In Fast-Changing Beijing, Nostalgia For This Morning's Landmarks

巨变北京速成怀旧情思

在这里，变化象滚雪球一样，不断积聚。
The more things change around here, the more they change.

北京正以惊人的速度发展着。这个不断向外扩张的城市常常让人感觉像是一个巨大的建筑工地。很多建设项目与明年的北京奥运会有关，但奥运会并非唯一主题。全国各地都在大兴土木。
Beijing is developing at a breathtaking pace. This whole sprawling metro area often feels like one giant construction site. Much of this activity is due to a rush to prepare for the Olympics, but it's bigger than that. There is similarly frenzied activity all across the country.

我们在亲眼目睹这个国家的演变，它的发展速度是我从未见过的。我和妻子来自美国宾夕法尼亚州和密歇根州的“锈带”(rust belt)。与这里相比，我们故乡小镇上的生活节奏绝对算得上缓慢悠闲。
The whole place is evolving right in front of our eyes, at a pace I can't compare to anything I have ever seen. It makes life in the rust belt towns in Pennsylvania and Michigan from which my wife and I hail seem positively glacial.

地图和旅行指南刚一印出来就已经过时了；从前的餐馆和地标性建筑踪影无处可寻；郊区玉米地里高速公路纵横交错。当然，不只我一个人注意到了这种巨变。实际上，每个在中国生活或匆匆路过的人都会惊叹于它奔腾的心跳。而一组经济学家也已开始着手量度中国的发展速度。
Maps and guidebooks become obsolete as soon as they are printed, restaurants and landmarks vanish on repeat visits, and highways spring up in cornfields on the fringes of town. I am, of course, not the only one to notice this. Virtually everyone living or passing through China is wowed by the country's racing heartbeat, and one team of economists has set out to quantify the evolution.

王志浩(Stephen Green)是渣打银行(Standard Chartered Bank)驻上海的高级经济学家。他经常和来访的朋友一道惊异于上海的发展速度，难以用语言形容这种变化。他说，自己无法比较伦敦和上海的生活，于是他开始着手设计一种方法对各地的发展速度进行比较。
Stephen Green, a senior economist at Standard Chartered Bank in Shanghai, continually found himself marveling with visiting friends at the pace of change and struggling to describe what he saw. 'I didn't have any way to compare my life in London with my life in Shanghai,' says Mr. Green, who set out to devise a formula to do so.

王志浩用国内生产总值(GDP)来衡量变化大小，并设计出“中国年”表。根据他的“中国年”表计算，美国一年的发展大约相当于中国三个月的发展。但王志浩也很快指出GDP并不能解释一切问题，而自己只是想找点乐子。即便如此，虽然你可以在计算方法上挑毛病，但结果却不容置疑。“中国年”表的结果完美地反映了我本人的经验，也就是说我在这里的两年半时间大约相当于在美国的十年。你该问问来自非洲国家马拉维的人，他们那里一年发生的变化是否真的相当于中国七小时的变化。在格林的“中国年”表上，马拉维排在最后。
By using gross domestic product as a measure of change, he devised a 'China years' table. According to this, one year in America is the equivalent of about three months in China. Mr. Green is quick to note that 'GDP can't explain everything,' adding that he was just trying to have some fun. Still, while you can quibble with the formula, it's hard to argue with the results. They perfectly mirror my own experience, indicating that my two and half years here equal about a decade in the U.S. You'd have to ask someone from Malawi, the African nation at the bottom of Mr. Green's chart, if a year's progress there could really be witnessed in seven Chinese hours.

广告2005年8月我们来到北京时，居住的小区似乎是在城市外扩的边缘上，距离郊区咫尺之远。这个地区位于北京东北部，附近有两三个小区，北边几英里的地方还有几个外国人居住区。这里住着外国人和富有的中国人。小区外，有屈指可数的几家餐馆和小店，周围是农田、小村庄、廉价市场和轻工业作坊。京顺路是这里的交通干线，交通异常繁忙。人们可以看到羊群在京顺路旁悠闲漫步。
When we arrived in Beijing in August 2005, our housing compound seemed to sit on the edge of urban sprawl, with the boonies lapping up against us. The area, on Beijing's northeast side, contained two or three nearby compounds, and several other expat housing clusters a few miles north. In between, a handful of restaurants and businesses catered to expats and wealthy Chinese amid farm fields, small villages, cheap markets and light industry. Flocks of sheep could be seen wandering down the side of the area's road artery, the very busy Jing Shun Lu.

