For China’s Women, More Opportunities, More Pitfalls
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/26/world/asia/26iht-china.html?_r=1&emc=eta1
BEIJING — The question that dashed Angel Feng’s job prospects always came last.
那个严重冲击冯小姐职业前景的问题总是出现在最后关头。
Fluent in Chinese, English, French and Japanese, the 26-year-old graduate of a business school in France interviewed between January and April with half a dozen companies in Beijing, hoping for her first job in the private sector, where salaries are highest.
26岁的冯小姐毕业于法国一所商业学校，能说流利的中、英、法和日语。今年一月至四月间她一直在北京的几所大公司面试，期望能在薪酬较高的私企中找到自己毕业后的第一份工作。
“The boss would ask several questions about my qualifications, then he’d say: ‘I see you just got married. When will you have a baby?’ It was always the last question. I’d say not for five years, at least, but they didn’t believe me,” Ms. Feng said.
冯小姐说：“老板都会问几个有关我资历的问题，然后他们会说：‘我看你刚刚结婚，打算什么时候生小孩儿？’最后一个问题一定是这个。我会说近五年内肯定不会，但是他们根本不信。”
Three decades after China embarked on dazzling economic reforms, much has changed for women. Unlike their mothers, whose working — and, often, private — lives were determined by the state, women today can largely choose their paths. Rural women are no longer tethered to communes; urban women no longer are assigned jobs for life or need permission from work units to marry, although all women must apply for permission to have a child.
中国改革开放三十多年后，女性的生活发生了很大变化。现代女性不像她们的母亲那一辈人，工作和私人生活常常由国家决定，她们很大程度上可以选择自己的发展途径。农村妇女不再被限制在公社；都市女性也不再被安排一辈子做某一份工作，结婚也不再需要得到单位的允许，尽管她们还是得获得准生证才能生孩子。(which is really funny)
Yet along with freedom has come risk, as socialist-era structures are dismantled and powerful cultural traditions that value men over women, long held in abeyance by official Communist support for women’s rights, return in force. Many employers are choosing not to hire women in an economy where there is an oversupply of labor and women are perceived as bringing additional expense in the form of maternity leave and childbirth costs. The law stipulates that employers must help cover those costs, and feminists are seeking a system of state-supported childbirth insurance to lessen discrimination.
有了自由固然是好事儿，随之而来的却是风险。随着社会主义时代的社会结构遭到重击，尽管国家对女性权力大加支持，重男轻女这个强有力的文化传统却卷土重来。在中国劳动力过剩的经济情势下，很多招聘单位不愿雇佣女性。他们认为由于产假和生育等原因，女性员工会带来额外的开销。法律规定，用人单位必须支付该类费用；而女权主义者正在寻求建立一个国家买单的生育保险体系以减轻雇佣关系中的性别歧视。
The result is that even highly qualified candidates like Ms. Feng can struggle to find a footing. Practical concerns about coping in a highly competitive world are feeding into a powerful identity crisis among China’s women.
结果是像冯小姐这样的高素质人才都很难找到立足之地。对成功应付竞争激烈社会的担忧正逐步渗透到中国女性严重的身份危机中。
“The main issue we face is confusion, about who we are and what we should be,” said Qin Liwen, a magazine columnist. “Should I be a ‘strong woman’ and make money and have a career, maybe grow rich, but risk not finding a husband or having a child? Or should I marry and be a stay-at-home housewife, support my husband and educate my child? Or, should I be a ‘fox’ — the kind of woman who marries a rich man, drives around in a BMW but has to put up with his concubines?”
杂志专栏作家秦丽雯（音）说：“我们目前面对的最大问题是关于我们到底是谁以及我们该做什么样的人的困惑。我是不是应该做个女强人，会赚钱、有自己的事业，说不定变成小富婆，但代价就是可能找不到老公或是生不了孩子？或者说，我是不是该结婚然后做全职太太，相夫教子？或者干脆去傍个大款，开着宝马车但是得接受老公在外面彩旗飘飘？”
Ms. Feng found a job at a company that promoted Chinese brands.
“It was a really bad place,” she said. Employees were fired immediately after promotional drives to slash costs. Working hours were long. A colleague who suffered a late miscarriage was ordered back to work within three days. Ms. Feng’s monthly salary was 5,000 renminbi, or about $745, without benefits.
In July, she quit — for the security of a “semi-state” organization run by the Ministry of Education.
冯小姐后来在一家中国品牌推广公司找到了工作。但是她说那个地方非常糟糕。推广活动一结束，公司就会为削减开销而裁员；工作时间过长；一个不幸流产的同事被要求三天内回来上班。冯小姐月薪5000，没有任何福利。她七月份辞职了，找到了一份由教育部运营的半国有机构内的稳定工作。
The pay is lower, about $625 a month, but lunch in the ministry canteen is free, and she gets benefits that hark back to socialist days, including a housing allowance. Hours are fixed, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., five days a week. Most important, her employer, the China Education Association for International Exchange, does not object to employees’ having babies and provides at least 90 days’ maternity leave at full pay.
这份工作薪水更低，每月4000多一点，但是提供免费午餐还有其它福利，包括住房补贴，算是又回到社会主义大时代了。这份工作工作时间固定，每周五天，每天上午8:30上班、下午5:00下班。最重要的是，她目前供职的中国教育国际交流协会没有命令反对生育，而且提供至少三个月的带薪产假。
The job may be “a bit boring,” but for now, she, like others, has made her choice.
“The state sector is quite popular with women because their rights are better protected there,” said Feng Yuan, head of the Center for Women’s Studies at Shantou University.
冯小姐说这份工作虽然‘有点单调’，但是跟其他人一样，她已经做出了选择。汕头大学妇女研究中心负责人冯媛说：“国有企业很受女性欢迎，因为她们的权益得在那里得到更好的保护。”
Guo Jianmei, director of the Beijing Zhongze Women’s Legal Counseling and Service Center, insists that, over all, women today are in a better position than they were three decades ago.
“They know so much more about their rights,” she said. “They are better educated. For those with a competitive spirit, there’s a world of opportunity here now, whether they are businesswomen, scientists, farmers or even political leaders. There really have been huge changes.”
众泽妇女法律咨询服务中心主任郭建梅认为，总体来说，当代女性的处境要比30年前好得多。她说：“她们更了解自己的权益，受到更好的教育。不管是商人、科学家、农民抑或是政治领袖，对于那些有竞争意识的女性来说，这个世界充满了机会。这方面的确有很大的变化。”
Women’s rights are well protected, at least on paper. In 2005, the government amended the landmark 1992 Law on the Protection of Women’s Rights and Interests, known as the Women’s Constitution, to make gender equality an explicit state policy. It also outlawed, for the first time, sexual harassment.
女性权益受到了良好保护，至少在书面上是这样。2005年，政府修定1992年颁布的具有里程碑意义的《妇女权益保障法》，至此性别平等明确成为基本国策，并首次将性骚扰纳入违法行为之列。
Yet gender discrimination is widespread. Only a few women dare to sue employers for unfair hiring practices, dismissal on grounds of pregnancy or maternity leave, or sexual harassment, experts say. Employers commonly specify gender, age and physical appearance in job offers.
