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【中文标题】一枚老硬币的价值
【原文标题】The Value of an Old Coin
【登载媒体】纽约时报
【原文作者】VERNA YU
【原文链接】http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/14/opinion/global/Nostalgic-for-Freedom-in-Hong-Kong.html?ref=china&_r=1&
有一天，我走近一家面馆吃饭。付款时，我拿出一枚殖民地时代、印有英国女王头像的一元硬币。我立即感到后悔。
我解释到：“抱歉，我能换回来吗？女王头像的硬币我想自己留下。”说着，我拿出一枚紫金花硬币。店主皱起眉头，摆出一副奇怪的表情。
我对自己的行为也有些疑惑不解。我并不喜欢生活在殖民地政府的统治下，我还清楚地记得我们曾经遭受的屈辱。作为70年代的人，我记得附近英国学校中的小孩喜欢在公交线上跳来跳去。直到1997年，白人同事那些毫不掩饰的种族意识依然让我震惊：有个人竟然对我说“回家啃鸡爪子去吧”，当我面露怒色时他居然还在笑。
于是，尽管已经在英国居住多年，我还是非常盼望香港的主权在1997年转交给中国。我在7月份的交接仪式前几个月回到香港，很多英国朋友都不能理解我为什么与那些试图逃离香港的人背道而驰。从80年代开始，很多香港人由于害怕共产党的统治而移民。但是我对我的英国朋友说，我终于可以骄傲地说自己是中国人了。
那么15年之后，我手里怎么还会有女王头像的硬币呢？
或许仅仅是为了怀旧吧，但我更可能是在试图保留一些能让我联想到主权转交之前的生活方式。在“一国两制”的主导下，他们告诉我们在转交之后可以保留50年的自由度，但是很多当地人现在就感到一种威胁，因为中国大陆在香港事务上开始扮演越来越积极的角色。
今年，当地方政府——当然是在北京的指使下——试图在学校教材中引进爱国主义内容时，民众的情绪爆发了，数万人走上街头抗议。
一个限制言论和出版自由的反颠覆法草案，像达摩克利斯之剑悬在我们头上。草案出现在2003年，在50万人的抗议之后被搁置，但是大陆官员不断提醒我们，香港在宪法上有责任制定这样一条法律。
我们的新闻自由也受到了限制，香港在记者无国界组织中新闻自由的排名，从2002年的18位下滑到2011－2012年的54位。记者长期以来在抱怨“看不见的手”让地方媒体做自我监察。据报道，今年中国驻香港代表处直接约淡一家报社的高管，对其报道范围表示不满。
人民代表大会政治局常委在2004年承诺，到2012年要实现全民选举的目标，这让香港在殖民统治结束前就已经走上正轨的民主制度彻底转身。尽管后来又说香港的政治领导人、立法委和议会“或许”在2017年会做全民选举，但是很多人担心北京不会兑现承诺，因为整个政治制度就是建立在亲北京基础上的。
我们的政治领导人梁振英，由大部分是亲北京的1132名议员投票选出，他被视为北京的手下，大部分香港人都不相信他。他拒绝承认地下共产党员的身份，但很多人持怀疑态度。
在这些挫折的基础上，又加上大陆人疯狂涌入香港，已经改变了当地人原来的生活方式。数万大陆怀孕妇女到香港医院产子，每年有2800万大陆游客进入小小的香港，很多香港人已经感觉无法忍受了。
在今年的反政府游行中，数十名抗议者挥舞带有米字图案的殖民地旗帜警告北京。一位中国官员说：“独立情绪像病毒一样扩散。”
但是北京并不需要担心，几乎没有香港人真的以为独立是一个现实的选择。对殖民地时代的向往并不代表我们期望英国的统治，而是一种对我们曾经享有的自由、一个能让我们延续自己生活方式的政府的怀念，而不是试图让媒体噤声，让孩子被灌输爱国主义教育。
这还是一种无助的表示，我们的领导人被北京指定，不被我们认可，他对于如何管理我们的领地没有发言权。
解决方法很简单：坚持已故的邓小平的“一国两制”方针，允许我们享受自由和原来的生活方式。这样，人们就不会挥舞殖民地旗帜，我也不用纠结为什么要保留女王头像的硬币了。
原文：
THE other day I went into a family-run noodle shop and when I paid, I handed over a colonial-era one-dollar coin with the British queen’s head. I instantly felt a pang of regret.
