Identity Crisis

 

身份危机

With industrialization and modernization, more and more people are confronted with the problem of identity.

随着工业化和现代化的发展，越来越多的人要面对身份问题。

The most interesting example is that of a so-called "banana",

最有趣的例子是所谓的香蕉型人，

which refers to an American who has an Asian face but holds Western values.

它代表长着一张亚洲人的脸，却拥有西方价值观的美国人。

In the US many banana children complain that they cannot explain to their young friends in the kindergarten

在美国，越来越多的“香蕉”儿童抱怨自己在幼儿园不知道怎么跟伙伴们解释

why they cannot speak a word of Chinese and practice Kungfu although they look exactly like a Chinese.

他们不会说汉语，不会功夫的原因，尽管他们的样子和中国人没什么区别。

In Shanghai, there now live a group of people from abroad.

在上海，有一群国外归来的华人。

They look no different from the locals and speak fluent mandarin or even Shanghai dialect,

他们看上去和当地人没有区别，说着一口流利的普通话或者上海方言，

but when it comes to writing the Chinese characters, they are almost illiterate.

但是谈到汉字，他们就像是文盲。

Jack is such an example. He runs a bar at the Changshu Road.

杰克就是这样的一个典型。他出生在上海，

Born in Shanghai, he moved to Los Angeles at the age of two with his parents.

两岁的时候和父母一起去了洛杉矶，现在在常熟路开了一个酒吧。

With his family, Jack spoke two languages: English and Shanghai dialect.

和父母在一起的时候，他说两种语言：英语和上海话。

But he never learned to read or write the Chinese words, which he find mysterious and difficult.

但是他从来没有阅读和书写过汉字，在他看来这是比较困难的事情。

"To be frank," he said, "Every time I signed a contract,

“说实话，每次我签署合同，”他说，

I would pretend to read its contents carefully, but actually I understood no word of it."

“我都会假装很认真地看合同，但事实上我根本看不懂。”