然而，性别歧视随处可见。专家说，仅有为数不多的几名女性敢以不正当雇用行为、因怀孕或产假遭解雇或性骚扰等理由与用人单位对簿公堂。用人单位在发布招聘信息是通常会指明性别、年龄和外貌等要求。
There are gaps in the law. A major problem, said Feng Yuan (not related to Angel Feng), is that it does not define gender discrimination. The law also sticks to the longstanding requirement that women retire five years earlier than men at the same jobs, thereby reducing earnings and pensions.
法律本身就有漏洞。冯媛教授说，其中最主要的问题是法律没有对性别歧视作出严格定义。法律还坚持同种工作女性比男性早五年退休的长期做法，因此减少了女性的工资收入和退休金。
In 2008, 67.5 percent of Chinese women over 15 were employed, according to Yang Juhua of Renmin University of China’s Center for Population and Development Studies, citing World Bank statistics. That was a drop from the most recent Chinese government data, from 2000, showing that 71.52 percent of women from 16 through 54 were employed, compared with 82.47 percent of men from 16 through 59. Ms. Yang has calculated that women earn 63.5 percent of men’s salaries, a drop from 64.8 in 2000.
2008年，67.5%的15岁以上中国女性有工作——中国人民大学人口与发展研究所的杨菊华援引世界银行的数据如是说。而中国政府于2000年的数据显示16至54岁的女性中71.52%的人有工作，而16至59岁的男性中，82.47%的人有工作。根据杨菊华的计算，女性收入仅为男性的63.5%，比2000年的数据64.8%又有所下降。
And yet there are many stories of individual success, built on hard work — and some luck. Shi Zaihong’s is one.
Born into a poor rural family in the central province of Anhui, Ms. Shi, now 41, came to Beijing to work as a nanny in 1987. She earned 40 renminbi a month.
当然，也有不少通过自己辛勤工作而取得成功的个案，这其中当然也需要点运气。石再红（音）就是其中之一。现年41岁的石女士来自安徽省的一个贫苦的农村家庭。1987年来到北京开始做保姆，那时候一个月挣40块。
Today, she works 10 cleaning and child-minding jobs, earning 7,000 renminbi a month. With her husband, who runs a small business putting up advertisements, she bought an apartment just outside Beijing for 500,000 renminbi — an astonishing achievement for a migrant worker with just five years’ education.
现在，她同时做着十份打扫和照看孩子的工作，每个月能赚7000块。她的老公经营着一个做广告牌的小生意。两人花了50万在北京近郊买了一套房子，这对一个仅有小学文化程度的外地务工人员来说绝对是惊人的成就。
Ms. Shi’s eyes shine as she talks about her steady accumulation of wealth, far outstripping what her mother was able to save in farming. “I have taken advantage of every opportunity that I had, and I have always worked hard,” she said. “Things are good. Very good.”
说起自己稳定的积蓄，石（音）女士眼睛里闪烁着光芒。那比她的母亲种地能攒的钱不知多出多少倍。她说：“我会好好把握每个机会而且一直勤勤恳恳工作。现在日子过得不错。”
The mother of a 16-year-old son and a 3-year-old daughter, she can now apply for her children to legally join her because buying property confers this right, she said. The children have always lived in her mountain village of 300, with her parents. “Having to leave your children behind is the hardest thing about being a migrant,” she said.
因为在北京购买了房产，石女士现在可以申请让16岁的孩子和3岁的女儿到北京居住。两个孩子此前一直跟外祖父母生活在偏远山区。石女士说：“在外面打工，最难过的就是和孩子分开。”
Liu Yan, 42, comes from quite a different background. The daughter of an actor and an opera singer from Sichuan Province in the southwest, she worked at China’s first private tour operator and is now a successful business consultant. Sophisticated and well connected, she specializes in putting people together to make a project “go.” She is divorced, with a 10-year-old daughter.
42岁的刘彦（音）的背景则大不相同。她的父母是四川的文艺界人士，她曾供职于中国首家私营旅行社，现在是一名成功的商业咨询师。刘女士成熟稳重、交际面广，专长是集合人才运行各种项目。离异的刘女士有一个十岁的女儿。
“I’ve been quite free and straightforward all my life,” she said. But “my family often calls me stupid for it. It’s not really the way you’re supposed to act here.” The upshot is that she feels her prospects of remarriage are dim.
“Tradition has come back strongly, but it’s not always a good thing,” she said. “With Chinese men, there is a line you cannot cross. They have ‘face’ that you have to respect. Anyway, most of them don’t find me feminine. They like young girls. They think a woman is beautiful when she’s ‘sweet.”’
她说：“我这辈子都活得很自由，为人处事不拐弯抹角。但是家里人总说我傻。直接并不是这个社会接受的行为方式。”刘女士觉得她再婚的可能性微乎其微。
China’s more well-to-do women, she said, are expected to tolerate a husband’s multiple mistresses. Concubinage, outlawed by the Communists after they took power in 1949, has re-emerged.
“Most women just assume that sooner or later it will happen,” she said. “Men have power. Women are weak, and they have too much to lose. But I want to be happy. I could not accept that.”
她还说，在中国，生活优越的女性要容忍丈夫在外面扎花惹草已经是大家心照不宣的事情了。1949年新中国成立后被认定为非法行为的妾侍制度仿佛又死灰复燃了。“大部分女性觉得老公在外沾花惹草迟早会发生的。男人是强势的。而女人就比较弱势，她们失去的太多了。但是我想活得开心点，那些是我不能接受的。”刘女士说。
2010年11月21日星期日
你爸是李刚，你们全家的爸都是李刚！
China’s Censorship Backfires in ‘Li Gang’ Case
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/18/world/asia/18li.html
BAODING, China — One night in late October, a college student named Chen Xiaofeng was in-line skating with a friend on the grounds of Hebei University in central China. They were gliding past the campus grocery when a Volkswagen sedan raced down a narrow lane and struck them head-on.
十月下旬的一个晚上，河北大学学生陈晓凤和朋友一起在校园里玩轮滑。正当她们滑过校园超市时，一辆大众轿车冲到路边便道迎面撞上了她们。
The impact sent Ms. Chen flying and broke the other woman’s leg. The 22-year-old driver, who was intoxicated, tried to speed away. Security guards intercepted him, but he was undeterred. He warned them, “My father is Li Gang!”
陈晓凤被撞飞，另一名女生腿被撞断。事发后，22岁的酒后驾车的肇事者企图开车逃逸。学校保安将其拦住，但肇事者冷漠嚣张，还大喊：“我爸是李刚！”
“The two girls were motionless,” one passer-by that night, a student who identified himself only by his surname, Duan, said this week. “There was a small pool of blood.” The next day, Ms. Chen was dead.