如今，很多小店被高档设施所取代；农田变成了商店、居住小区和高速公路；这条从前尘土飞扬、肮脏不堪的京顺路也已是绿树成荫、花团锦簇。一面装饰墙掩盖了部分未拆除的小店铺，其他的已经变成废墟。变化如此之快，可谓一夜之间旧貌换新颜。
Now, many local businesses have been replaced by higher-end establishments; fields are becoming shops, compounds and highways; and the formerly dusty, dingy road is being lined with trees, bushes and flowers. An ornamental wall obscures some of the remaining small shops, while others are now rubble. The change is so rapid that a section can be transformed from morning to evening.

一天，我和保姆丁阿姨驱车行使在京顺路上，我用中文问她，她觉得为什么会发生这样的变化。她用中式英语回答说，因为明年北京要开奥运会了。
I drove up the road with our ayi (nannie) Ding the other day and asked her in Chinese why she thought this was all happening. 'Yinwei (because) next year Olympics come,' she said in our usual Chinglish style.

我打电话给地方政府部门了解情况，发现丁阿姨基本上一语中的。因为京顺路是一条连接机场和奥运场馆的重要道路，所以政府投资人民币2.2亿元（合2,940万美元）用于美化环境。
I called the regional development office and learned Ding was basically right; because the thoroughfare is deemed 'an important road between the airport and Olympic functional area,' it received 220 million Chinese yuan (about $29.4 million) for its aesthetic improvement.

一个月前，有人告诉我，我经常穿越的一条土路上正在大兴土木。我骑车过去，看到从前的农田里满是重型推土机、起重机、巨大的钻孔设备，还有几十个人。这是正在修建中的机场南线高速路，它连接两条现有高速公路，长18英里。
A month ago someone told me about a major construction project on a back road I regularly traverse. I biked over and saw the old agricultural field filled with earthmovers, cranes, huge drilling apparatus and dozens of men. Pylons were rising up, ready to carry traffic between two busy highways on what will be the 18-km Airport South Expressway.

这将彻底改变这个地区的面貌，一个巨大的混凝土结构将从该地区中心穿过，而从前这里是鸟类飞行的路线。现在却已是尘土满天。过去每年秋天农民们会占用一半的道路晾晒玉米饲料，而如今已踪影全无；附近的小店、房屋和工厂也已变成一片瓦砾。有时这些砖石瓦砾会被骡车运走，突兀地显出中国在大步奔向未来的时候，一些农村旧习仍难消除。
The project will transform the area, with flyways and a massive concrete structure cutting through the heart of our neighborhood. Already, dust covers everything. The farmers who filled half of the road with feed corn laid out to dry every fall are absent and blocks of nearby small businesses, homes and factories have been reduced to piles of bricks. These are sometimes carted away by mule-drawn carriages, a jarring metaphor for the way in which China holds onto an agrarian past even as it speeds into the future.

所有这一切让我感到有些悲伤，因为我喜欢住在城市边缘的那种感觉。但我不会喋喋不休地谈论过去如何如何，况且我在此居住的时间也并不长。每个人对“正常”的理解都是在初来乍到那一刻就形成了。唯一不变的是“不停的变化”，以及了解当地居民对变化的感受之难。
All of this leaves me a little sad because I liked the feeling of living on the frontier. But I'm not going to fall into the trap of talking about how things used to be, especially after living here such a short time. Everyone's view of 'normal' starts the moment they arrive. The one thing that won't change is the continual change -- or the difficulty in gauging just how local residents feel about it.

