在彩云之南，追求爱和真理

文/ David C.Lewis

中文里有个词非常有用，叫作“不好意思”，其含义就是“尴尬的”。我经常能听到这个词或许是因为我是个外国人，更有可能对我周围的人做一些蠢事，或者做一些令人尴尬的事情。在我众多“不好意思”的时刻里，有一次是我第一次去上课，当面对一帮新学生时，我一开口讲话，就开始流鼻血。这帮学生对他们新外教的第一印象就是：一个高高的外国人躺在地上，被很多学生围着一边递纸巾一边讨论该怎么办。

A Chinese phrase which is very useful to know is “不好意思” (bu hao yisi), which means ‘embarrassing’! Perhaps I hear the phrase quite often because as a foreigner I am more likely to make ‘gaffs’ or do things which are embarrassing to those around me! One of my more “不好意思” moments was when I arrived for the very fi rst class of a course with a new group of students: as soon as I began to speak, my nose started to bleed!This group’s fi rst experience of their new teacher was of a tall“外国人” (waiguoren – foreigner) lying on the fl oor surrounded by several students offering me not only tissues but also at least half a dozen suggestions about what to do!

之后，我意识到流鼻血可能是抗疟药物的一个副作用。我的大女儿在巴布亚新几内亚的一个偏远丛林医院里当医生，那个夏天我们去那里看望她的时候吃了这种药。我的家人都分散在世界各地：大儿子和他的妻子、两个女儿生活在中国北部；二儿子和他的妻子、女儿生活在英国；我们的另外两个小女儿和我与妻子住在中国。

Later on, I learned that nosebleeds were a possible side-effect of the anti-malarial tablets that I had been taking that summer in Papua New Guinea when we were visiting our eldest daughter,who is a doctor at a remote jungle hospital. Our family is scattered in different parts of the world: our eldest son, with his wife and two daughters, are in the north of China and our second son, with his wife and daughter, live in England. Our two younger daughters live in China with my wife and myself.

To a large extent our decision to move to China arose out of a desire for our two youngest daughters to learn Chinese and to experience life in China. It was almost twenty years ago that Ruth,my wife, watched a television documentary about abandoned babies in China. Ruth felt that even though we already had three birth children we could also adopt such a Chinese child. We discussed it with our own three children, and in the end started on a long process of bureaucracy which led to our first visit to China in January 1998 to adopt Esther Xiufen, who was then nine months old. Two years later we repeated the process when we adopted Joanna Xiaoying, who was then eleven months old. At that time we were living in England, so the girls grew up speaking English as their mother tongue. However, we also wanted them to be able to appreciate their Chinese heritage.

很大程度上，我们搬到中国是因为我们想让两个小女儿学中文，让她们有一段在中国的生活经历。20年前，我的妻子露丝看了一个关于中国弃婴的电视纪录片。露丝觉得虽然我们已经有三个自己的孩子了，但我们可以收养一个中国孩子。我和我们的三个孩子经过讨论后开始了漫长的收养过程。我们于1998年1月第一次到中国，收养了当时只有9个月大的Esther Xiufen（路秀芬）。两年以后，我们又收养了11个月大的Joanna Xiaoying（路晓英）。那个时候我们住在英国，所以英语成为两个小女儿的母语。然而，我们希望她们也能懂得欣赏她们的中国“遗产”。

Some years later I had a dream. In the dream it was as if I were standing on a mountain looking down at a new development on the outskirts of a city. I could see a new house, around which other houses and roads were being built. After waking up I did not think about the dream and would probably have forgotten it except for what happened two days later, when we took the girls to a beach. As they were playing in the sand, Ruth told me about a dream of hers the previous night in which she had seen a new house on the edge of a city with other houses and roads being built around it!

几年后我做了个梦，梦里我站在山上往下看，看到了一个城市郊区的新发展。我看到了一栋新房子，房子周围正在建造房屋和公路。我醒来之后并没有去想这个梦，要是两天后我没带我的小女儿们去沙滩边的话我大概早就忘掉这个梦了。当孩子们在玩沙子时，露丝告诉了我前一晚她做的一个梦，梦里她在一个城市的郊区看到了一栋新房子，而房子周围也在建造新的房屋和道路。

I was amazed and told Ruth that two nights previously I had dreamed the same dream. Did it literally mean that we should move to a new home somewhere in a new development on the edge of a city? Or was it more symbolic, meaning something like ‘a new start’? I think in the end it actually meant both of these. Ruth remembered a detail in her dream about red coloured earth. Now that we live in Chenggong, not far from the new Yunda campus, we are sometimes reminded of that dream when we look out over the surrounding area and see new buildings being constructed around us.