本周，当晚事件目击者、河北大学一名姓段的学生说：“（当时）两个女孩儿都躺在那儿不动了。地上有一滩血。”事发第二天，陈晓凤身亡。
Chen Xiaofeng was a poor farm girl. The man accused of killing her, Li Qiming, is the son of Li Gang, the deputy police chief in the Beishi district of Baoding. The tale of her death is precisely the sort of gripping socio-drama — a commoner grievously wronged; a privileged transgressor pulling strings to escape punishment — that sets off alarm bells in the offices of Communist Party censors. And in fact, party propaganda officials moved swiftly after the accident to ensure that the story never gained traction.
陈晓凤是个普通的农村女孩儿，而涉嫌酒后驾车撞人致死的李启铭是河北保定市北市区公安分局副局长李刚。陈晓凤的死完全就是一出扣人心弦的社会戏剧（socio-drama）——一边是受到不公的平民；一边是享受特权的企图利用关系逃脱法律制裁的犯法者。这出戏剧给共产党的审查机构敲响了警钟。事实上，宣传部官员已在事发后第一时间采取措施以确保这则消息不会带来太大的负面效应。（gain traction）
Curiously, however, the opposite has happened. A month after the accident, much of China knows the story, and “My father is Li Gang” has become a bitter inside joke, a catchphrase for shirking any responsibility — washing the dishes, being faithful to a girlfriend — with impunity. Even the government’s heavy-handed effort to control the story has become the object of scorn among younger, savvier Chinese.
然而，说起来也怪，事实恰恰相反。事故发生一个月之后，大半个中国都知道了这件事儿，而‘我爸是李刚’已经成了一个大家都能意会的笑话，也是成了逃脱诸如洗碗、忠诚于女友等责任并免受处罚的一句口头禅。而政府控制消息传播的企图(heavy-handed?)也成了年轻、明理的中国人嘲讽的对象。
“There was a little on the school news channel at first,” one Hebei University student who offered only his surname, Wang, said in an interview last week. “But then it went completely quiet. We’re really disappointed in the press for stopping coverage of this major news.”
河北大学一名姓王（汪）的学生上周接受采访时说：“开始的时候学校新闻频道有一点相关报道。但是后来全部失声了。对于媒体关于这样的大新闻集体失声，我们感到非常失望。”
In many ways, the Li Gang case, as it is known, exemplifies how China’s propaganda machine — able to slant or kill any news in the age of printing presses and television — is sometimes hamstrung in the age of the Internet, especially when it tries to manipulate a pithy narrative about the abuse of power.
众所周知，中国的宣传机器能在这个平面和电视媒体时代歪曲报道或是审查掉一些新闻，而李刚事件从许多方面来讲都是中国的宣传机器在网络时代如何被‘阉割’的典型，尤其是在它试图操控权利滥用的有力报道的时候。
“Frequently we’ll see directives on coverage, but those directives don’t necessarily mean there is no coverage,” said David Bandurski, an analyst at the University of Hong Kong’s China Media Project. “They’re not all that effective.”
“Censorship is increasingly unpopular in China,” he added. “We know how unpopular it is, because they have to keep the guidelines themselves under wraps.”
香港大学中国传媒研究项目的分析师David Bandurski说：“我们常常能看到有关新闻报道范围的指示，但是这些指示并不一定说明就不会有相关报道。审查制度在中国越来越不得人心。我们知道它到底有多不得人心，因为有关部门的所谓指导方针也见不得光。”
A gadfly blog, sarcastically titled Ministry of Truth, has begun to puncture the veil surrounding censorship, anonymously posting secret government directives leaked by free-speech sympathizers. According to the blog’s sources, the Central Propaganda Department issued a directive on Oct. 28, 10 days after the accident, “ensuring there is no more hype regarding the disturbance over traffic at Hebei University.”
一个讽刺地命名为‘真理部’的草根博客（gadfly blog）已经着手掀开审查制度的面纱。博客上匿名发表了言论自由支持者透露的政府机密指示。根据博客的消息来源，中共中央宣传部于车祸发生10天后，即10月28日，发布了一份指示：确保不再出现关于河北大学交通骚乱的大肆报道。
On that same day, censors prohibited reporting on six other incidents. One involved another girl’s death in police custody. Others included an investigation of a Hunan Province security official, the sexual dalliance of a Maoming vice mayor, the abandonment of closed pavilions at Shanghai’s World Expo and the increasing censorship of Internet chat rooms.
同一天，审查机构又禁止报道其它六个事件。其中一个有关另一个女孩儿在警方监禁期间死亡。其它还包括对湖南省一名安全系统官员的调查，茂名副市长玩弄女记者事件，上海世博会闭幕后场馆的遗弃，以及网上聊天室内日益增强的审查监控。
But the Li Gang case was hard to suppress, partly because it personified an enduring grievance: the belief that the powerful can flout the rules to which ordinary folk are forced to submit. Increasingly, that grievance focuses on what Chinese mockingly call the “guan er dai” and “fu er dai” — the “second generation,” children of privileged government officials and the super-rich.
然而，李刚事件难以压制，部分原因是这一事件使人们长期以来对‘只许州官放火不许百姓点灯’的不满具体化。这种不满越来越集中在‘官二代’和‘富二代’身上——享尽特权的政府官员和有钱人的孩子。
Realizing the delicacy of the matter, the government tried to shape public reaction in more ways than by simply restricting coverage. After Internet bulletin boards began buzzing with outrage, China’s national television network, CCTV, broadcast an Oct. 22 interview with Li Gang and his son, filled with effusive apologies for the accident. On Oct. 24, the news media reported that Li Qiming, who had been detained by the police the day after the accident, had been arrested.
意识到这一事件的微妙，政府除了严控新闻报道之外还采取了其它多种措施来引导公众对此事件的反应。网民纷纷在网络上表达愤怒之后，中国国家电视台——中央电视台于10月22号播出了一段对李刚和李启铭的采访，两人在采访中流露出深深的忏悔。10月24日，新闻媒体报道，事发后第二天已被拘留的肇事者李启铭已经被逮捕。
Police regulations ostensibly bar interviews with detainees. A Baoding police spokeswoman who identified herself as Ms. Zhou said in an e-mail that the network obtained the interview because it had been approved by the local party propaganda office.
警方表面上规定，被羁留人员严禁接受采访。保定警方的一位发言人周女士在邮件中说中央电视台之所以得以采访李启铭是因为获得了中宣部当地办事处的批准。
Ms. Chen’s survivors were not afforded the same access. In early November, Fenghuang Satellite Television, a news channel based in Hong Kong that is available to some in mainland China, broadcast an angry interview with Ms. Chen’s brother, Chen Lin. On Nov. 4, the Central Propaganda Department banned further news of the interview.
而陈晓凤的家人却没有同等的访问权限。11月初，香港凤凰台（在中国大陆，一部分人可以看到凤凰台的节目）播出了一段陈晓凤的哥哥陈林愤怒的采访画面。11月4号，中宣部下令禁止有关该采访的进一步报道。
But censorship officials were seeking to control a message that had already spread widely.
On Oct. 20, a female blogger in northern China nicknamed Piggy Feet Beta announced a contest to incorporate the phrase “Li Gang is my father” into classical Chinese poetry. Six thousand applicants replied, one modifying a famous poem by Mao to read “it’s all in the past, talk about heroes, my father is Li Gang.”
