【大西洋月刊 20141126】在中国的肯德基餐厅过感恩节

满仓

【中文标题】在中国的肯德基餐厅过感恩节
【原文标题】My Thanksgiving at a KFC in China
【登载媒体】大西洋月刊
【原文作者】MATT SCHIAVENZA
【原文链接】http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/11/thanksgiving-at-a-kfc-in-china/383197/



这里并不是理想中的过感恩节的地方。

2004年夏天，在我前往中国连云港市做英语教师的前几天，我与一位在中国居住过几年的朋友谈话。他说：“节日比较难熬。圣诞节还好，感恩节不好过。”

当时，怎么过节这个问题不在我操心的范围内。我即将去一个语言不通、文化迥异、历史陌生的国家，从事一份我从来没有做过，也不知道该怎么做的工作。不仅如此，我的目的地城市——连云港——让我闻所未闻，网上也找不到任何相关的信息。

除此之外，我算是准备好了。

连云港位于上海以北300英里，是一个港口城市，有75万人口。据说是十六世纪一本小说《西游记》主人公美猴王的诞生地。但是在2004年，那里和中国其它城市没有什么区别：到处都是摩天大厦、霓虹灯和喷着热气的出租车。

连云港的外国人少之又少。我听说，第一位英语教师在2000年来到这里，是一位白头发的新西兰中年人。当她走在街上，骑车的中国人甚至会撞倒街边的汽车。我在4年后来到那里的时候，城市里大约有10名西方教师，但是当我们走进人群还是会引发一些骚动。

通常情况下，我会听到一些“hello”。街上年轻的中国人会冲我喊出这个词，伴随着洪亮的笑声。有些人会跟着我，管我要电话号码和住址。有一次，当我走在一所大学的校园里，引来了一大帮要和我练习英语的人，他们丢过来一大堆没头没脑的问题。

“你喜欢中国食物吗？你会用筷子吗？”

是的，会——美国也有这些东西。

“你最喜欢中国哪座城市？”

“呃，连云港。”除了来连云港转机时在北京待过几个小时，我还没有去过其它城市。

“真的吗？”

几个月之后，来到中国的兴奋心情逐渐退却，我的生活走上了正轨。白天我需要工作，我为十五、六岁的孩子上两个小时的英语课。我很少留作业，也不考试，所以整个下午我一般会读书，或者心不在焉地学点中文。

晚上在学校的食堂吃完饭之后，我会来到街上的商店，买一个盗版DVD，只需要50美分。DVD的质量参差不齐，有的是在电影院里用手持摄像机拍摄的，内容还可以看得清楚，有时候前面会有人站起来挡住画面。但是看这些东西能让我逃避周围的现实。我不可救药地想回家，“做完这一年，你就可以离开了，”我告诉自己。

感恩节快到了，我决定不理会这个节日。在中国这并不难，与圣诞节不同，很多中国人在圣诞节的时候会用装饰品、音乐和聚会来庆祝，而感恩节会悄悄地溜走——只不过是个平平常常的星期四。

于是，我走进教室、上课、备课、回家。但是当我坐在沙发上，看着我在商店里花12美元买来的007新片的时候，我有一种惭愧的感觉。我在做什么？今天是感恩节啊，我无论如何需要一个体面的感恩节晚餐。

只有一个问题。在连云港，以及中国所有的小城市里，根本没有火鸡，也没有酸果曼沙司、填料、甘薯、南瓜馅饼这类东西。实际上，在这座70万人口的城市里，只有一家餐厅所供应的食物与感恩节稍微搭上一点边——肯德基。

我就要去那里。

连云港唯一一家肯德基餐厅离学校不远。但我一直以来都不愿意进去，似乎是想保留自己对快餐食品一贯的态度。但是在感恩节这一天，我对山德士上校打个招呼，走进大门，看到的景象出乎我的想象。与我去过城市里的其它餐厅不同，肯德基有干净的地板、可以使用的卫生间和中央供暖。来这就餐的人都是衣着整洁的年轻人，我还看到有几个人明显是在约会。收款处排队的人很有秩序，几分钟之后，我就端着一桶炸鸡、一碗土豆泥、一块玉米和从菜单上选择的一款可疑的“晚餐卷”，找个桌子坐下。

我拧了一下自己，这是中国吗？

我打开这些食物，每一口都很美味。吃到一半的时候，我有了一种熟悉的恶心感觉——伴随着自我厌恶的情绪，这是长期以来吃快餐食品的感觉。但是管它呢，这是感恩节，先享受了再说。

饭后，我走到街上召唤出租车。这时听到身后有脚步声，一个穿着餐厅服装的年轻人走过来，想要和我说些什么。天啊，他想干什么？

他说：“感恩节快乐！祝你愉快。”

之后，他就转身走开了。这就是我在中国的第一个——总共有5个——感恩节。不管怎样，比我预想中连云港的感恩节完美很多。




原文：

Alone, in a strange country, the fast-food franchise saved the day.

