滇缅公路(Burma Road)

　　盟军忍受疾病、季风和日军的袭击，筑起了这条臭名昭著的1800公里长的补给线。这条路目前仍蜿蜒穿越在三个国家——也留在了老兵们的记忆里。

　　the old soldiers urge me not to go looking. they'd prefer to think that the road they hacked across india's steep patkai range and down through the jungles of burma to china during world war ii is gone. that its two stringy lanes—now six decades old—have been devoured by time and landslides, jungle monsoons and swampy earth.

　　老兵们劝我别去找。他们宁愿相信二战期间他们所开凿的、始于印度陡峭的帕特开山、经由缅甸的热带雨林、最后通往中国的那条道路已经不存在了。他们宁愿相信那已有60年历史、狭窄崎岖的两车道公路，已经被时间、山崩、雨林季风和沼泽湿地所湮灭。

　　but right now, step after step, i'm crossing a steel bridge near the northeastern indian village of jairampur: a dilapidated span the old soldiers laid above the muddy khatang nalla in early 1943, the first true bridge of the burma road's 1,100-mile (1,800 kilometer) length.

　　可是现在，我正一步一步地越过印度东北jairampur村附近地一个铁桥：这座已经荒废了的桥是老兵们于1943年初，在泥泞的khatang nalla河上架设的，这也是全长1800公里的滇缅公路的第一座真正的桥。

　　i leave the bridge's far end, walking between walls of rain forest that rise like green tapestries a hundred feet high. as i walk, i'm thinking of mitchell opas, now 86, who served as a u.s. army medic during world war ii and whom i've interviewed at reunions from massachusetts to texas. "if that road's still there," opas has instructed me, his finger pointed in my direction for emphasis, "then you send pictures of it."

　　我走出了桥的尽头，走入了拔地而起的重重雨林，像是走在百英尺高的绿色挂毯之间。我一边走一边想着现年86岁的mitchell opas，他在二战期间是美军义务人员，我在从麻省到德州的各类老兵聚会上数次采访过他。“如果那条路还在的话，”opas用手指着我，加强语气说：“那你就寄些他的照片回来。”

　　up the pavement ahead of me, dogs doze in the sun as children run back and forth across the otherwise empty road's chipped asphalt. two hundred yards farther along, a wood-planked district police station encircled by razor wire sits off the road's left shoulder. when i begin to pass it by, a green-uniformed sentry—his assault rifle slung across his belly—lifts his weapon. using the gun's black barrel, he motions me inside the front gate. "please," he suggests, "come inside."

　　在我前方的路面上，狗在阳光下打盹，孩子们则在柏油已经碎裂的空旷道路上跑来跑去，除了他们之外四下无人。再往前200码的左边路肩上，是四周围用有刺铁丝围起的地方警察局。当我准备通过时，一名肚子前斜挂着突击步枪，身穿绿色制服的哨兵举起武器，用黑色的枪管示意我从前门进去。

　　i'm led to the commander's office, where i'm offered a handshake and a chair. the commander is an imposing man in his 40s named g. k. grung, his olive uniform festooned with flashing gold stars. seated behind a wooden desk, he examines my passport and visa. he's especially interested in my restricted area permit, the paper authorizing me to travel the final 18 miles (28 kilometers) of road inside india's otherwise off-limits state of arunachal pradesh. here in arunachal's jungle, the road crests a 3,727-foot (1,135-meter) mountain notch called pangsau pass, which constitutes india's hotly defended border with myanmar, the nation formerly known as burma.

　　我被引入指挥官的办公司，他跟我握了手，请我坐下。年过40的指挥官名叫g. k. grung，颇有威严，橄榄色制服上挂满闪闪发亮的金星。他坐在木桌后，先检查了我的护照和签证。他对我的“禁区通行证”特别感兴趣，这个文件授权我行走此路段的最后28公里，这段路位于印度的禁区arunachal pradesh。公路在arunachal的丛林中直上1136公尺高的pangsau隘口(在印度语中的意思为“地狱隘口”)。这里位于印度和缅甸激烈争议的边界上。

　　commander grung looks up. "i'm sorry," he says, "but we have been issued new orders about the road to pangsau pass. no visitors are allowed past this point. unfortunately, this means you." he smiles, then taps his desk with his right forefinger. "there is significant rebel activity here at the moment. the jungles are something of a no-man's-land. we cannot assure your security. therefore, you cannot proceed."

　　grung指挥官抬起头。“很抱歉，”他说：“我们已经接到关于通往pangsau隘口路段的新指示。所有访客都禁止通过此处。很不幸，这也包括你。”他微微一笑，然后用右手食指轻敲桌面。“目前本地叛军活动十分猖獗，丛林已经是战争的前线了。我们无法保证你的安全，因此，你不能再往前了。”

　　i smile back. this is how my journey along the burma road begins: with recollections of old soldiers and a warning backed by machine guns as i get close to india's touchy frontier.

