美国国家公共电台 NPR Thousands Of Fire Evacuees To Spend The Holiday Without Homes

Thousands Of Fire Evacuees¹ To Spend The Holiday Without Homes

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Many people in Northern California are away from home this holiday week because their homes were destroyed by the Camp Fire. NPR's Elise Hu reports on how some are spending Thanksgiving.

ELISE HU, BYLINE²: Roxanne Peters (ph) currently lives out of her pickup³ truck after her home went up in flames. She was supposed to be preparing dinner tomorrow and enjoying it with her friends.

ROXANNE PETERS: I was celebrating at two different houses. (Laughter). You know? We were invited at two different places, and then I was cooking to bring, like, potluck. You know?

HU: And where are those houses now?

PETERS: They're burned, both of them.

HU: The scale of the fire's destruction is so spread out that very little of the towns of Paradise, Magalia and Concow remain. The fire scorched⁴ 230 square miles so far, an area the size of Chicago.

PETERS: Well, I'll be giving thanks this year that we made it out alive.

HU: So many evacuees have fled to nearby Chico, prompting local businesses to try and give them a place to exhale⁵. Breanna Fischer (ph) manages the Buffalo⁶ Wild Wings near the disaster recovery center.

BREANNA FISCHER: When you see them come in, they have ash on their clothes or their face has soot⁷ on it because they - you don't know what they were doing.

HU: She says customers have streamed in with so many different stories of survival.

FISCHER: You're, like, heartbroken. Like, you can hear my voice. It's, like - makes you sad.

HU: The restaurant is usually closed on Thanksgiving Day, but tomorrow, she and the other managers decided⁸ not just to stay open but to host a free feast for hundreds of fire survivors⁹.

FISCHER: It's all on us. This is a family event, basically.

HU: Inside the giant walk-in freezers in the back, 40 giant turkeys are lined up waiting to be deep fried.

FISCHER: We're going to test one tonight. See how long it's going to take to cook, and that's what it's going to be.

HU: Have you ever fried 40 turkeys at once?

FISCHER: No way. I've done one. It was crazy.

HU: The restaurant can seat 240 in all, and it's accepting reservations until the place reaches capacity. Elsewhere in town, the nonprofit group World Central Kitchen, founded by celebrity¹⁰ chef Jose Andres, is teaming with the town of Paradise, Chico State University and the Sierra Nevada Beer brewery¹¹, which is headquartered here, to make 15,000 Thanksgiving meals tomorrow.

ELAINE KRAMER: Yes. It's definitely a huge undertaking¹².

HU: Elaine Kramer is associate dining director at Chico State, which is turning over two of its dining halls to any evacuees who show up.

KRAMER: Maybe just to make somebody feel better, even if it's for a very short amount of time.

HU: Volunteers from the community will help with serving the food. And the volunteer sign-up filled up within hours. At Buffalo Wild Wings, all the staff will also work for free. Manager Breanna Fischer says their focus is giving fire victims some semblance¹³ of a normal holiday.

FISCHER: Where are they supposed to go? They don't really have a home so it's kind of, like, our responsibility to do it.

HU: So many are temporarily homeless, but tomorrow, they won't be hungry. Elise Hu, NPR News, Chico, Calif.

1 evacuees   

n.被疏散者( evacuee的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Moreover, for multi-exits, evacuees select a exit based on game theory. 在有多个出口时，疏散人员根据对策论选择出口。 来自互联网
• Evacuees wade through flooded area following heavy monsoon rains in Peshawar on Saturday, July 31, 2010. 撤离灾区涉水通过后在白沙瓦沉重的季风降雨在周六，2010年7月31日。 来自互联网

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 pickup   

n.拾起，获得

参考例句：

• I would love to trade this car for a pickup truck.我愿意用这辆汽车换一辆小型轻便卡车。||The luck guy is a choice pickup for the girls.那位幸运的男孩是女孩子们想勾搭上的人。

4 scorched   

烧焦，烤焦( scorch的过去式和过去分词 )； 使（植物）枯萎，把…晒枯； 高速行驶； 枯焦

参考例句：

• I scorched my dress when I was ironing it. 我把自己的连衣裙熨焦了。
• The hot iron scorched the tablecloth. 热熨斗把桌布烫焦了。

5 exhale   

v.呼气，散出，吐出，蒸发

参考例句：

• Sweet odours exhale from flowers.花儿散发出花香。
• Wade exhaled a cloud of smoke and coughed.韦德吐出一口烟，然后咳嗽起来。

6 buffalo   

n.(北美)野牛；(亚洲)水牛

参考例句：

• Asian buffalo isn't as wild as that of America's. 亚洲水牛比美洲水牛温顺些。
• The boots are made of buffalo hide. 这双靴子是由水牛皮制成的。

7 soot   

n.煤烟，烟尘；vt.熏以煤烟

参考例句：

• Soot is the product of the imperfect combustion of fuel.煤烟是燃料不完全燃烧的产物。
• The chimney was choked with soot.烟囱被煤灰堵塞了。

8 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

9 survivors   

幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The survivors were adrift in a lifeboat for six days. 幸存者在救生艇上漂流了六天。
• survivors clinging to a raft 紧紧抓住救生筏的幸存者

10 celebrity   

n.名人，名流；著名，名声，名望

参考例句：

• Tom found himself something of a celebrity. 汤姆意识到自己已小有名气了。
• He haunted famous men, hoping to get celebrity for himself. 他常和名人在一起, 希望借此使自己获得名气。

11 brewery   

n.啤酒厂

参考例句：

• The brewery had 25 heavy horses delivering beer in London.啤酒厂有25匹高头大马在伦敦城中运送啤酒。
• When business was good,the brewery employed 20 people.在生意好的时候，这家酿造厂曾经雇佣过20人。

12 undertaking   

n.保证，许诺，事业

参考例句：

• He gave her an undertaking that he would pay the money back with in a year.他向她做了一年内还钱的保证。
• He is too timid to venture upon an undertaking.他太胆小，不敢从事任何事业。

13 semblance   

n.外貌，外表

参考例句：

• Her semblance of anger frightened the children.她生气的样子使孩子们感到害怕。
• Those clouds have the semblance of a large head.那些云的形状像一个巨大的人头。