Not your typical Thanksgiving destination. (Darley Shen/Reuters)

In the late summer of 2004, days before I was to move to Lianyungang, China, to teach English for a year, I spoke to an acquaintance who had spent a few years in the country.

"Holidays are hard," he said. "But oddly, not so much Christmas. Christmas isn't that bad. It's Thanksgiving that's hard."

At the time, surviving the holidays was the least of my worries. I was moving to a country where I didn't speak the language, understand the culture, or know the history, in order to do a job that I had never done and didn't know how to do. And not only that, I was going to a city—Lianyungang—that I hadn't even heard of, and could find no information about online.

Other than that, I was completely prepared.

Lianyungang, 300 miles or so north of Shanghai, is a port city of around 750,000 people and is famous in China for being the birthplace of the Monkey King, a literary hero from the 16th century novel Journey to the West. But in 2004, it looked like any other city in the country: full of tall, gray skyscrapers, neon signs, and belching taxis.

Foreign residents in Lianyungang were few and far between. I was told that the first English teacher arrived in 2000 and when she—a middle-aged New Zealander with white hair—walked around, bicyclists sometimes slammed into parked cars. By the time I arrived four years later, there were about ten Western teachers in the city, but we still caused a minor frenzy when we ventured into a crowd of people.  

Usually, there were the "hellos": Young Chinese people would shout the word, accompanied by peals of laughter, as I walked in the city. Other people would tail me and ask for my phone number or address. Once, when walking through a university campus, I attracted a small mob of people who, wishing to practice their English, bombarded me with questions.

"Do you like Chinese food?" "Can you use chopsticks?"

Yes, and yes—we have them at home.

"What is your favorite Chinese city?"

"Uh, Lianyungang." Except for a few hours in Beijing on the day I arrived, I hadn't been anywhere else.

"Really?"

Within a couple of months, the euphoria of being in China had worn off, and I found myself settling into a routine. During the day, there was work: I taught two hour-long classes of 15 and 16-year-olds, and, because I assigned no homework and rarely gave out tests, spent the afternoons either reading or making a halfhearted attempt to learn Chinese.

At night, after dinner at my school's canteen, I'd walk to a store down the street and buy a pirated DVD, which usually cost about 50 cents. The quality of the copies were variable—sometimes, they were filmed with a camcorder inside a cinema, which worked okay until someone stood up in front—but watching them kept me from having to deal with my Chinese reality. I was desperately homesick. "Just get through this year," I told myself. "Then you can leave."

When Thanksgiving came around, I decided it'd be easiest if I just ignored it. In China, this isn't difficult; unlike Christmas, which many Chinese people commemorate with decorations, music, and festivities, Thanksgiving slips past unnoticed—it's just another Thursday.

And so it was. I walked to school, taught my classes, did some lesson planning, and came home. But as I sat on my sofa, watching the next film from the James Bond box set I bought for $12 at a local shop, I felt a sense of shame. What was I doing? It was Thanksgiving, damn it. I needed to have a proper Thanksgiving dinner.

There was only one problem. In Lianyungang, as in most small Chinese cities, there's no turkey. Or cranberry sauce. Or stuffing, yams, pumpkin pie, or anything else. In fact, in the entire city of 700,000 people, there was exactly one restaurant whose food even resembled, at a distance, Thanksgiving fare.

Kentucky Fried Chicken.

And so that's where I headed.

Lianyungang's one KFC was located near my school, but until then I had refused, in an effort to preserve a degree of cultural authenticity, to go in. But on Thanksgiving, after I waved hello to Colonel Sanders and walked through the front door, what I found was a revelation. Unlike any of the other restaurants I had been to in town, KFC had clean floors, a functional public bathroom, and central heat. Its patrons were smartly dressed young professionals. Several people, I noticed, were even there on dates. The line behind the cash register was orderly, and within minutes of my arrival I found myself in possession of a bucket of crispy fried chicken, a tub of mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, and a dubious-looking "dinner wrap" I selected from the menu.

I pinched myself. Was this China?

I sat down and tore into my food. Every last bite was delicious. About halfway through the meal, I felt the familiar wave of nausea—tinged with self-loathing— I recognized from a lifetime of eating fast food. But I didn't care. It was Thanksgiving, and I wanted my food coma.

As I left, walking to a busy street to look for a cab, I heard footsteps and turned around: A young man wearing a suit had followed me from the restaurant and wanted to tell me something. Oh God. What did he want?

"Happy Thanksgiving!" he said. "I hope you have a good day."

With that, he turned around and ran off. And my first Thanksgiving in China—there would be five more—was complete. More complete than I would have imagined it being in Lianyungang, anyway.

每天的晨吟

认为感恩节很滑稽滴，也很快乐。

beifei

原意是感恩印第安人给予的帮助，后来这些帮助美国人的印第安人却被美国人屠杀殆尽。