我震惊了！我告诉露丝两天前我也做了同样的梦。我在想，这是不是就意味着我们应该搬到一个城市新发展起来的区域？抑或是象征着一个“新的开始”？我想其实应该包含这两方面的含义。露丝还记得她梦里的细节，那儿有红土地。现在我们住在呈贡，离云南大学新校区不是很远，有时候我们看看周围那些正在新建的建筑物就会想起这个梦。

在露丝的心里，她觉得这一定和中国有关。这也与我们想让秀芬和晓英学习中文、体验中国生活的想法相关联。

At the time, Ruth felt that it had something to do with China. It linked in with our desire for Esther and Joanna to learn Chinese and to experience life in China.

如果我们本就该去中国的话，该去中国的哪里呢？我们在思考这个问题的时候，昆明总是能吸引我们的注意力。我们的一个朋友寄了一封信来邀请我们去昆明；之后我去参加剑桥大学的研讨会，来自云南大学的教授讲述了她在云南的研究。我在想这或许也是有意义的。研讨会结束后，按惯例都会去附近的酒吧喝上一杯，当时我告诉她我们在考虑移居到中国，但是还不确定什么时候去，具体去哪个地方。尽管她给了我联系方式，但是直到我移居中国后才联系她，也正是她帮我在云南大学找到了教社会人类学的工作。

If we were supposed to go to China, which part of the country should we go to? While we were thinking about this, Kunming started to come to our attention in a number of ways. A friend of ours sent us a letter describing a visit to Kunming. Then I attended a seminar at Cambridge University at which a professor from Yunnan University was talking about her research in Yunnan. I wondered if this might be signif i cant. After the seminar it was the custom to go for a drink at a nearby pub, so there I mentioned to her that we were considering moving to China but were not sure when or to which part. Although she gave me her contact details, I did not make contact with her again until after we had actually moved to China. It was she who later helped me to get a job teaching Social Anthropology at Yunnan University.

就这样我们来到昆明。一开始，我希望在昆明住一两年，后来延长到了4个学年（2006年—2010年）。之后我们回到了英国，露丝可以陪陪她的老母亲，她的母亲于2011年去世了。这样一来，小女儿们可以受到英国的初中教育。

In such ways we came to Kunming.Initially we had expected to live here just for a year or two but in the end it got extended to four academic years (2006 – 2010). We then moved back to the UK so that Ruth could spend signif i cant time with her elderly mother, who passed away in 2011, and so that the girls could experience a British secondary school education.

我们曾想过会回到英国住几年，至少住到小女儿们完成她们的中等教育。然而，因为晓英想将来申请在大学读医科专业，那么在此之前让她在英国接受完该阶段的教育对她来说很重要。

We had thought we would be settled back in Britain for some years, at least until the girls had fi nished their secondary education.However, it would be important for Joanna to complete her schooling in Britain before she applies to do medicine at university.

2013年，我回到云南继续任教两年。住在呈贡，我们感觉就像回到家一样。秀芬通过在当地的师范大学上课继续提高她的中文水平，而晓英一直在网上继续她的英国教育。

From 2013 to 2015 we returned to Yunnan for a further two years, living in Chenggong, where we feel very much at home.Esther has been continuing to improve her Chinese by studying courses at the local ‘Normal’ University (师范大学), while Joanna has been continuing her British education online.

我们所有人都在不同程度地学习中文，但我大部分时间都用来备课和教学，同时也编辑其他学者写的英文文章。我同样受邀到俄罗斯和其他地方上课，这些工作缩短了我学习中文的时间。露丝和小女儿们进步得都比我快好多。

All of us have been studying Chinese to some extent but a lot of my time has been taken up with preparing my lectures and teaching them, as well as editing various articles that other academics have written in English. I have also been invited to teach at times in Russia or other places, which has reduced my available time for studying the Chinese language. Ruth and the girls have made much faster progress than I have.

