美式发音 适合泛听
记得中国前国家足球队主教练米卢说过一句话:态度决定一切。还有人说,有什么样的态度就有什么样的人生。听了下面几个主人公的故事,你惭愧吗?
I am a 1)dwarf. God made me this way. I’m little, just like He made you have brown hair and blue eyes.
我是一名侏儒。是上帝把我造成这个样子,小个子,就像是他让你有褐色的头发和蓝色的眼睛一样。
Based on birth records, it’s estimated that there are at least 15,000 people with dwarfism in the United States. And there are more than 200 different types of dwarfism. What these people have in common is their unique application of a skill that every human being learns in one way or another: how to adapt to the world around you, regardless of who or what or how big the world thinks you are.
根据出生记录的资料,美国估计至少有一万五千个侏儒,而侏儒的种类有两百多种。这些人的共通之处就是他们独树一帜地运用所有人都会通过某种方式学会的一项本领:不管别人怎么样看你、你的身份和身材,自己要如何适应你周围的环境。
Susie (Campbell), at 3’10”, has the most common form called 2)achondroplasia. Susie’s achondroplasia came from a 3)mutation in a gene from her father. Her parents and brothers are all average sized. And when she was born in West Texas in 1961, her mother got some 4)sage advice from her grandmother.
苏丝身高只有三英尺十英寸(约1.17米),她患的软骨发育不全症是侏儒病中最常见的一种,她的病源自父亲体内一个基因的变异。她的父母和兄弟的身材都属正常。1961年她在得克萨斯州西部出生时,她母亲从自己的母亲那里得到睿智的意见。
Susie: “Take her home, love her.” And my mother had no doubt. She just needed that reassurance from her mother. Here we are, you know, 45 years later.
苏丝:“把她带回家,好好爱她。”我母亲本来对这一点就没有疑问,她只不过是需要从她母亲那里找到安慰。你看,45年过去了,我还好好的。
At home in Maryland, Susie’s own family has gone to extraordinary lengths to extend that philosophy. They adopted a young dwarf named Suscha from a Russian 5)orphanage.
在马里兰的家中,苏丝自己的小家不遗余力地实践这种观念。他们从俄罗斯的一家孤儿院收养了一名叫莎莎的小侏儒。
Mark (Susie’s Husband): They brought this little girl in and she walked in, and this little girl was looking down at her feet like this and she just looked up every once [in] a while and we both just, right at that moment, fell in love. It was quite a powerful moment.
马克(苏丝的丈夫):他们带着她走进来,小女孩两眼盯着自己的双脚,每隔一会儿就会抬头看一下,当时我们俩就在那一瞬间喜欢上了她。那真是一个很美好的时刻。
Susie: What comes after 19?
Suscha: Twenty-one.
Susie: Say “twenty.”
Suscha: Twenty.
苏丝:19后面跟着是什么?
莎莎:21。
苏丝:20。
莎莎:20。
Suscha’s two front teeth are missing. That’s normal for a 6-year-old. But because of the design of her jaw, her tongue also gets in the way of learning to pronounce words. When she’s an adult, her 6)skull will, in fact, grow larger than average. With Suscha, there are also unanswered questions. She has a form of dwarfism that is unknown to doctors, complicated by the fact that she was abandoned and no family history is available for her. Her legs are not like a typical dwarf’s. She stands and walks on her toes in a kind of painful half 7)crouch. Next year, Suscha is scheduled to have surgery in hopes of correcting the problem. In the meantime, the Campbells have given her a life in a 8)suburban neighborhood where she can be a kid. And the Campbells can only map her future one day at a time.
莎莎前面的两颗门牙掉了,这对六岁的小孩子来说很正常。但她颌的结构决定的她的舌头会妨碍她学发音。等她长大后,她的头骨会变得比常人大。而且对莎莎来说,还有其它未有答案的问题。她患的侏儒症对医生来说是全新的,但她的情况更为复杂,因为她被亲生家庭抛弃,而造成她的家庭病史无从知晓。她的双腿与常见的侏儒不同,她用脚趾站立和行走,形成一个半蹲伏的痛苦姿势。明年,莎莎会进行手术来矫正这个毛病。与此同时,坎贝尔一家让她在市郊过着她的童年。对于她的未来,他们只能随遇而安。
Susie: She’s our rare little diamond.
苏丝:她是我们珍贵的小宝贝。
Reporter: What has it meant to you to have Suscha in your family?
记者:你们家有了莎莎意味着什么?
Susie: Oh, God, it’s meant a lot. For me, for Mark, for Joshua.
苏丝:噢,天啊,太多了。对我,对马克,对乔舒亚来说都一样。
Joshua is still another story from the Campbell family. He is Susie and Mark’s 9-year-old biological son. And he already towers over his mother because he is not a dwarf. He is a kid of average height who has absorbed the unusual diversity in his family in his own way.
在坎贝尔这一家里,乔舒亚情况却不同。他是苏丝和马克九岁的亲生儿子,他现在已经比妈妈高了,因为他并不是一名侏儒,身高正常。他以自己的方式消化着这个不寻常的缤纷家庭。
Reporter: Do you have to teach other kids about your mom and dad or do they know them?
记者:你是不是得跟其他小孩解释你父母的事?他们知道你父母的事吗?
Joshua: Yeah. I have to tell them that they were made by God, you know? And I…I think it’s very nice to have them as my parents and I love them. That’s what I tell to the little kids.
乔舒亚:对。我得跟他们说,他们是上帝创造的,你知道吧。我……我觉得有这样的父母很好,我爱他们。我就是这样告诉那些小孩子的。
To complete this remarkable family portrait, there is Mark, who is a systems analyst with the Social Security Administration. He has still another type of dwarfism, much more rare called 9)hypochondroplasia. At 4’7”, Mark is taller than most other dwarfs. His body proportions are closer to an average human’s, but his arms are disproportionately short.
要完整地呈现这个与众不同的家庭的面貌,还要包括马克的故事。他是美国社会保障管理局的系统分析员。他患的是另一种更为罕见的叫软骨发育欠全的侏儒病。身高四英尺七英寸(约1.4米)的马克比绝大多数的侏儒都要高,他身体比例比较接近正常人,但他的双臂短得不成比例。
Four people, three dwarfs, no two alike, one family.
就这样,四口人,其中三人是侏儒,但又无两人相似,他们组成了一个家庭。
Reporter: When you think of your family and what makes your family unique, does height even enter into that equation?
记者:你想想你的家庭,想想你们家的特别之处,身高会是其中的一部分吗?
Susie: Uhm-uhm. We are a family. We’re a mother, father, a son and a daughter. I take them to school. They clean their room. I discipline them. We’re just like any other family. No different.
苏丝:不,我们是一家人,有父亲、母亲、儿子和女儿。我送他们上学,他们要整理自己的房间,我对他们进行管教。我们就跟其它家庭一样,没有什么不同。
翻译:丁一 