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发帖数: 22064 | 1 http://cn.nytimes.com/world/20170609/kenyans-fear-chinese-backed-railway-is-another-lunatic-express/dual/
Nairobi Journal
Kenyans Fear Chinese-Backed Railway Is Another ‘Lunatic Express’
By KIMIKO DE FREYTAS-TAMURA June 9, 2017
内罗毕日志
KIMIKO DE FREYTAS-TAMURA 2017年6月9日
NAIROBI, Kenya — With sloping, charcoal-gray walls that resemble the
elegant curves of a luxury car, Nairobi's sleek new railway station, built
by China, looks more like an airport terminal reserved for wealthy Kenyans
and their private jets.
肯尼亚内罗毕——由中国建造的内罗毕新火车站造型优美，有着类似豪华轿车优雅曲线
的深灰色倾斜墙面，看起来更像是肯尼亚有钱人及其私人飞机专用的机场航站楼。
Given the price tag, it might just as well be.
从它高昂的建造成本看，似乎也是如此。
President Uhuru Kenyatta's government spent $4 billion on a 300-mile railway
connecting the capital to the Indian Ocean port of Mombasa, the most
expensive infrastructure project since Kenya's independence 54 years ago and
one-fifth of its national budget.
乌胡鲁·肯雅塔(Uhuru Kenyatta)总统花40亿美元修了一条300英里（约合480公里）长
的铁路，将首都与印度洋港口城市蒙巴萨连接起来，这是肯尼亚独立54年来造价最高的
基础建设工程，相当于国家预算的五分之一。
本周，在标准轨铁路崭新的内罗毕站，肯尼亚铁路的一名工作人员目送从内罗毕到蒙巴
萨的火车离开。
?
肯尼亚的“2号疯狂铁路”
由于成本巨大，且偿还中国贷款的任务同等艰巨，一些肯尼亚人给这条铁路起了个绰号
：2号疯狂铁路——一条英国殖民时期造价不菲、导致数千劳工丧命的铁路。
Eager to portray it as a major achievement ahead of national elections in
August, Mr. Kenyatta opened the so-called Standard Gauge Railway last
Wednesday. But the fanfare was overshadowed by a concern that has been
snowballing for months, filling many Kenyans with mild terror: How can the
country repay its monstrous debt to China?
肯雅塔急于在八月份的全国大选之前将之塑造成自己的一项重大业绩，于是在上周三开
通了所谓的内罗毕标准轨铁路(Standard Gauge Railway)。但这大张旗鼓的声势被一种
不断加重的担忧蒙上了阴影，让许多肯尼亚人有些担心：这个国家要如何偿还欠中国的
巨额债务呢？
China's Eximbank accounts for about 90 percent of the Nairobi-Mombasa
project. The loan has already pushed the Kenyan debt above 50 percent of
output, and imports of Chinese supplies and materials required to build the
railway are making people anxious about Kenya's worsening trade imbalance
with China.
中国进出口银行为内罗毕—蒙巴萨项目提供了大约90%的资金。这项贷款令肯尼亚的债
务比国内产值高出50%，而且修建这条铁路需要从中国进口物资，这也令人们对肯尼亚
与中国日益恶化的贸易不平衡心存担忧。
The Kenyan government says that the railway will increase gross domestic
product by 1.5 percent, and that the loan will be paid back in about four
years. The government is also aiming to run the trains on electricity.
肯尼亚政府表示，这条铁路将使国内生产总值增加1.5%，这项债务会在大约四年时间里
偿清。政府还打算在这条线路上跑电力火车。
Ken Mugane, a Nairobi businessman who went on a test ride a few days before
it opened officially, said the train was impressive, echoing widespread
opinion that it would improve trade and reduce congestion. The Express
service cuts travel time by about half — to five hours from 10.
在正式通车几天前体验过试运行的内罗毕商人肯·穆甘雷(Ken Mugane)表示，火车给他
留下深刻印象，这与一种普遍存在的观点一致，即它将提升贸易，减少拥堵。这条高速
铁路能将这段旅途的时间缩短近一半——从10小时减少至5小时。
But very little of it conjured an image of Kenya, he said, except maybe for
the landscape. “It needs to look like it's ours,” he said. “After all, we
’re going to pay for it through our noses, aren’t we?”