其他让我觉得进度很慢的还有慢跑！因为我的大部分工作是坐在桌子前，我尝试每周在附近慢跑几次。2007年，其他外国人一定见过我在慢跑，因为有一天露丝接到他们其中一个人打来的电话，询问我是否可以参加一个第二天和当地警察的跑步比赛。我对这个比赛完全不了解，只知道第二天我该坐警察局的车到昆明西边山上的一个地方去参加比赛。

Something else I thought I was slow at was jogging! Because most of my work is just sitting at a desk, I try to go for a jog a few times a week around the local area. In 2007 some of the other foreigners must have seen me doing this, as one day Ruth got a phone call from one of them asking if I could take part the next day in a race against the local police! I knew no other details except where I should go the next morning in order to be taken in a police vehicle to somewhere in the hills to the west of Kunming.

当我们到达那里，我发现这是在纪念一年前北京奥运会开幕。显然，警察局是被要求组织一个国际型跑步比赛，所以他们需要邀请外国人参与。当我看到其他外国人时，我松了一口气，因为他们看上去是一帮体格健美的巴西人，这似乎能让我们外国人阵营不至于丢脸。

When we got there, I discovered that it was an event marking the day exactly one year before the opening of the Beijing Olympics. Apparently the police had been asked to organise an international running race, so they needed to invite foreigners to take part. As I looked around at the other foreigners, I was relieved to see a group of athletic-looking Brazilians who might be able to prevent us foreigners from losing face!

大概有80到100人参加了这个比赛。这些巴西人和很多警察超越了我，我当时已经是50岁的“老爷爷”了，但我坚持跑到了山顶。我不知道究竟需要跑多远，但我坚持一直跑，并且超越一些警察，甚至超越了一些不适应高海拔的巴西年轻人。之后跑了两公里多，我到达了山顶，以为比赛就结束了。当我坐下来时，有人清楚地告诉我必须再跑回去。于是，我再次跑起来，超越了更多的警察。当我最终到达山底时，我不知道我该去哪里，但有人领我去一个桌前，我把在山顶领到的卡上交了。

Probably eighty to one hundred of us took part. The Brazilians and many of the police shot ahead of me – at that time a fi fty year old grandfather – as I kept on jogging up the hill. I had no idea how far we had to run but I just kept going and found that I was passing some of the police and even the young Brazilians who were not used to the altitude. After more than two kilometres I reached the top and thought that was the end of the race.When I sat down, someone there made it clear to me that I had to run back down again. As I did so, I passed more policemen.When I eventually reached the bottom, I had no idea where I had to go but I was directed to a desk where I had to hand in a card that I had been given at the top of the hill.

在桌边的一位女士用中文跟我说了一些话，但我没听懂，之后她就消失了。我猜她是想告诉我让我等着，她去找一个能说英语的人过来，之后那个女士再次找到我，把我带回到桌前，这样他们就可以记下我的名字。颁奖仪式上，最先是两名中国男子领取奖品——一个花瓶，却没有一个证书证明他们在这次跑步比赛中的名次。之后我就听到了我的名字，我走上前去，领取了我的奖品——花瓶，但我并不知道我到底是第一名还是第三名。直到现在我都没搞清楚我到底是第几名！

The woman at the desk said something to me in Chinese that I did not understand; then she disappeared. I guess she probably told me to wait until she found someone who could speak English but I was later found by that same lady, who brought me back to the desk so that they could make a note of my name.Later on, when there was a prize-giving ceremony, at fi rst two Chinese men were called forward to receive their prizes - a vase, without any certif i cate to show their position in the race.Then I heard my name being called. I went to the front to be given my vase, not sure whether I was in third place or first place. I never did fi nd out the answer to that one!