最近，我花了一天的时间开车逛了一下这条新建高速公路直接影响到的地区，通过翻译询问人们有何感想。一个常见的回答是，“这对我没有影响”。他们会说新建高速公路离他们的住处比较远，然后用手指向最多四分之一英里远的地方。我顺着与这条高速公路并行的另一条土路开过去，看到一台推土机正在敲倒一幢房子。道路两边的建筑物都已被推倒了。两周前，这里还是一条僻静的乡间小路。我问一个骑车而过的人对此有何感想。他回答说，“那些人得到了很多搬迁费。我希望我也是搬迁户。可是我的房子在那边，不需要搬。”
I recently spent a day driving around areas directly affected by the new highway, asking people what they thought, with the aid of a translator. A common refrain was, 'It doesn't affect me.' The person was likely to say they don't live close to the new highway, before pointing to an area at most a quarter mile away. I drove down another back road which will run next to the expressway and saw a frontloader knocking down a house. Buildings on either side were already demolished. Two weeks ago, this was a quiet country lane. I asked a man biking by how he felt about this. 'Those guys got a lot of money for their house,' he said. 'I wish it was mine. Mine is over there and they don't want it.'

在孙河市场周边地区，虽然这条高速公路离一些商贩非常近，路的影子都会罩过来，但很多商贩说公路不会影响到他们；也有人说这里车流量会增加，会有更多的顾客。我感觉到其中掺杂着宿命情绪和乐观情绪，但与我的想法背道而驰。
Inside the neighboring Sunhe Market, many vendors said the highway wouldn't affect them -- though it will run close enough to cast a shadow -- while others said it would bring more cars and therefore more customers. I sensed an odd mix of fatalism and optimism, which both run counter to my own views.

只有一个商贩毫不隐瞒自己的疑虑。他指着店铺前两三码以外一个只剩空壳的房子说，“他们让我从那幢房子里搬出来，因为离路太近了。”他6月份才搬到这里，之前他在市区以北12英里远的地方开店，但是店铺的房子被已经被推倒了。“我不想再搬来搬去了，这太痛苦了。”
Only one vendor was openly skeptical. 'They moved me out of that building because it will be too close to the highway,' he said, pointing to an empty shell just two or three yards from his current front door. He relocated to the market in June because the building housing his previous store some 12 miles north of town had been torn down. 'I don't want to move again, because it's a pain.'

他不该指望能在这里呆上很久。在路边一片空地上，正在建设新的中国国际展览中心。它占地660,000平方米，会使这个地区仅存的一点乡村气息荡然无存。一个大酒店已在公路对面拔地而起，一个大型购物中心Europlaza也即将开业。
He shouldn't get too settled in his new digs. A new China International Exhibition Center is rising out of a formerly empty lot up the road -- a 660,000 square meter facility that will permanently quash whatever rural feeling this area retains. A giant hotel has already risen across the street and a large mall, the 'Europlaza,' is ready to open soon.

有传言说Europlaza里面会有麦当劳、Megaplex电影院等等设施。有些人热切盼望着它的开业，而有些人对此有保留意见，我就是其中之一。与这个新建的庞然大物相比，附近的日祥广场(Pinnacle Plaza)相形见绌。日祥广场是外国人的天堂，里面有玩具店、小餐馆、达美乐披萨店(Domino's)、星巴克咖啡店(Starbucks)和巴斯金•罗宾斯冰淇淋店(Baskin-Robbins)。在我们大部分人来到这里之前，日祥广场就已经矗立在那了，所以它已与周围环境融为一体，而不是外来闯入者。它确实也是个“古老”的建筑──已经有七年之久了。
The rumor mill is churning, with talk of a McDonald's, megaplex movie theater and more. Some people look forward to its opening, but I am not alone in cringing. The new construction is dwarfing the nearby Pinnacle Plaza, something of an expat oasis, featuring a toy store, a diner, Domino's, Starbucks and Baskin-Robbins. Because it was there when most of us arrived, Pinnacle Plaza seems like a natural part of the landscape rather than an alien invader. It really is an ancient edifice, too -- it's been here for seven years.

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Alan Paul：

这是我写的第50篇《老外在中国》专栏文章。虽然我知道除我之外，这对其他人来说没有什么意义，但我还是希望借此机会感谢读者提供的宝贵反馈。请继续提出意见和建议。我也会继续努力。我还要感谢《华尔街日报》北京分社的研究人员和新闻助理们，他们为好几个专栏都提供了极大帮助。
This is my 50th Expat Life column. Though I realize that this milestone surely means little to anyone other than me, I wanted to take the opportunity to thank readers for all of their great feedback. Please keep it coming. I will try to do the same. Thanks also to the researchers and news assistants at the WSJ Beijing bureau, who have provided immeasurable assistance for several columns.