但他表示，你除了沿途的风景，它一点也不肯尼亚。“它需要看起来像是我们的，”他
说。“毕竟，辛辛苦苦为它埋单的是我们，对吧？”
Small details seemed designed to remind Kenyans that the project wasn’t a
free ride, he joked. Pamphlets were in Chinese. Some staff members wore
uniforms of red and gold — the colors of China's flag. Even the music on
the train wasn’t Kenyan, he complained.
他开玩笑说，小细节的设计似乎是为了提醒肯尼亚人，该项目不是顺风车。车上的小册
子用的是中文，部分工作人员穿的制服是红色和金色——中国国旗的颜色。他抱怨说，
就连火车上的音乐都不是肯尼亚的。
The biggest surprise, Mr. Mugane said, was seeing a sculpture of Mao Zedong
at the Mombasa station. (It was actually of Zheng He, a 15th-century Chinese
explorer who sailed to East Africa.) The man putting it on a plinth was
Chinese, Mr. Mugane noted. “Even that wasn’t being done by a Kenyan,” he
said ruefully.
穆甘恩说，最惊讶的是在蒙巴萨站看到了一尊毛泽东雕塑。（那其实是15世纪航海到达
东非的中国探险家郑和。）他指出，正在把塑像安放在基座上那名男子也是中国人。“
就连这件事都不是肯尼亚人做的，”他不满地说。
Despite such misgivings, Kenya wouldn’t have had its first new railway for
more than a century – the last one was built by the British in 1901 – if
it weren’t for Chinese loans and China's strong record of getting projects
built on time. It took less than four years for the line to be completed.
尽管存在此类疑虑，但如果不是中国的贷款和中国按时完工的良好记录，肯尼亚也不会
建成一个多世纪以来的首条新铁路——上一条铁路是英国在1901年修建的。这条铁路施
工耗时不到四年。
China's state-run news media has celebrated its completion as demonstrating
a Chinese commitment to African development.
中国官方新闻媒体称赞说，它的完工彰显了中国对非洲发展的责任感。
The new Kenyan line “bears the Kenyan people's dream for this century of
striving for national development and prosperity,” a Chinese vice foreign
minister, Zhang Ming, said in Nairobi this month. “This also shows China's
firm support for Kenya achieving independent and sustainable development.”
肯尼亚这条新铁路“承载着肯尼亚人民致力于国家发展繁荣的世纪梦想”，中国外交部
副部长张明本月在内罗毕说。“也体现了中国对肯尼亚实现自主可持续发展的坚定支持
。”
But on Kenyan television, reports about the railway's opening invariably
turned to its inflated cost, and to questions of corruption. On one show, a
politician who had switched allegiances from the opposition to Mr. Kenyatta'
s party and who extolled the railway's virtues was quickly submerged by
calls from viewers. “You are lying,” one person said. “You were bribed.”
但在肯尼亚的电视上，有关该铁路通车的报道无一例外地转向了它巨大的成本和腐败问
题。在一档节目上，一名从在野党加入肯雅塔所在政党并宣扬该铁路优点的政客，很快
便被观众的电话淹没。“你在撒谎，”其中一人说。“你被贿赂了。”
As a result of the railway's gargantuan cost, and the equally enormous task
of repaying China, some Kenyans already have a nickname for it: the Lunatic
Express 2.
因为该铁路成本巨大，并且偿还中国贷款的任务同等艰巨，一些肯尼亚人给它起了个绰
号：2号疯狂铁路。
The name Lunatic Express was coined more than a century ago to describe a
colonial British railway so costly it was considered a “gigantic folly,”
even by the standards of the Empire. The 660-mile line linked Lake Victoria
with Mombasa. Thousands of laborers, most of them Indians, died from harsh
working conditions, disease, hostile tribes and even man-eating lions.