另一个难忘的事发生在2009年，当时将近有4000名人类学家来到昆明参加由云南大学举办的大型国际会议。在会议筹备期间，我除了准备其中一个展板，也帮忙做其他事务，如编辑会议手册的英文版本。我仅仅把这个工作看作是需要去完成的任务，并没有什么特别之处。所以，当我得知云南省政府颁发了一个奖牌以证明我对此事的贡献，我有些受宠若惊了。在颁奖典礼上，我获得了“彩云奖”，也叫作“友谊奖”。这些奖牌是由云南省副省长李江女士颁发的，云南省的其他一些主要官员也参加了颁奖典礼，我代表获奖的外国专家作了发言。然而我觉得应该借此机会谈谈更深层次的问题，所以我接下来是这样说的：

Another memorable event took place in 2009, when about 4,000 anthropologists descended on Kunming for a huge international congress held at Yunnan University. In preparing for that,besides organising one of the panels, I was sometimes called on to help with various arrangements and to edit the English version of the conference handbook. I just regarded this as something that needed to be done, not as anything special. So I was somewhat surprised when I was later told that I had been nominated to receive a medal from the Yunnan provincial government in recognition of my contributions.

At the award ceremony to receive this “彩云奖” (Cai Yun Jiang- Colourful Yunnan Prize), also referred to as a ‘Friendship Award’ (友谊奖, Youyi Jiang), the medals were presented by Her Excellency, Madam Lijiang, Vice Governor of Yunnan Province.Quite a few other leading officials of the province were also present. I was asked to give a speech on behalf of the foreigners who were receiving this award. Having been told that it was conventional to mention the progress that China has been making, I did what I was told in that regard. However, I also felt that I should address deeper issues, so I went on to say:

David在云南大学授课

“在云南大学，我欣赏许多学生对知识的渴望。然而，真正的知识远不止是了解事实。智慧不会从图书馆得到。若没有爱来平衡的话，对真理的追求可能让我们变得很冷酷无情，就像没有真相的爱让我们变得柔弱无比。二者的结合会让我们富有人性。

“At Yunnan University I admire the great desire for knowledge shown by many of the students. However, real knowledge is more than simply knowing facts. Wisdom cannot be borrowed from a library! A focus on Truth, if it is not balanced by Love,can make us become too hard, just as Love without Truth can make us too soft. The combination of both of these helps to make us human.”

“‘友谊奖’提醒我们，无论我们是来自中国还是其他地方，我们都是人类，都应该在爱和真理的基础上负责任地和别人沟通。这些是任何一个持续发展的社区的基石，无论是一个家庭、一个企业抑或是一个国家。不管是个人还是国家，我们都应该去找寻真理，也要追寻爱的力量，这对我们很重要。在马丁·路德·金博士的书《爱的力量》里，他提到我们需要的是‘坚韧的毅力和温柔的心’。这是我们所有人都能运用到自己生活中的原则。我们所有人都行走在生命的旅途中，都有义务去找到出路、找到真理、找到人生。”

“The Friendship Award is a reminder that, whether we are from China or elsewhere, we are all fellow human beings with a responsibility to relate to other people on the basis of both Truth and Love. These are the foundation stones for any lasting community - whether it is a family, a business or a nation. Not only as individuals but also as nations it is important for us to seek not only the source of truth but also the strength to love. In his book ‘Strength to Love’ Dr.Martin Luther King says that what we need is a ‘tough mind and a tender heart’. That is a principle which all of us can apply to our own lives. All of us are on the journey of life. On that journey, all of us have a responsibility to seek and to fi nd the way, the truth and the life.”

我还在这场旅行的路上，正如我们所有人一样，我不知道前方有什么在等着我。现在因为晓英的教育问题，我们准备回到英国，可能还是住在剑桥。即使我们将在英国生活，很多时候我的心依旧在中国。我已经爱上中国人民和他们的生活方式。中国有句古话叫作“身在曹营心在汉”。我想这句话很适合马上要回到英国的我。如果我可以根据我自己的情况稍微更改一下这句话的话，那就是“身在英国心在汉”。

I am still on that journey, as all of us are, and I do not know what lies ahead. Now we are returning to England for the sake of Joanna’s education and shall probably be living in Cambridge. Even though we shall be in England, in many ways my heart is still in China. I have come to love the Chinese people and their way of life. There is an old Chinese saying that, even if one’s body is elsewhere, one’s heart is still in the land of the Han: 身在曹营心在汉. I think this will be true for me too as I return to England.If I could paraphrase this for our own situation, it would be that my body will be in England but my heart in China: 身在英国心在汉.