Orchard叔叔的櫻桃園

于爾根·福特　常玉田/譯

In April， my uncles cherry orchard is an amazing sight. I used to score girls by taking them on a ride past Frauenstein， up on a hill where you could see the trees， the whole lot of them sparkling white and pink in the breeze. Then wed go for a walk through the orchard to my special tree， where I had a ladder set up so you could get to one of the branches in the crown. Wed smoke a joint and then climb up higher to where you could stick your head out on top. It felt like coming up from a dive in an ocean of cherry blossoms， like taking a swim in cherry blossom seas. Girls loved it， and to be honest， I loved it too. The girls were just an added bonus.

我叔叔的櫻桃園，一到4月，景色便美不勝收。我過去泡妞時經常開車帶著女孩，經過弗勞恩施泰因，開上一座小山，那里可以居高臨下俯視那些櫻桃樹，看那滿園白色和粉色的櫻桃花，微風中光彩照人。然后，我們會步行穿過果園，走到我特別喜歡的那棵樹前——我早在樹旁放了一架梯子，這樣我們就可以爬到樹冠中的樹杈上。我們會抽一根大麻卷煙，之后爬到更高的地方，把頭伸出樹葉。那感覺，就像是在櫻桃花的海洋中下潛出水，就像在櫻桃花的大海里游泳。女孩兒們喜歡那么鬧，說實話，我也喜歡。跟女孩兒們廝混只不過是個捎帶。

At night， Id often drink whiskey with my uncle and wed take walks through the moonlit orchard， talking about the old days when I was a boy and my parents were still alive. Hes a good man， my uncle， and a great cherry farmer.

晚上，我經常和叔叔一起喝點兒威士忌。我倆會在月光下的果園里散步，邊走邊聊從前的好時光，那時我還小，我的父母都還活著。他是個好人，我是說我的叔叔，櫻桃種得也不錯。

Recently， though， things have been different. First of all， Im older and Ive been growing a bit of a paunch2. My good looks and boyish charms are getting away from me. I can tell. Convincing girls—women， really—to take a ride with me is more of a challenge than it used to be.

然而，最近事情出現了變化。首先，我年歲漸長，還有點兒長肚子了。我本來挺英俊，很有小伙子的魅力，如今卻不那么俊朗了，男子漢氣概也少多了。這我都知道。說服女孩子——實際上我只能跟少婦搭訕了——和我一起開車兜風比以前難多了。

And the orchards facing worse problems： my uncle says that every year， summer has been coming earlier and the cherries are rotting on the trees. Hes lost money for three years running. One year， half his harvest had worms， and many trees are dying from a bark disease related to the weather. Uncle tried to explain it to me， how the health of the trees hangs in a precarious balance， the way the weather， the worms， the water in the soil， and the fertilizer have to come together. “Like a hammock strung up on ten different poles，” he said. “If one is missing or hanging too high or too low， youre going to roll out of the hammock and bump your head.”

叔叔的櫻桃園面臨的問題更嚴重：我叔叔說，如今夏天來得一年比一年早，櫻桃還在樹上就開始腐爛了。他已經連續三年虧損。有一年，他收獲的櫻桃中五成都有蟲子，許多果樹都死于與天氣有關的一種樹皮病。叔叔盡量向我解釋，果樹長得好不好，取決于多種不穩定的因素能否達到平衡，要想長得好，天氣、蟲害程度、土壤中的水分、所施的化肥都得合適才行。他說：“就像一張吊床掛在十根柱子上。如果少了一根柱子，或者哪一根上掛得太高或太低，你都會從吊床上掉下來撞傷頭。”

A cherry orchard with dead trees is a sorry sight. Cherries with worms in them are an awful thing. It can scar you for life， biting into a worm， spitting it out and then checking the remaining half of the cherry to find a wiggling mealy-white maggot3. This happened to a redhead I picked up in a Frankfurt biergarten last summer， and I doubt shell ever eat another cherry again in her life. She gagged for several minutes， didnt want to come for dinner afterwards， and hasnt called me since. Uncle definitely had to do something about his orchard， or pack it in for good.