疯狂铁路这个名字是一个多世纪以前发明出来的，指的是英国殖民时期一条造价非常昂
贵，以至即便是按照帝国的标准也被认为“愚蠢至极”的铁路。该铁路全长660英里，
连接了维多利亚湖和蒙巴萨。数千名劳工死于恶劣的工作条件、疾病、心怀敌意的部落
，甚至是吃人的狮子，其中大部分是印度人。
In recent years, riding the train had become an act of lunacy itself.
Passengers boarded a rusting, creaking millipede overtaken by trucks, buses
and grazing animals that had claimed parts of the railway as resting spots.
近年来，乘坐那趟火车本身成了一种疯狂的行为。乘客像是登上了一条锈迹斑斑、嘎吱
作响的千足虫，被卡车、大巴和吃草的动物甩在身后。动物甚至占领了部分铁路，将其
作为栖身之地。
The SGR, its Chinese successor, travels much faster, averaging 74 miles an
hour, and is designed to carry 22 million tons of cargo a year. Its
construction involved little foreign labor or murderous animals. The lunacy,
many Kenyans say, is the idea of generations being chained to China, long
after Mr. Kenyatta and his coterie leave office.
代替它的标准轨铁路运行速度大大提升，平均时速74英里，设计的年载货量为2200万吨
。它的施工几乎没有涉及外国工人和致人死亡的动物。很多肯尼亚人说，它的疯狂之处
在于，在肯雅塔及其集团下台很久后，一代又一代人将仍和中国拴在一起。
“It's madness,” said Samuel Nyandemo, a senior lecturer in economics at
Nairobi University, who was visibly outraged. Why, he almost shouted, is the
railway twice as expensive as a similar project in neighboring Ethiopia or
Morocco? And why was the tendering process done behind closed doors, if not
to allow Kenya's political elite to pocket vast sums of kickbacks?
“真是疯了，”内罗毕大学(Nairobi University)的经济学高级讲师塞缪尔·尼安德莫
(Samuel Nyandemo)说。他的愤慨之情溢于言表，几乎喊了起来。这条铁路为什么比邻
国埃塞俄比亚或摩洛哥类似的项目贵一倍？如果不是为了让肯尼亚的政治精英能够赚取
巨额回扣，为什么不公开进行投标？
“This is another type of lunacy,” he said.
“这是另一种疯狂，”他说。
There are parallels between the old Lunatic line and its replacement, said
Elias Randiga, the assistant director of the Railway Museum in Nairobi, a
stone's throw from the original Nairobi Station.
紧邻原来的内罗毕车站的内罗毕铁路博物馆(Railway Museum)助理馆长埃利亚斯·兰迪
加(Elias Randiga)说，旧疯狂铁路和它的替代品之间有诸多相似之处。
Shabby and dilapidated, it had imposing lettering on one wall that read (as
if to drive the point that lower classes weren’t welcome), “Upper Class
Booking and Ticketing Office.”
老车站破败不堪、摇摇欲坠，一面墙上醒目地写着“一等车厢订票、购票处”（似乎是
为了明确不欢迎低等人群这一点）。
Opened in 1899, the building was constructed on marshland used by Maasai
pastoralists to graze their cattle. The name Nairobi is derived from the
Maasai word meaning “a place of cool waters.”
1899年对外开放的该建筑是建在马赛族牧民用来放牛的一片沼泽地上的。内罗毕这个名
字源自马赛语中的一个词，意思是“凉水之地”。
Today, a cacophonous, chaotic city shoves itself onto the grounds of the
prim Victorian station. “Matatu” buses unceremoniously dump off passengers
, while businessmen in suits buy fruit from village women. A bright-red
election bus spilling over with President Kenyatta's supporters recently
snarled traffic, as some hopped off and strutted to Kenyan pop music and the
honking horns of irritated drivers.