事实上，新闻审查官员是在企图控制一条已经广泛传播的消息。10月20日，华北一名网名为Piggy Feet Beta的网友发起了一项‘我爸是李刚’诗歌大赛，约6000名网友进行了回复。其中一名网友改编了毛泽东的一首词：俱往矣，数风流人物，我爸是李刚。
Copycat competitions, using ad slogans and song lyrics, sprang up elsewhere on the Internet. In the southern metropolis of Chongqing, an artist created an installation based on the phrase.
类似的使用广告语和歌词比赛在网络上层出不穷。在中国西南部城市重庆，一位艺术家根据这个流行语创作了an installation?
On Nov. 9, Internet chatter on the case abruptly withered. But some have continued to dodge Web censors: starting in early November, the Beijing artist and activist Ai Weiwei posted on his Web site an interview with Ms. Chen’s father and brother, who said he had rejected appeals to negotiate a settlement.
“In society they say everyone is equal, but in every corner there is inequality,” Chen Lin said.
“How can you live in this country and this society without any worry?” he added.
11月9日，网络上有关这一事件的讨论突然销声匿迹了。但仍有一部分躲开了新闻审查的进攻。11月初，艺术家和政治积极分子艾未未在自己的网页上发布了对陈晓凤父亲和哥哥的采访。陈晓凤的哥哥表示他们已经拒绝了私下和解的请求。
Censors repeatedly blocked the interview. Mr. Ai has played a cat-and-mouse game, moving it to a new Web site every time.
Finally, last Thursday, the Chens’ lawyer, Zhang Kai, received a telephone call from his clients. “They thanked me for all the efforts I put into this case,” he said, “but they told me they have resolved their dispute with Li Gang’s family. Half an hour after the call, they came to my office and handed in a termination contract. And after that, they just disappeared.”
新闻审查部门不厌其烦地封杀这段采访。而艾未未则玩儿起了猫捉老鼠的游戏，每次都把这段录像搬到不同的网页上。最终，陈家的代理律师张凯于上周四接到了其客户的电话。张律师说：“他们感谢我为这个案子所作的一切努力，但是告诉我他们的事情已经解决了。半个小时后，他们到律师事务所解除了合同。”
Mr. Zhang said many of his cases involving conflicts between ordinary citizens and powerful people had ended the same way. “In current Chinese society, people put an emphasis on power more than on individual liberty,” he said.
If the settlement was intended to quash chatter about the Li Gang case, it, too, seems to have accomplished the opposite.
张律师说，这类普通公民和有权势的人之间的纷争大多都以这种类似的方式收场。他说：“当今中国社会中，人们把权力看得比个人自由看得更重。”
In Baoding, Hebei students questioned at random this week uniformly denounced the handling of the Chen case. “I’d see the case to the end,” said one man who gave only his surname, Zhang. “Go through the legal process and seek justice.”
A second student, Zhao, was unsparing. “This is the kind of society we live in,” he said angrily. “People who have power, they can cover up the sky. We want this settled according to the law.”
在河北保定，记者本周随机采访的学生一致谴责对陈晓凤案件的处理。一位张姓同学说：“我想看看这起案件的最终结果。应该走法律程序，伸张正义。”另一位姓赵的学生言辞激烈地说：“这就是我们生活的社会，有权有势的人能一手遮天。我们希望这起案子能通过正当的法律途径解决。”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/18/world/asia/18li.html
BAODING, China — One night in late October, a college student named Chen Xiaofeng was in-line skating with a friend on the grounds of Hebei University in central China. They were gliding past the campus grocery when a Volkswagen sedan raced down a narrow lane and struck them head-on.
十月下旬的一个晚上，河北大学学生陈晓凤和朋友一起在校园里玩轮滑。正当她们滑过校园超市时，一辆大众轿车冲到路边便道迎面撞上了她们。
The impact sent Ms. Chen flying and broke the other woman’s leg. The 22-year-old driver, who was intoxicated, tried to speed away. Security guards intercepted him, but he was undeterred. He warned them, “My father is Li Gang!”
陈晓凤被撞飞，另一名女生腿被撞断。事发后，22岁的酒后驾车的肇事者企图开车逃逸。学校保安将其拦住，但肇事者冷漠嚣张，还大喊：“我爸是李刚！”
“The two girls were motionless,” one passer-by that night, a student who identified himself only by his surname, Duan, said this week. “There was a small pool of blood.” The next day, Ms. Chen was dead.
本周，当晚事件目击者、河北大学一名姓段的学生说：“（当时）两个女孩儿都躺在那儿不动了。地上有一滩血。”事发第二天，陈晓凤身亡。
Chen Xiaofeng was a poor farm girl. The man accused of killing her, Li Qiming, is the son of Li Gang, the deputy police chief in the Beishi district of Baoding. The tale of her death is precisely the sort of gripping socio-drama — a commoner grievously wronged; a privileged transgressor pulling strings to escape punishment — that sets off alarm bells in the offices of Communist Party censors. And in fact, party propaganda officials moved swiftly after the accident to ensure that the story never gained traction.
陈晓凤是个普通的农村女孩儿，而涉嫌酒后驾车撞人致死的李启铭是河北保定市北市区公安分局副局长李刚。陈晓凤的死完全就是一出扣人心弦的社会戏剧（socio-drama）——一边是受到不公的平民；一边是享受特权的企图利用关系逃脱法律制裁的犯法者。这出戏剧给共产党的审查机构敲响了警钟。事实上，宣传部官员已在事发后第一时间采取措施以确保这则消息不会带来太大的负面效应。（gain traction）
Curiously, however, the opposite has happened. A month after the accident, much of China knows the story, and “My father is Li Gang” has become a bitter inside joke, a catchphrase for shirking any responsibility — washing the dishes, being faithful to a girlfriend — with impunity. Even the government’s heavy-handed effort to control the story has become the object of scorn among younger, savvier Chinese.
然而，说起来也怪，事实恰恰相反。事故发生一个月之后，大半个中国都知道了这件事儿，而‘我爸是李刚’已经成了一个大家都能意会的笑话，也是成了逃脱诸如洗碗、忠诚于女友等责任并免受处罚的一句口头禅。而政府控制消息传播的企图(heavy-handed?)也成了年轻、明理的中国人嘲讽的对象。
“There was a little on the school news channel at first,” one Hebei University student who offered only his surname, Wang, said in an interview last week. “But then it went completely quiet. We’re really disappointed in the press for stopping coverage of this major news.”
河北大学一名姓王（汪）的学生上周接受采访时说：“开始的时候学校新闻频道有一点相关报道。但是后来全部失声了。对于媒体关于这样的大新闻集体失声，我们感到非常失望。”
In many ways, the Li Gang case, as it is known, exemplifies how China’s propaganda machine — able to slant or kill any news in the age of printing presses and television — is sometimes hamstrung in the age of the Internet, especially when it tries to manipulate a pithy narrative about the abuse of power.
