前夫妻俩返回家乡,骄傲地解开一叠厚厚的钞票,那是他们过去一年来的积蓄,大约是人民币1万5000元,足够抚养双亲和女儿一年,但思婷并不懂这一切。看到面前的两个陌生人,她直往后缩,躲到奶奶身后从胯下向外窥看。待在家里的两个星期,铁人和孙静用拥抱和饼干来赢得女儿的信任,思婷终于学会了叫妈妈、爸爸。然而当他们登上巴士,准备再离家一年时,小女孩完全无动于衷。“真令人难受,”铁人说着,一边把手放在正在拭泪的太太的手臂上,“但为了女儿的将来,我们没别的办法。”
    pursuing a better future takes iron man and his wife through the three northeastern provinces—heilongjiang, jilin, and liaoning—that make up the region once revered as the "cradle of industrialization." their odyssey from the depressed northern reaches of manchuria to their final destination near the glittering port city of dalian in the region's more vibrant south mirrors, in many ways, the government's own ambitious plans for the northeastern rust belt. in 2003, shortly after coming to office, president hu jintao and premier wen jiabao unveiled a program to turn the northeast into china's next engine of development. in the hands of american marketing gurus, the campaign slogan, "revitalize the northeast," might well have been the "manchurian mandate." the road to salvation, for the region as well as for iron man's family, will demand sacrifices: a break with the past, a voyage into the unknown—and no guarantee of success. but the journeys, at least, have begun.
    为了追求更美好的未来,铁人和太太穿过曾被誉为“工业摇篮”的东北三省——黑龙江、吉林和辽宁,从萧条的东北最北端出发,目的地是较繁荣的南部,离光彩夺目的港口城市大连不远;这趟旅程在许多方面充分反映出中国政府为振兴东北“铁锈地带”而推出的宏图大计。今年,国家主席胡锦涛与总理温家宝上任不久,便提出一项,让东北成为带动中国下一波发展的火车头;用资本主义行销手法,提出了“振兴东北”这样的口号。对整个东北以及王铁人一家来说,要摆脱困境需要有所牺牲:撇开过去,航向未知──成不成功没有保证。无论如何,旅程至少已经启行。
    a touring group of retired government employees learns about the brash new sights of dalian, a city on the rise in china's northeast. the view from xinghai square takes in soaring apartment blocks and a museum castle, attractions built with investment money pouring into a region trying to shed its gritty industrial past. in 2003 china's leaders designated the northeast, or manchuria as the west commonly knows it, as a national priority for economic revitalization.
    一个退休干部旅行团正在听导游介绍中国东北窜升中的城市——大连急速发展的新市景。从星海广场望去,可见林立的公寓大楼和一个博物馆的城堡,各景点的兴建经费来自大量涌入东北的资金;东北正试图摆脱旧时生了锈的工业区形象。今年,中国领导人指定东北为全国经济振兴的优先地区。
    inside a shenyang factory that once churned out tractors, workers scale down, pouring molten iron into molds to make cast-iron fences and gates. like many of the region's outmoded state-run factories, the plant couldn't compete in china's new open-market economy. when it went bankrupt in 1998, a former employee bought space in the cavernous plant and converted it into a privately run foundry. the workers, however, won't be receiving housing and other steady benefits, like in the old socialist days. the iron rice bowl, as the government-sponsored benefits system was known, is disappearing, replaced, workers hope, by a menu of stock options.
    在沈阳一间过去生产牵引机的工厂内,工人把熔铁倒进模型,制作铸铁栏杆与大门。就像东北许多旧时的国有工厂,这家工厂也无法在中国新的开放市场经济中竞争。这家工厂在1998年破产后,一名从前的员工买下穴状工厂内的空间,将它改成私营铸造厂。不过,厂内工人不能享受昔日社会主义时期的住宅及其它稳定福利。少了政府补助的福利制度“铁饭碗”,工人希望能转而获得股权。
    a snow-streaked slag heap looms large in the lives of poor villagers in the xinjian coal miners' village. when winter temperatures fall to minus 20°f (minus 29°c), poor families regularly scale the steep and slippery 500-foot-high (150 meters) waste pile to scavenge for pieces of coal to heat their homes. with its large coal and iron reserves, dongbei (the chinese name for the northeast) became the nation's center for heavy industry in the 1950s. today, dongbei is a rust belt, its once muscular industries falling victim to poor state planning and inefficient operations.
    对新建矿工住宅区的贫困户来说,这个白雪蔼蔼的煤渣堆是不可或缺的。当冬天气温降到摄氏零下29度,贫困户常爬上峭而滑的150米高的煤渣堆,寻找未燃尽的煤块来为家中加热所用。东北因为蕴藏了大量的煤与铁,在1950年代成为中国的重工业中心。如今,东北则是“铁锈地带”,曾经强有力的国企都成了经济和低效运作的牺牲品。
    when nian shifu moved into a model workers' village in the tiexi industrial district of shenyang in 1956, he felt like a privileged patriot of the new china. hired to work at the state-owned shenyang pneumatic tool factory, nian, a veteran of the communist victory over the nationalists in 1949 and the korean war in the early 1950s, was given a government apartment in the city's most modern development. five decades later, nian, 76, is on the verge of homelessness. in keeping with china's free-market ideology, the government intends to demolish the workers' decaying village and replace it with an upscale housing development. but nian and some 400 other dwellers have refused to move, deeming the relocation payment inadequate. "we can't afford to buy a new house," nian said. "if i moved out, i'd end up on the street." the government reacted by cutting off water and electricity to the units. "they're forcing us out," he said.
    年世福在1956年搬进沈阳铁西工业区的工人新村时,觉得自己像是新中国的幸运爱国者。他是个退伍老兵,打过1949年的国共内战及1950年代初期的朝鲜战争,后来退伍安排到国营沈阳气压机厂工作,并在沈阳最现代化的住宅区分配到一间政府公寓。50年后,现年76岁的年世福却到了无家可归的地步。为了符合中国的自由市场意识型态,政府打算拆除破败的工人村,代之以高档的住宅社区。但年世福与其它约400名居民拒绝搬迁,他们认为搬迁赔偿不够。年世福说:“我们买不起新房子。如果我搬走,最后会流落街头。”政府的反应是对这些房子断水断电。“他们要逼我们走。”他说。
    hearts pumping faster than the oil rigs behind them, newlyweds ride in a garlanded car to a reception in daqing, capital of china's oil industry. meaning "big celebration" in chinese, daqing became a boomtown following the discovery of oil in 1959. with the local industry shrinking due to depleted oil deposits, the former security of refinery work is lost to most of the current generation, descendants of the model workers. if they're lucky, they'll find a future in the region's new boom fields of software, tourism, and telecommunications.
    这对新人的心跳恐怕比后方的油井跳得还快,他们正搭乘礼车到大庆举行仪式。大庆是中国的石油工业之都,在1959年发现石油之后崛起,成为新兴都市。随着石油藏量耗竭,当地的工业萎缩,炼油厂工作对当年劳模们的后代来说已没有保障。如果幸运的话,他们会在东北新兴的软件、观光与电信领域找到未来。