读博,读什么.docx

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读博,读什么?(柳东阳)
Working on a Doctoral Degree — what are you working on? (苗德岁)
 
母亲有位远亲,据说在英国,八十年代终于回国探亲。母亲第一次和我说起人家是博士,当回国看到国内的烟囱冒着黑烟时,很有感叹称黑烟中可以提炼出好多东西,这样冒出去白白浪费了;还有不可考证的是英国人在他体内注射了药物,如果不按时回去,就会发作而死。童年的印象很深刻,现在还有记忆,一是知道了有个“博士”这个名称,二是听到到“西方外国”就联想到从烟囱里提炼东西,感觉人家好聪明。
 
My mother has a distant relative, who was said to live in England and came back to visit his relatives in China in the 1980s. My mother first mentioned to me that he is a PhD, and that during his visit, he saw the black ing out of chimneys mented, “What a waste? You could extract a lot of things from
the smoke!”There was also an uncheckable anecdote, saying he was given some kind of shots in England, and if he did not return on time, he would die. The impression left in my childhood was so strong that I still remember it now. For one, I learned a title called “PhD”; moreover, once “western countries” were mentioned, I immediately fancied about extracting stuff from smoke and felt that the westerners were so smart.
 农家孩子上学没有太多的想法,五岁多,在生产队解散后的牛棚里上了育红班(我们是钦定的红色接班人了),在出粪口爬来爬去,好玩。上小学,目的很简单:省的到城里认不出男女厕所,让人家打出来。小学读完,身子骨没长成,到初中再读几年,长长个子,为以后说媳妇学泥瓦匠做准备。表兄四位,均是泥瓦匠,大表兄称瓦刀已经给我准备好了,后来没有用上,可惜了。祖母在1949以后扫盲时认了几个字,又忘掉了,她对读书没有感受,只给我念叨“三代不读书,赛过一窝猪,”读书有啥用?她也说不清。念了初中,下一步怎么办?父亲是高小毕业,母亲初中毕业,儿女要比他们高一点。那就向上走吧,高中,本科,硕士,博士。
 
Farm boys go to school without diddling around what it’s for. A little over five-year old, I was enrolled into a “little red guard kindergarten”that was previously an abandoned cattle shed of the village production unit (we automatically became revolutionary essors bestowed by the red emperor). Crawling around the cattle shit piles, we were having a lot of fun. Then, the purpose of my going to the elementary school was very straightforward: to avoid being beaten up for stepping into the wrong side of the restrooms in cities simply because I could not read the signs. Having finished the elementary school, I continued to attend the junior high, for I was still an immature lad; I needed to grow up and