众所周知，中国的宣传机器能在这个平面和电视媒体时代歪曲报道或是审查掉一些新闻，而李刚事件从许多方面来讲都是中国的宣传机器在网络时代如何被‘阉割’的典型，尤其是在它试图操控权利滥用的有力报道的时候。
“Frequently we’ll see directives on coverage, but those directives don’t necessarily mean there is no coverage,” said David Bandurski, an analyst at the University of Hong Kong’s China Media Project. “They’re not all that effective.”
“Censorship is increasingly unpopular in China,” he added. “We know how unpopular it is, because they have to keep the guidelines themselves under wraps.”
香港大学中国传媒研究项目的分析师David Bandurski说：“我们常常能看到有关新闻报道范围的指示，但是这些指示并不一定说明就不会有相关报道。审查制度在中国越来越不得人心。我们知道它到底有多不得人心，因为有关部门的所谓指导方针也见不得光。”
A gadfly blog, sarcastically titled Ministry of Truth, has begun to puncture the veil surrounding censorship, anonymously posting secret government directives leaked by free-speech sympathizers. According to the blog’s sources, the Central Propaganda Department issued a directive on Oct. 28, 10 days after the accident, “ensuring there is no more hype regarding the disturbance over traffic at Hebei University.”
一个讽刺地命名为‘真理部’的草根博客（gadfly blog）已经着手掀开审查制度的面纱。博客上匿名发表了言论自由支持者透露的政府机密指示。根据博客的消息来源，中共中央宣传部于车祸发生10天后，即10月28日，发布了一份指示：确保不再出现关于河北大学交通骚乱的大肆报道。
On that same day, censors prohibited reporting on six other incidents. One involved another girl’s death in police custody. Others included an investigation of a Hunan Province security official, the sexual dalliance of a Maoming vice mayor, the abandonment of closed pavilions at Shanghai’s World Expo and the increasing censorship of Internet chat rooms.
同一天，审查机构又禁止报道其它六个事件。其中一个有关另一个女孩儿在警方监禁期间死亡。其它还包括对湖南省一名安全系统官员的调查，茂名副市长玩弄女记者事件，上海世博会闭幕后场馆的遗弃，以及网上聊天室内日益增强的审查监控。
But the Li Gang case was hard to suppress, partly because it personified an enduring grievance: the belief that the powerful can flout the rules to which ordinary folk are forced to submit. Increasingly, that grievance focuses on what Chinese mockingly call the “guan er dai” and “fu er dai” — the “second generation,” children of privileged government officials and the super-rich.
然而，李刚事件难以压制，部分原因是这一事件使人们长期以来对‘只许州官放火不许百姓点灯’的不满具体化。这种不满越来越集中在‘官二代’和‘富二代’身上——享尽特权的政府官员和有钱人的孩子。
Realizing the delicacy of the matter, the government tried to shape public reaction in more ways than by simply restricting coverage. After Internet bulletin boards began buzzing with outrage, China’s national television network, CCTV, broadcast an Oct. 22 interview with Li Gang and his son, filled with effusive apologies for the accident. On Oct. 24, the news media reported that Li Qiming, who had been detained by the police the day after the accident, had been arrested.
意识到这一事件的微妙，政府除了严控新闻报道之外还采取了其它多种措施来引导公众对此事件的反应。网民纷纷在网络上表达愤怒之后，中国国家电视台——中央电视台于10月22号播出了一段对李刚和李启铭的采访，两人在采访中流露出深深的忏悔。10月24日，新闻媒体报道，事发后第二天已被拘留的肇事者李启铭已经被逮捕。
Police regulations ostensibly bar interviews with detainees. A Baoding police spokeswoman who identified herself as Ms. Zhou said in an e-mail that the network obtained the interview because it had been approved by the local party propaganda office.
警方表面上规定，被羁留人员严禁接受采访。保定警方的一位发言人周女士在邮件中说中央电视台之所以得以采访李启铭是因为获得了中宣部当地办事处的批准。
Ms. Chen’s survivors were not afforded the same access. In early November, Fenghuang Satellite Television, a news channel based in Hong Kong that is available to some in mainland China, broadcast an angry interview with Ms. Chen’s brother, Chen Lin. On Nov. 4, the Central Propaganda Department banned further news of the interview.
而陈晓凤的家人却没有同等的访问权限。11月初，香港凤凰台（在中国大陆，一部分人可以看到凤凰台的节目）播出了一段陈晓凤的哥哥陈林愤怒的采访画面。11月4号，中宣部下令禁止有关该采访的进一步报道。
But censorship officials were seeking to control a message that had already spread widely.
On Oct. 20, a female blogger in northern China nicknamed Piggy Feet Beta announced a contest to incorporate the phrase “Li Gang is my father” into classical Chinese poetry. Six thousand applicants replied, one modifying a famous poem by Mao to read “it’s all in the past, talk about heroes, my father is Li Gang.”
事实上，新闻审查官员是在企图控制一条已经广泛传播的消息。10月20日，华北一名网名为Piggy Feet Beta的网友发起了一项‘我爸是李刚’诗歌大赛，约6000名网友进行了回复。其中一名网友改编了毛泽东的一首词：俱往矣，数风流人物，我爸是李刚。
Copycat competitions, using ad slogans and song lyrics, sprang up elsewhere on the Internet. In the southern metropolis of Chongqing, an artist created an installation based on the phrase.
类似的使用广告语和歌词比赛在网络上层出不穷。在中国西南部城市重庆，一位艺术家根据这个流行语创作了an installation?
On Nov. 9, Internet chatter on the case abruptly withered. But some have continued to dodge Web censors: starting in early November, the Beijing artist and activist Ai Weiwei posted on his Web site an interview with Ms. Chen’s father and brother, who said he had rejected appeals to negotiate a settlement.
“In society they say everyone is equal, but in every corner there is inequality,” Chen Lin said.
“How can you live in this country and this society without any worry?” he added.
11月9日，网络上有关这一事件的讨论突然销声匿迹了。但仍有一部分躲开了新闻审查的进攻。11月初，艺术家和政治积极分子艾未未在自己的网页上发布了对陈晓凤父亲和哥哥的采访。陈晓凤的哥哥表示他们已经拒绝了私下和解的请求。
Censors repeatedly blocked the interview. Mr. Ai has played a cat-and-mouse game, moving it to a new Web site every time.
Finally, last Thursday, the Chens’ lawyer, Zhang Kai, received a telephone call from his clients. “They thanked me for all the efforts I put into this case,” he said, “but they told me they have resolved their dispute with Li Gang’s family. Half an hour after the call, they came to my office and handed in a termination contract. And after that, they just disappeared.”
新闻审查部门不厌其烦地封杀这段采访。而艾未未则玩儿起了猫捉老鼠的游戏，每次都把这段录像搬到不同的网页上。最终，陈家的代理律师张凯于上周四接到了其客户的电话。张律师说：“他们感谢我为这个案子所作的一切努力，但是告诉我他们的事情已经解决了。半个小时后，他们到律师事务所解除了合同。”
Mr. Zhang said many of his cases involving conflicts between ordinary citizens and powerful people had ended the same way. “In current Chinese society, people put an emphasis on power more than on individual liberty,” he said.