如今，城市的喧闹和混乱蔓延到了一本正经的维多利亚时代风格的车站四周。“马塔图
”公交车随意下客，身着西服套装的商人则向村妇购买水果。前不久，一辆挤满肯雅塔
总统的支持者的鲜红色选举大巴堵塞了交通，一些人跳下车，在肯尼亚流行音乐和愤怒
的司机按响的汽车喇叭声中阔步前行。
The British railway, Mr. Randiga said, was built to extract and ship out
natural resources from the African interior, something that many Westerners
frequently accuse China of doing.
兰迪加说，英国修建那条铁路是为了发掘并把自然资源从非洲内陆运出来。现在，很多
西方人经常以这个理由指责中国。
The Indian laborers working for the British faced a hostile environment,
including the sheer physical challenge of laying down 17,000 miles of track
that climbed into mountains and then descended into the Great Rift Valley.
当年为英国工作的印度劳工面临的环境颇为险恶，包括仅凭人力铺设先是穿山越岭，然
后又要下到东非大裂谷(Great Rift Valley)中的1.7万英里铁轨。
More than 4,000 people died during the railway's construction. Among them,
dozens were killed and eaten by lions, including one British man who was
dragged out of his bed by one. “Tsavo camp remained very much a man-eater's
chophouse,” wrote Charles Miller in “The Lunatic Express,” a book about
the railway's construction, referring to the region that became Tsavo
National Park.
铁路施工期间，4000多人死亡。其中数十人是被狮子吃掉的，包括一名英国男子。他被
一头狮子从床上拖走。“察沃营地依然很像一家食人动物餐厅，”查尔斯·米勒(
Charles Miller)在介绍该铁路的修建过程的著作《疯狂铁路》(The Lunatic Express)
中写道。他指的是后来成为察沃国家公园(Tsavo National Park)的相关地区。
Lion attacks were so bad that Indian laborers went on strike, Mr. Randiga
said. “There was a myth among Indians that they were targeted because they
ate spice and lions liked spice,” he said, taking out a small plastic box
from a drawer and presenting it. In it were century-old claws that belonged
to one of the lions, yellowed and smooth like pieces of ivory. (“I keep
them under lock and key,” he said.)
兰迪加说，狮子袭击人类的情况非常严重，以至于印度劳工开始罢工。“当年，印度人
中流传着一个错误观念，认为他们成为攻击目标是因为他们吃香料，而狮子也喜欢香料
，”他说，并从抽屉里取出一个小塑料盒给我们看。盒子里放着一个世纪前的某头狮子
的爪子。它们已经变成了黄色，光滑得像象牙制品。（“我把它们锁了起来，”他说。）
The Chinese railway has also not been without controversy. At least 10
elephants were killed during construction when they collided with trains,
according to Save the Elephants, a nongovernmental group.
中国修建的这条铁路也不是没有争议。据非政府组织“拯救大象”(Save the
Elephants)称，施工期间，至少10头大象被火车撞死。
Just as there has been local opposition to the Chinese-made railway over
land issues, the British were attacked by a tribe led by a man who had
prophesied that an “Iron Snake” would lure its people and colonize them.
就像中国修建的这条铁路因为土地问题而遭到地方的反对一样，英国人当年也受到一个
部落的袭击。率领该部落的男子预言，一条“铁蛇”会引诱民众，并对他们进行殖民统
治。
“Which turned out to be true,” said Mr. Randiga.
“结果预言成真，”兰迪加说。
He proceeded to recite a poem by a British politician, Henry Labouchere, who
opposed the railway's construction back in the early 1900s. It says, in
part:
他接着背诵了20世纪初反对修建该铁路的英国政治家亨利·拉布歇雷(Henry
Labouchere)的一首诗。其中几句写道：
Where it is going to, nobody knows.
没人知道，它去哪里。
What is the use of it, none can conjecture.
没人明白，它有何用处。
What it will carry there's none can define.
没人清楚，它将装载什么。
It is clearly nought but a lunatic line.
它很明显，只是一条疯狂铁路。
Mr. Randiga paused, and laughed. “We have the same debate today.”
兰迪加停下来，并笑了起来。“我们如今进行着同样的争论。”
储百亮(Chris Buckley)自北京对本文有报道贡献。
翻译：纽约时报中文网 | t******0
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