櫻桃園有枯樹令人遺憾。櫻桃里有蟲子令人惡心。吃一口櫻桃咬到一條蟲子，把它吐掉，再看看剩下那半個櫻桃，卻發現一條粉白色的蛆蟲在蠕動——這可能叫你半輩子都心有余悸。這樣的事我見過：那是去年夏天，我在法蘭克福一家啤酒店里搭訕上了一個紅頭發的女人，就是她吃到了蟲子。我懷疑她這輩子都不會再吃櫻桃了。她干嘔了好幾分鐘，嘔完后不想來跟我共進晚餐了，后來也沒再給我打過電話。我叔叔肯定得對他的櫻桃園做點兒什么，要不就干脆關門大吉得了。

He really didnt have much of a choice， then， when the man from Monsanto came with his suitcase full of studies and sample seeds， and made his proposition. Genetically modified cherry fertilizer had been used to great success in Japan， home of the most amazing cherry blossoms in the world， and even Washington， D.C. was considering Monsanto products for its famous trees at the Jefferson Memorial. The first year was free， the case studies were more than promising， the research nothing short of amazing. Uncle signed， and soon began to spread the fertilizer that subtly altered the DNA of his trees and made them resistant to worms， bark rot， and the onslaught of the seasons.

后來，孟山都公司的那個人帶著裝滿研究報告和種子樣本的手提箱來找我叔叔了，并提出了建議。當時，叔叔真的別無選擇。轉基因櫻桃化肥已在世界上最令人驚嘆的櫻花之鄉日本施用并獲得了巨大成功，甚至美國首都華盛頓也在考慮為杰斐遜紀念堂周邊那聞名于世的櫻花樹施用孟山都公司的化肥。第一年是免費的；那些案例說得言之鑿鑿，那些研究令人深感驚訝。叔叔在合同上簽了字，很快就開始施肥。這種肥料巧妙地改變了他那些果樹的DNA，使它們能夠抵抗病蟲害、樹皮腐爛病和季節交替對果木的傷害。

I could never get a satisfying answer out of him about the side effects， whether or not the man from Monsanto had told him about that. I first noticed it in early April， when I took a girl named Sue I picked up at an orphanage in Wuppertal to the orchard. We were sitting on the top branch of my special tree， high as kites， sticking our heads through the canopy4 of blossoms， when Sue asked me why all the tiny leaves had tiny corporate logos on them. Wed smoked some powerful Amsterdam weed， and so I giggled for a bit before I realized she was serious and investigated a blossom myself. She was right： every little petal showed a company logo： the Nike swoosh5， the Yahoo “y” with exclamation point， a tiny Coca-Cola mark， the McDonalds golden arches， and so forth. Sue and I laughed and laughed， but later that night， with a glass of Scotch in my hand， I asked Uncle about it， and he just shrugged.

至于那些化肥的副作用，無論孟山都公司的那個人是否告訴過叔叔，他都始終沒有給我一個滿意的回答。我第一次注意到化肥的副作用是在4月初，當時我帶著一個名叫蘇的女孩去了櫻桃園——我是在伍珀塔爾一家孤兒院結識的她。我倆坐在我特別喜歡的那棵樹最高的樹枝上，就像兩只風箏，把頭伸出櫻桃花開滿的樹冠，這時蘇突然問我，為什么所有的小葉子上都有微小的公司標志。此前我倆剛抽了一支特沖的阿姆斯特丹大麻，所以我笑了好一會兒才意識到她是認真的，于是仔細觀察了一朵花。蘇是對的，每一片小花瓣上都有一個公司標識：耐克公司的對勾、代表雅虎的字母y還帶著個感嘆號、可口可樂的小標志、麥當勞的金色拱門等等。我和蘇大笑了好一陣子，但那天晚上晚些時候，我手里拿著一杯蘇格蘭威士忌向我叔叔問起這件事，他只是聳了聳肩。

“Remember how I told you about the hammock？ Now my orchard is propped up like a Formica counter6—the weather and the worms， none of it really matters any more.”

“還記得我拿吊床打的比方嗎？現在我的果園就靠化學撐著，跟一個佛米卡柜臺沒什么兩樣——天氣啊、害蟲啊，都不再是個事兒了?！?/p>

And he was right. In the summer， none of the trees got sick， and not a single cherry had worms. Instead， they showed the logos on their ripe red skins. People didnt seem to mind， and bought cherries like they did in the old days. I never took another girl there again， but Uncle thought it was a small price to pay for a healthy orchard and a booming business.

叔叔說得對極了。夏天里，沒有一棵果樹生病，也沒有一顆櫻桃長蟲子。在成熟的紅櫻桃果皮上倒是出現了多家公司的標識。人們似乎并不介意，還像過去一樣買櫻桃吃。我再也沒有帶女孩兒去櫻桃園；而叔叔認為，為了果園生機勃勃，為了櫻桃種植生意蒸蒸日上，那不過是付出的很小的代價。