If the settlement was intended to quash chatter about the Li Gang case, it, too, seems to have accomplished the opposite.
张律师说，这类普通公民和有权势的人之间的纷争大多都以这种类似的方式收场。他说：“当今中国社会中，人们把权力看得比个人自由看得更重。”
In Baoding, Hebei students questioned at random this week uniformly denounced the handling of the Chen case. “I’d see the case to the end,” said one man who gave only his surname, Zhang. “Go through the legal process and seek justice.”
A second student, Zhao, was unsparing. “This is the kind of society we live in,” he said angrily. “People who have power, they can cover up the sky. We want this settled according to the law.”
在河北保定，记者本周随机采访的学生一致谴责对陈晓凤案件的处理。一位张姓同学说：“我想看看这起案件的最终结果。应该走法律程序，伸张正义。”另一位姓赵的学生言辞激烈地说：“这就是我们生活的社会，有权有势的人能一手遮天。我们希望这起案子能通过正当的法律途径解决。”
2010年11月14日星期日
爱情买卖（都怪远远，我想到了这首非常恶俗恶俗的歌名儿）
In China, Money can buy love
BEIJING — Money really can buy you love in China — or at least that seems to be a common belief in this increasingly materialistic country.
在中国，钱真的能买到爱情。至少，在这个逐步物质化的国家，‘金钱买得到爱情’似乎已经成了一种普遍观念。
Many personal stories seem to confirm that the ideal mate is the one who can deliver a home and a car, among other things; sentiment is secondary.
很多人的故事似乎能够证实这一点：理想伴侣一定要有房有车，当然还要有其它东西；感情已经退居其次了。
However widespread this mercantilist spirit, not everyone thinks it is a good thing. A spate of Chinese films, plays and television shows have raised the question: What is love in an age of breakneck economic growth?
不管这种重商思想有多普遍，并非所有人都认为这是件好事儿。中国有一大批电影、戏剧和电视剧提出了这样一个问题：在这个经济极速发展的时代，爱情究竟是什么？
Many Chinese were shocked this year when a female contestant on a popular TV dating show, “If You Are the One,” announced: “I’d rather cry in a BMW than smile on a bicycle.” But others insisted that the contestant, Ma Nuo, now popularly known as “the BMW woman,” was merely expressing a social reality.
今年，一个广受欢迎的电视相亲节目《非诚勿扰》中，一名女嘉宾的一句“宁愿在宝马里哭，也不愿在自行车上笑”着实让很多中国观众大吃一惊。但是很多人相信，被冠以“宝马女”称呼的嘉宾马诺只是表达出了一种社会现实。
Rocketing property prices in recent years have contributed to such feelings, with many people in Beijing and other cities accepting the idea that a woman will pursue a relationship with a man only if he already owns an apartment.
在北京和其它城市的很多人正在逐步接受这样的想法：女人只愿意跟有房的男人谈‘感情’，而近年来飙升的房价已然成了催化剂。
Feng Yuan, a 26-year-old who works in a government education company, tried to set up a friend with a man she thought suitable.
“When she heard he didn’t own an apartment, she refused even to meet him,” recalled Ms. Feng. “She said, ‘What’s the point? Without an apartment, love isn’t possible.”’
26岁的Feng Yuan在一家政府教育机构工作。她曾想把一个女性朋友介绍给一个自己觉得合适的男人。Feng Yuan说：“她听说他没房子的之后，根本见都不愿意见。她说：‘那样有什么意义？没房子，爱情根本没可能。’”
Fueling these attitudes is a drumbeat of fear. After three decades of fast-paced, uneven economic growth, there is enormous anxiety among those who feel they are being left behind, lacking the opportunities and contacts to make big money while all around them others prosper and prices soar.
强烈的恐惧刺激着这种态度。30年的快速、不均衡的经济发展之后，很多人富起来了，物价也飞速上涨，很多人感到在这样的大环境下自己被时代遗忘了、缺少赚大钱的机会和社会关系。
The new creed can be hard, as a 26-year-old cultural events organizer learned.
The man, who asked for anonymity to protect his privacy, earns about 4,000 renminbi, or $600, a month, making even a modest apartment in an unfashionable district of Beijing unaffordable. These homes can cost about $3,000 per square meter, or about $280 per square foot. Housing inflation is severe. Ten years ago, a similar apartment cost about $345 per square meter.
这种金钱至上的人生信条会很残酷，一名不愿透露姓名的男性受访者深有体会。这名文化活动组织者月收入4000人民币，就算是北京偏远区域的一套普通公寓都负担不起。那样的房子每平米两万以上。中国目前的房屋价格上涨严重。十年前，类似的公寓房大概只要两三千每平米。
Instead, he tried to impress his girlfriend of three years by saving for a year to buy aniPhone 3. The newer iPhone 4 — a hot status symbol — had just gone on sale. But at about $900, that was beyond his means.
The phone was not enough. Last week, she left him, citing pressure from her parents to find a richer mate.
所以他只能用其它办法讨女友欢心。他用攒了一年的钱买了一部iPhone3给交往了三年的女友。象征地位的iPhone4已经开始降价了，但五六千块的价格让他无能无力。一部手机是不够的。上周，女友以来自父母的要找个有钱老公的压力为由跟他分手了。
He is heartbroken, believing, despite all, that his girlfriend truly loved him. “Why else did she live with me for three years?” — albeit in a rented apartment. Yet, he is philosophical, too.
“I understand her situation and the pressure from her family,” he said. “I also understand that her parents want their daughter to find someone who can give her a better life.”
他伤心欲绝，但尽管如此，仍相信女友曾真心爱过他。“不然他为什么跟我一起住了三年？”尽管是在租住的公寓里。但他还能保持冷静：“我理解他的处境和来自家庭的压力。我也能理解她的父母想让自己的女儿找到一个能给她提供更优越生活的伴侣。”
The only way to find love, he said, is to become rich. “The most important thing for me now, is to work and earn a living.” he said. “I need to grow stronger, support myself and my parents, and then my future girlfriend can have a good life.”
他说，得到爱情的唯一途径就是赚钱。“现在，对我来说最重要的事情就是工作和谋生。我得变强大，不仅要自食其力还要供养父母，那样我未来的女朋友就能生活得好一点。”
Such calculations have their critics. The hard-nosed attitude of Ms. Ma, the BMW woman, earned her a gentle reprimand recently from the film director Zhang Yimou. In an interview in The South China Morning Post, a Hong Kong newspaper, he urged young people to re-examine their values.
“I don’t think economic advancement and our yearning for love are mutually exclusive,” he said.
这样的想法也受到了各种批评。‘宝马女’马诺的现实态度受到了著名导演张艺谋温和的指责。在接受香港《南华早报》采访时，张艺谋呼吁年轻人重审自己的价值观。他说：“我认为经济发展和我们对爱情的渴望并不是互相排斥的。”
Mr. Zhang, who turns 59 on Sunday, represents an older generation that remembers the more egalitarian, if also poorer and more politically repressive, Maoist era, before the economic changes that unleashed the scramble for material advancement.
