介绍:
Years ago during the Labor Day holiday, when my mother-in-law asked me to climb a mountain in her rural Hangzhou village, it wasn’t sightseeing she had in mind.
许多年前的五一劳动节，我的婆婆让我随她到杭州乡下老家的山里去。这趟旅程并不是为了欣赏风景。
Granted, it felt like an adventure as we ascended through tall, weedy patches of grasses and vines, pulling ourselves up with the help of shaggy China firs, smooth bamboo trees and weathered gray rocks scattered along a trail only visible to a veteran hiker. The view we were rewarded with halfway up the mountain, gazing upon the colorful patchwork of fields and whitewashed homes set against the verdant hills and a sky so blue it looked digitally altered, was just a benefit of being there.
那感觉真像是一场冒险。我们攀过一片片丛生的杂草和藤蔓，拉着冷杉的树干，沿着只有山中常客们才会注意的道路攀援前行，路边布满了竹子和风化的灰岩。在半山腰看到的美丽景色让我们的辛苦有了回报：五彩错落的田野，洁白的民居，映衬着青郁郁的山丘和蓝得像数码合成的天空——这一切风景只有爬上高山才能见到。
After all, our eyes were mostly fixed on the ground instead, in search of the real purpose for our journey -- the wild edible plants that thrived on the mountainside.
毕竟在大部分时间里，我们都将目光盯着地面，寻找此次行程的真正目标——在山里繁荣生长的野味。
We first came upon wild mountain bamboo, a smaller variety of bamboo with clusters of slender shoots that grew shorter than my own knee. This tender plant was the main ingredient in my mother-in-law’s salted bamboo shoots that, once preserved, could be used all year long in stir-fries and stews. Up to that moment, when I was helping my mother-in-law harvest the shoots, I had never realized that preparing this important kitchen staple actually required an annual trek to the woods.
我们先是找到了野竹子，这类竹子形态较小，其丛生细长的枝条只到我膝盖处。这种娇嫩的植物就是我婆婆腌制竹笋的主要原料，保存妥当便可以常年用于炒菜和炖肉。直到帮我婆婆收割嫩芽的那一刻，我才意识到，要准备这种重要的厨房食材，每年都得徒步到山里采摘。
But along the way, we also encountered another precious wild food -- fiddlehead ferns. Those delicate, curled fronds had often appeared on my mother-in-law’s table, stir-fried with fragrant ginger, garlic and green peppers. Once I had actually purchased fiddleheads at a specialty market in the US, and at a premium. Yet there we were, plucking this prized vegetable on our own, with only our labor as the cost.
但这一路上，我们还找到了另一种珍贵的野菜 —— 蕨菜。我婆婆经常将这种嫩而卷曲的植物嫩叶佐以姜，蒜和青椒炒香，端上餐桌。在美国的一个专门市场，我曾经买到过蕨菜，花了不少钱。然而，在山里，获得这种珍贵食物的成本只是劳动而已。
What we had collected that afternoon looked the same as any other wild mountain bamboo shoots and fiddlehead ferns I had glimpsed before in my mother-in-law’s kitchen. And yet, they felt different to me because I had used my own hands to help pick them and carry them back down the mountain. Spending time and energy to gather these wild plants had given me a deeper appreciation for the food that ends up on the dinner table.
那个下午我们收获的东西看起来和曾在婆婆厨房里看到的其他野笋和蕨菜一样。 但是，对我来说它们是独特的，因为它们是我用自己的双手采摘并带回的。因为花费时间和精力，我对这些食物有了更深的认识。
It also made me more aware of the powerful connection among the natural world, food and life, symbolized by my mother-in-law. Living in the city, it’s so easy to forget that we all depend on the environment to sustain us -- that the green mountains and blue rivers matter as much to our survival as supermarkets and shops. But she tends her own garden and sustainably forages the surrounding area for wild edible plants, a natural lifestyle that many people like her have kept for generations. Those mountains and rivers supporting her life weren’t some abstract concept. They were right there, outside her door and within her rural village. And once I saw them through her perspective that afternoon, I realized they were closer to me than I ever imagined.
这也让我更加意识到，自然，食物和生活之间不可分割的联系，这也是我婆婆所象征的。 生活在城市里的人很容易忘记，我们的生活都靠着自然环境来维系——绿色的山脉和蓝色的河流对我们的生存来说就像超市或商店一样重要。但我婆婆更喜欢自己的花园，同时也不断搜寻着周边地区的野生食用植物，这种自然生活方式被许多人像她一样的人世代相传。那些支撑她生活的山川并不是抽象的概念。它们就在门外，在她的乡村里。那个下午，当我从她的角度看自然时，我意识到自然比想象中离我更近。
大家还在听