　　我也报以微笑。这就是我的滇缅公路之旅的序幕：有老兵们的回忆;也有在接近印度敏感前线时，荷枪实弹的军人给我的警告。◆

　　for about 75 cents a day—three-quarters of what men make—women in ledo, india, carry coal to railway cars. the city's rail line made it the terminus of one of the most controversial and ambitious engineering feats of world war ii: the building of a military supply road through burma, then held by the japanese. the allied forces who built the road were plagued by monsoons, disease, and enemy fire.

　　印度利多(ledo)的女人把煤扛到火车上，一天工资约75美分——男人所得的三分之一。正因为利多拥有铁路网线，才使这个城市成为二战中最具争议和野心的工程壮举的终点站：穿越日军占领的缅甸，建筑一条军事补给线路。建造此路的盟军军民也因此饱受季风、疾病和敌军炮火所苦。

　　weighed down by human cargo, a truck barrels across a bridge on the old burma road. another driver wasn't as lucky, permanently parking his truck in the creek. in water-logged burma, now known as myanmar, world war ii crews built dozens of bridges, while under constant attack by the japanese. chinese nationalist leader chiang kai-shek estimated the road would be finished in a few months. it took two years.

　　一辆卡车载满了人，驶过老滇缅公路的桥。另一位驾驶员就没这么幸运，他的车永远地陷在了溪沟里。仅在缅甸这个水乡泽国，二战的军民们在日军不断攻击的情况下还是建了几十座桥。中国国民党领袖蒋介石曾估计只要几个月时间就可以筑好滇缅公路，结果它花了两年。

　　women harvesting rice make for a peaceful scene in myanmar's mogaung valley—a sharp contrast to 1944 when u.s. and chinese troops passed through on their way to a bloody battle with the japanese at myitkyina. the japanese were finally vanquished after a ten-week siege that took more than 2,000 lives, including 972 chinese. despite china's losses along the road, gen. joseph "vinegar joe" stilwell, the u.s. commander in asia, criticized chiang kai-shek throughout the war for not fighting the japanese more aggressively. as it turned out, chiang was as worried about communist insurgents under mao zedong as he was about the japanese army.

　　妇女在缅甸的孟拱河谷割稻，构成了一幅平和的画面。这和1944年中美军队穿越此处，前往密支那和日军浴血奋战的情景形成强烈的对比。日军在遭到长达十周的包围后，终于在此战役中败北。这场战事夺去了2000多条生命，其中有972名中国人。尽管中国方面沿路损失惨重，可美军的亚洲指挥官史迪威将军还是抨击蒋介石，指责他没有采取更积极的态度抵抗日军。如我们现在所知，这是因为蒋在对抗日本人时，还要分心担忧毛泽东领导下的共产党军队。

　　beneath fluttering red banners chinese students practice for a memorial ceremony at the battlefield of songshan, or pine tree mountain. in the summer of 1944 the allies battled thousands of japanese who had commandeered the mountain's strategic heights. chinese troops pressed their assault for nearly three months before they took control of the summit. by then some 1,300 japanese and more than 7,600 chinese lay dead.

　　在飘逸的红旗下，中国的学生正在松山的这处战场遗址排练纪念仪式。在1944年的夏天，日军控制了这座山的制高点，盟军则对其发起进攻。中国军队持续进行了三个月的苦战，才攻克下峰顶。而那时，已经有约1300名日军和超过7600名国军丧身此间。

　　compared with most citizens of impoverished myanmar, a woman cradling her newborn in shingbwiyang is doing well thanks to the recent discovery of gold nearby. her home may be made of tarpaulin, but her husband's jewelry business is flourishing, bringing in such luxuries as a tv set, a vcr, and a motorcycle. the country's economy has long been hampered by a series of repressive and often brutal military regimes that have ruled the nation since 1962. with valuable timber and mineral resources such as petroleum, tin, copper, and gemstones, myanmar could be described as the poorest rich country in the world.

　　与大部分贫困的缅甸人民相比，这个新背洋(shingbwiyang)的抱着婴儿的女子过得相当不错，这多亏了附近最近发现的金矿。她家虽然还是用放水布搭起来的，但她丈夫的珠宝生意却日益兴隆，给家里带进了电视机、录像机和摩托车等奢侈品。因为1962年以来在缅甸掌权的残暴而专制的军人政府，这个国家的经济长期一直都未能起色。缅甸拥有贵重的木材，还有如石油、锡、铜和宝石等矿藏资源，可以称得上是世界上最富饶的穷国。