刚满59岁的张艺谋代表了毛泽东时代平等主义背景下更贫穷和政治压抑的一代人。那时，经济变化尚未引起人们对物质的追求。
His latest film, “Under the Hawthorn Tree,” depicts the innocent love between a teacher, Jing Qiu, and a geologist, Lao San. Set in 1975 toward the end of the Cultural Revolution, and without a BMW in sight, the film shows the teacher spending quite a lot of time smiling on her sweetheart’s bicycle. Love is the thing, it concludes.
张艺谋的最新影片《山楂树之恋》讲述了女教师静秋和地质工作者老三之间纯洁的爱情故事。发生在1975年、文革即将结束的背景之下，故事里没有宝马，只有静秋坐在老三的自行车上甜笑。爱令一切无往不胜。
Other productions have joined the debate.
“Fight the Landlord,” a play by Sun Yue that premiered in Shanghai last month, is another ringing defense of love in an age of materialism.
A character known as B, grilled by a potential mother-in-law about her very ordinary income, yells: “Don’t think that because I have nothing to be proud of you can insult and destroy me!”
“I have my dignity and pride,” B says, “and I don’t want to turn love, which I value so much, into something vulgar and pale!”
其它影视作品也纷纷加入这场关于爱情和现实的辩论。
由孙悦改编的话剧《斗地主》上个月在上海首演，这又是这个物欲横流的年代里一场响亮的‘爱情保卫战’。主角B的普通收入被准婆婆诟病，忍不住大喊：“别以为我没什么可骄傲的你就可以随便侮辱我！”B说：“我也有骄傲和自尊。我不愿把自己珍视的爱情变的庸俗、苍白!”
A new film, “Color Me Love,” celebrates the cult of materialism but also comes down, somewhat, on the side of love. Modeled on “The Devil Wears Prada,” and with product placement for Hermès, Versace and Diesel, it follows poor but gorgeous Fei as she arrives in Beijing to intern at a fashion magazine.
另一部影片《爱出色》大肆吹捧了对物质主义的狂热，但也稍稍赞美了下爱情。以影片《时尚女魔头》为蓝本的《爱出色》讲述了美丽窘迫的汪小菲来到北京在一家时尚杂志实习的故事，片中不乏爱马仕、范思哲和迪赛尔的植入广告。
“Fei, one day you’ll understand,” Zoe, her glamorous editor, cautions her. “Nothing is as important as the person you’ll spend the rest of your life with.”
A tumultuous courtship with a wacky artist named Yihong ends up with the couple united in New York. A closing shot shows her in his arms, a diamond on her finger. The real fantasy, perhaps, is love plus money.
杂志社的编辑Zoe提醒她说：“小菲，有一天你会明白，没有什么比能跟你共度余生的那个人还重要。”
在经历了一段轰轰烈烈的爱情纠葛后，小菲和先锋艺术家亦鸿在纽约重逢。小菲依偎在亦鸿怀里，手上闪耀着钻戒的光芒。也许，最终的梦想应该是爱情加财富。
Ms. Feng, who had failed to find a match for her apartmentless friend, said the demands that many Chinese women make on prospective mates reflected weakness, not power. Lower in status, they fear not getting what they want in life, and look to men to provide it.
“Women are very dependent,” she said. “I blame them. Why can’t they work hard and buy a house together with their man? But very few women today think like that.”
上文中提到的没能帮自己没房子的朋友介绍到女友的冯小姐说很多中国女性对未来伴侣的要求体现出的不是力量，而是软弱。由于地位较低，女性害怕得不到她们想要的，只能指望男人来提供一切。
冯小姐说：“现在的女性非常想依赖别人。这都怪她们自己。为什么不能自己努力工作然后跟自己的男人一起买套房子？但是现在很少有女性这么想。”
Few Chinese men do either, reinforcing the rules of the game. For the 26-year-old events organizer, losing his love to money was justifiable.
“We didn’t need to waste time on a relationship that was doomed to vanish,” he said.
其实，也很少有男人这么想，这更强化了游戏规则。对于那位26岁的活动组织人员来说，爱情败给金钱看似合理。他说：“我们没必要在注定要消失的爱情上浪费时间。”
BEIJING — Money really can buy you love in China — or at least that seems to be a common belief in this increasingly materialistic country.
在中国，钱真的能买到爱情。至少，在这个逐步物质化的国家，‘金钱买得到爱情’似乎已经成了一种普遍观念。
Many personal stories seem to confirm that the ideal mate is the one who can deliver a home and a car, among other things; sentiment is secondary.
很多人的故事似乎能够证实这一点：理想伴侣一定要有房有车，当然还要有其它东西；感情已经退居其次了。
However widespread this mercantilist spirit, not everyone thinks it is a good thing. A spate of Chinese films, plays and television shows have raised the question: What is love in an age of breakneck economic growth?
不管这种重商思想有多普遍，并非所有人都认为这是件好事儿。中国有一大批电影、戏剧和电视剧提出了这样一个问题：在这个经济极速发展的时代，爱情究竟是什么？
Many Chinese were shocked this year when a female contestant on a popular TV dating show, “If You Are the One,” announced: “I’d rather cry in a BMW than smile on a bicycle.” But others insisted that the contestant, Ma Nuo, now popularly known as “the BMW woman,” was merely expressing a social reality.
今年，一个广受欢迎的电视相亲节目《非诚勿扰》中，一名女嘉宾的一句“宁愿在宝马里哭，也不愿在自行车上笑”着实让很多中国观众大吃一惊。但是很多人相信，被冠以“宝马女”称呼的嘉宾马诺只是表达出了一种社会现实。
Rocketing property prices in recent years have contributed to such feelings, with many people in Beijing and other cities accepting the idea that a woman will pursue a relationship with a man only if he already owns an apartment.
在北京和其它城市的很多人正在逐步接受这样的想法：女人只愿意跟有房的男人谈‘感情’，而近年来飙升的房价已然成了催化剂。
Feng Yuan, a 26-year-old who works in a government education company, tried to set up a friend with a man she thought suitable.
“When she heard he didn’t own an apartment, she refused even to meet him,” recalled Ms. Feng. “She said, ‘What’s the point? Without an apartment, love isn’t possible.”’
26岁的Feng Yuan在一家政府教育机构工作。她曾想把一个女性朋友介绍给一个自己觉得合适的男人。Feng Yuan说：“她听说他没房子的之后，根本见都不愿意见。她说：‘那样有什么意义？没房子，爱情根本没可能。’”
Fueling these attitudes is a drumbeat of fear. After three decades of fast-paced, uneven economic growth, there is enormous anxiety among those who feel they are being left behind, lacking the opportunities and contacts to make big money while all around them others prosper and prices soar.
强烈的恐惧刺激着这种态度。30年的快速、不均衡的经济发展之后，很多人富起来了，物价也飞速上涨，很多人感到在这样的大环境下自己被时代遗忘了、缺少赚大钱的机会和社会关系。
The new creed can be hard, as a 26-year-old cultural events organizer learned.
