她终于可以微笑了An impossible smile comes true

Qingmei Dorlma was smiling — something she says she physically couldn’t do until age 14. And she previously felt little reason to, she says. 青梅卓玛（Qingmei Dorlma）笑了，这是一件直到她14岁时她的身体都不能做到的事。她之前也没有意识到为什么会这样。 I couldn’t help but smile back. 我情不自禁地向她回以微笑。 Nobody calls her “monster” anymore. 现在没有人会再叫她“怪胎”了。 The teenager has friends — something she’d never imagined before her cleft-palate surgery three years ago. 这个女孩儿现在还有了朋友，这是她三年前接受腭裂手术时想都不敢想的事。 Her father left the day she was born. 她的父亲自她出生后便离开了这个家。 Doctors say her condition was particularly difficult to treat, since the operation should have been done during infancy. 医生们曾表示青梅卓玛的情况治疗难度很大，因为这样的手术本应该在婴儿期进行。 But her mother, who earns about 1,500 yuan ($225) a year herding others’ yaks on the isolated Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, couldn’t afford it. 但她的母亲，在偏僻的青藏高原上以替他人放牧牦牛为生，每年只能挣得1500元（合计225美元）实在难以承担这笔手术费用。 Qingmei no longer hides behind the literal and metaphorical masks she had worn most of her life. (She used to eat in private so others couldn’t see her mouth.) 青梅卓玛再也不用将自己隐藏在戴了大半生的“面具”之下。这个“面具”既是字面意义，又有比喻含义。（她曾经常常自己一个人吃饭，避免其他人看到她的嘴巴。） Now, she faces the world with confidence — enough to perform as a singer and dancer. 现在，她满怀信心地面对这个世界，足以自信到成为一名歌手与舞者。 There’s a Tibetan saying: “If you can talk, you can sing. If you can walk, you can dance.” 藏族有句谚语：“会说话的藏人就会唱歌。能走路的藏人就能跳舞。” Qingmei felt too stigmatized to do either. 青梅卓玛之前做任何一件时都会遭到非难。 Not anymore. 现在这种情况再也不会发生了。 And her school performance has drastically improved, her teachers say. 她的老师表示，青梅卓玛在校表现有了巨大提升。 I was visiting her home in the migrant district of Qumalai county — a community of nomadic Tibetan yak herders in Qinghai province’s Yushu prefecture — three years after a volunteer initiative I founded in 2011 provided the surgery that transformed her life. 我在2011年创立的志愿者行动为她提供了改变人生的手术，3年后，我拜访了青海省玉树藏族自治州曲麻莱县的流动区内的卓玛家，这儿住着的是藏族游牧牧民们。 We’d saved for nearly a year to pay the operation in Beijing. It was estimated to cost 30,000 yuan. 我们用几乎耗时一年省下的钱支付青梅卓玛在北京的手术。手术预计花费三万元。 The doctor immediately offered to do it for free when he met her. 但医生在见到青梅卓玛后立即表示可以免费提供手术。 It was but one of many such compassionate acts Qingmei experienced in the capital. 这只是青梅卓玛在北京经历的众多爱心事件之一。 We’d arranged for her to stay in a rented apartment. The owner refused to take her mother’s money. Instead, he gave her the equivalent of her annual income and served them meals. 我们本来安排卓玛住在一所出租屋内。但房东不仅拒绝收她妈妈的钱，相反他还捐了相当于她一年收入的钱给她并为她们提供饭菜。 So, too, did my gandie (the Chinese equivalent of a godfather), when he treated them to food unlike anything they’d seen — let alone tasted — on the grassland. 我的干爹（在中国相当于教父）也做了类似的事情。他在草地上用美食款待青梅卓玛母女，那些食物她们之前未曾见过，更不用说品尝了。 I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anyone smile as much as her mom during that time. 我不知道我是否曾见过有人像她妈妈那段时间一样笑过那么多次。 Beijing stunned Qingmei, who’d never left her isolated home on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. 青梅卓玛之前从未离开过青藏高原的偏僻家乡，北京的一切都给她留下了深刻印象。 She’d only seen high-rises, crowds and elevators on TV. 她之前只在电视上见过高楼大厦、人山人海和电梯。 The girl relished the experience but says she missed vast green expanses. 这个女孩非常喜爱这段经历，但她也表示十分想念广阔绿色无垠的大地。 Her Beijing experience also inspired a new life goal — to become a doctor. 她的北京经历同时激发了她的新人生目标，希望将来能成为一个医生。 She wants to help others in the way others have helped her, she explains. 她解释道，她希望能以别人帮助过她的方式来帮助他人。 Indeed, doctors, teachers, volunteers, renters and friends showed empathy for Qingmei that I’d categorize more as solidarity than charity. It’s a universal unanimity that extends beyond ethnic, national and professional borders. 事实上，医生、老师、志愿者、房东、朋友们对于青梅卓玛展示出来的同情，我更愿意将其归之为团结而不是慈善。这是一种跨越种族、国家以及专业界限的共同一致。 As I left her home, Qingmei leaned toward me and touched her forehead to mine — a Tibetan custom typically reserved for major life events like weddings and funerals. 当我离开她家时，青梅卓玛倚靠着我，用她的前额碰了碰我的额头，这是一种通常保留于人生重大时刻，例如婚礼、葬礼的藏族习俗。 An indescribable force — warm, electric, kinetic — coursed between us. 就在这时一股不可名状的力量传递于我们之间。它温暖而又活跃，像电流一般。 It was like my heart jumpstarted at the point where our scalp lines made contact. 这就像在我们的额头接触时我的心脏重启了一次。 My friends and I waved goodbye to Qingmei and her family. 我与朋友们向青梅卓玛和她的家人挥手告别。 We all smiled. Together. 我们都笑了。与彼此同在。