“Sorry, could I swap it? I want to save the one with the queen’s head,” I explained, popping another dollar coin with a Bauhinia flower into the money pot and retrieving my old coin. The owner frowned and gave me a funny look.
I was puzzled by my own action. It’s not like I loved living under the colonial government. I vividly remember the sense of humiliation we endured: as a child in the 1970s, I remember kids from the nearby British school habitually jumping the public bus line. As late as 1997, I was shocked at the blatantly racist attitude of white colleagues: one even told me to “go home and eat chicken feet” and laughed when I looked offended.
So despite the fact that I spent my formative years in Britain, I was looking forward to the handover of sovereignty to China in 1997. I returned to Hong Kong only months before the event that July, worrying my friends in England who couldn’t understand why I was going “the opposite way” from those who tried to get out. Since the 1980s, many Hong Kong people who feared Communist rule had emigrated. But I told my British friends: it was time we proudly called ourselves Chinese.
So 15 years later, why was I hanging on to a coin with the queen’s head?
Perhaps, it was just nostalgia. But more likely I was trying to hold on to something that linked me to the pre-handover way of life. Under the “one country, two systems” arrangement, we were told our freedoms would be preserved for 50 years after the handover, but many locals now feel under threat as mainland China takes an increasingly active role in Hong Kong affairs.
This year, emotions boiled over when the local government — likely prompted by Beijing — tried to introduce patriotic education classes in the school curriculum, prompting tens of thousands to take to the streets in protest.
A proposed anti-subversion law, which would put limits on speech and publication freedoms, is hanging over our heads like the sword of Damocles. The draft law, introduced in 2003, was stalled after a protest of 500,000 people, but mainland officials remind us repeatedly that Hong Kong has a constitutional obligation to enact such a law.
Our press freedom has suffered — Hong Kong’s ranking on the Reporters Without Borders worldwide press freedom index slid from 18th in 2002 to 54th in 2011-2012. Journalists have long complained of an “invisible hand” prompting the local media to self-censor, but this year it was reported that China’s representative office here had directly contacted a newspaper’s top management to complain about its coverage.
And Hong Kong’s democratic development, started before the end of colonial rule, suffered a U-turn after the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress in 2004 ruled out a goal of achieving universal suffrage by 2012. Even though it later ruled that the election of Hong Kong’s political leader and the legislative council, or parliament, “may be” elected by universal suffrage in 2017, many fear that Beijing will not honor its commitment, given a political system that is designed to favor pro-Beijing policies.
Our new political leader, Leung Chun-ying, chosen by a largely pro-Beijing group of 1,132 people, is seen as Beijing’s man and is widely distrusted by Hong Kong people. He has denied allegations that he was an underground Communist Party member but many people continue to view him with suspicion.
Of course, these frustrations add to the complaints that an influx of mainlanders is altering Hong Kong’s original way of life. From tens of thousands of mainland mothers flooding Hong Kong hospitals to give birth, to the 28 million mainland visitors crossing the border into the crowded territory every year, many Hong Kong people are feeling overrun.
Dozens of protesters waved colonial-era flags emblazoned with the Union Jack at antigovernment demonstrations this year, alarming Beijing. A Chinese official warned “pro-independence” was “spreading like a virus.”
But Beijing needn’t worry. Few Hong Kong people actually believe independence is a viable option. The apparent display of longing for the colonial past shows not so much our feelings toward British rule but nostalgia for the freedoms we once enjoyed and for a government which left us to get on with our lives — without trying to muffle the press and indoctrinate the young.
It is also a manifestation of the sense of helplessness over having a leader not endorsed by us, but by Beijing, and having little say in how our territory is run.
The solution is simple: adhere to the “one country, two systems” formula of the late Deng Xiaoping and allow us to continue enjoying our freedom and our original way of life. Then people will cease waving the colonial flag and I won’t need to think about keeping the coin with the queen’s head.
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狗仔卡
发表于 2012-12-25 11:13
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发表于 2012-12-25 11:59