The man, who asked for anonymity to protect his privacy, earns about 4,000 renminbi, or $600, a month, making even a modest apartment in an unfashionable district of Beijing unaffordable. These homes can cost about $3,000 per square meter, or about $280 per square foot. Housing inflation is severe. Ten years ago, a similar apartment cost about $345 per square meter.
这种金钱至上的人生信条会很残酷，一名不愿透露姓名的男性受访者深有体会。这名文化活动组织者月收入4000人民币，就算是北京偏远区域的一套普通公寓都负担不起。那样的房子每平米两万以上。中国目前的房屋价格上涨严重。十年前，类似的公寓房大概只要两三千每平米。
Instead, he tried to impress his girlfriend of three years by saving for a year to buy aniPhone 3. The newer iPhone 4 — a hot status symbol — had just gone on sale. But at about $900, that was beyond his means.
The phone was not enough. Last week, she left him, citing pressure from her parents to find a richer mate.
所以他只能用其它办法讨女友欢心。他用攒了一年的钱买了一部iPhone3给交往了三年的女友。象征地位的iPhone4已经开始降价了，但五六千块的价格让他无能无力。一部手机是不够的。上周，女友以来自父母的要找个有钱老公的压力为由跟他分手了。
He is heartbroken, believing, despite all, that his girlfriend truly loved him. “Why else did she live with me for three years?” — albeit in a rented apartment. Yet, he is philosophical, too.
“I understand her situation and the pressure from her family,” he said. “I also understand that her parents want their daughter to find someone who can give her a better life.”
他伤心欲绝，但尽管如此，仍相信女友曾真心爱过他。“不然他为什么跟我一起住了三年？”尽管是在租住的公寓里。但他还能保持冷静：“我理解他的处境和来自家庭的压力。我也能理解她的父母想让自己的女儿找到一个能给她提供更优越生活的伴侣。”
The only way to find love, he said, is to become rich. “The most important thing for me now, is to work and earn a living.” he said. “I need to grow stronger, support myself and my parents, and then my future girlfriend can have a good life.”
他说，得到爱情的唯一途径就是赚钱。“现在，对我来说最重要的事情就是工作和谋生。我得变强大，不仅要自食其力还要供养父母，那样我未来的女朋友就能生活得好一点。”
Such calculations have their critics. The hard-nosed attitude of Ms. Ma, the BMW woman, earned her a gentle reprimand recently from the film director Zhang Yimou. In an interview in The South China Morning Post, a Hong Kong newspaper, he urged young people to re-examine their values.
“I don’t think economic advancement and our yearning for love are mutually exclusive,” he said.
这样的想法也受到了各种批评。‘宝马女’马诺的现实态度受到了著名导演张艺谋温和的指责。在接受香港《南华早报》采访时，张艺谋呼吁年轻人重审自己的价值观。他说：“我认为经济发展和我们对爱情的渴望并不是互相排斥的。”
Mr. Zhang, who turns 59 on Sunday, represents an older generation that remembers the more egalitarian, if also poorer and more politically repressive, Maoist era, before the economic changes that unleashed the scramble for material advancement.
刚满59岁的张艺谋代表了毛泽东时代平等主义背景下更贫穷和政治压抑的一代人。那时，经济变化尚未引起人们对物质的追求。
His latest film, “Under the Hawthorn Tree,” depicts the innocent love between a teacher, Jing Qiu, and a geologist, Lao San. Set in 1975 toward the end of the Cultural Revolution, and without a BMW in sight, the film shows the teacher spending quite a lot of time smiling on her sweetheart’s bicycle. Love is the thing, it concludes.
张艺谋的最新影片《山楂树之恋》讲述了女教师静秋和地质工作者老三之间纯洁的爱情故事。发生在1975年、文革即将结束的背景之下，故事里没有宝马，只有静秋坐在老三的自行车上甜笑。爱令一切无往不胜。
Other productions have joined the debate.
“Fight the Landlord,” a play by Sun Yue that premiered in Shanghai last month, is another ringing defense of love in an age of materialism.
A character known as B, grilled by a potential mother-in-law about her very ordinary income, yells: “Don’t think that because I have nothing to be proud of you can insult and destroy me!”
“I have my dignity and pride,” B says, “and I don’t want to turn love, which I value so much, into something vulgar and pale!”
其它影视作品也纷纷加入这场关于爱情和现实的辩论。
由孙悦改编的话剧《斗地主》上个月在上海首演，这又是这个物欲横流的年代里一场响亮的‘爱情保卫战’。主角B的普通收入被准婆婆诟病，忍不住大喊：“别以为我没什么可骄傲的你就可以随便侮辱我！”B说：“我也有骄傲和自尊。我不愿把自己珍视的爱情变的庸俗、苍白!”
A new film, “Color Me Love,” celebrates the cult of materialism but also comes down, somewhat, on the side of love. Modeled on “The Devil Wears Prada,” and with product placement for Hermès, Versace and Diesel, it follows poor but gorgeous Fei as she arrives in Beijing to intern at a fashion magazine.
另一部影片《爱出色》大肆吹捧了对物质主义的狂热，但也稍稍赞美了下爱情。以影片《时尚女魔头》为蓝本的《爱出色》讲述了美丽窘迫的汪小菲来到北京在一家时尚杂志实习的故事，片中不乏爱马仕、范思哲和迪赛尔的植入广告。
“Fei, one day you’ll understand,” Zoe, her glamorous editor, cautions her. “Nothing is as important as the person you’ll spend the rest of your life with.”
A tumultuous courtship with a wacky artist named Yihong ends up with the couple united in New York. A closing shot shows her in his arms, a diamond on her finger. The real fantasy, perhaps, is love plus money.
杂志社的编辑Zoe提醒她说：“小菲，有一天你会明白，没有什么比能跟你共度余生的那个人还重要。”
在经历了一段轰轰烈烈的爱情纠葛后，小菲和先锋艺术家亦鸿在纽约重逢。小菲依偎在亦鸿怀里，手上闪耀着钻戒的光芒。也许，最终的梦想应该是爱情加财富。
Ms. Feng, who had failed to find a match for her apartmentless friend, said the demands that many Chinese women make on prospective mates reflected weakness, not power. Lower in status, they fear not getting what they want in life, and look to men to provide it.
“Women are very dependent,” she said. “I blame them. Why can’t they work hard and buy a house together with their man? But very few women today think like that.”
上文中提到的没能帮自己没房子的朋友介绍到女友的冯小姐说很多中国女性对未来伴侣的要求体现出的不是力量，而是软弱。由于地位较低，女性害怕得不到她们想要的，只能指望男人来提供一切。
冯小姐说：“现在的女性非常想依赖别人。这都怪她们自己。为什么不能自己努力工作然后跟自己的男人一起买套房子？但是现在很少有女性这么想。”
Few Chinese men do either, reinforcing the rules of the game. For the 26-year-old events organizer, losing his love to money was justifiable.
“We didn’t need to waste time on a relationship that was doomed to vanish,” he said.
其实，也很少有男人这么想，这更强化了游戏规则。对于那位26岁的活动组织人员来说，爱情败给金钱看似合理。他说：“我们没必要在注定要消失的爱情上浪费时间。”
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