Unit 6 Urbanization
Remembering When Brooklyn Was Mine
By Naima Coster
（忆起我的布鲁克林）
1 I have always felt as if Brooklyn belonged to me. At the very least, Fort Greene was mine.
我一直觉得布鲁克林好像是属于我的。至少，格林堡曾经是我的。
2 While I was growing up in the late 1980s and the 1990s, Fort Greene was notorious for being a rough neighborhood, home to one of New York City’s largest public housing projects. For most of my life, this provided me with incredible and undue street credibility: I survived life in the Fort.
我成长于20世纪80年代末到90年代，那时，格林堡臭名昭著，被誉为野蛮街区，是纽约市最大的公共住房住宅区之一。在我生命的大部分时间里，这让我有了一个令人难以置信却不恰当的街头声望：我在格林堡生存了下来。
3 When I tell someone I am from Fort Greene now, I get quite a different response. And now I am the one who is troubled by what the neighborhood has become.
如今，当我告诉别人我来自格林堡时，我得到的反应大不相同。现在我才是被街区变化困扰的人。
4 I remember walking with my father one afternoon near Fort Greene Park. It was sunny, and we were holding hands.
记得一个午后，我与父亲在格林堡公园附近一起散步，那天阳光明媚，我和父亲手牵着手。
5 My father, Martin, moved to Fort Greene in 1973 to attend Long Island University. By the time I was born, in 1986, he knew the character of every block around our building. He taught me how to keep safe in the neighborhood.
我的父亲马丁1973年搬到格林堡，进入长岛大学。到1986年我出生时，他已经熟知我们住所周围每个街区的特点。他教我如何在街区里注意安全。
6 “If I’m ever walking with you, Naima, and someone starts bothering us, let go of my hand,” he said.
他对我说：“奈玛，如果我和你走在一起，有人开始骚扰我们，你就放开我的手。”
7 I imagined an encounter I could picture only vaguely: two men, younger than my father, about his size, approaching us, wordlessly, to rob us.
我想象着这样一次遭遇，我只能依稀描绘出来：两个男人，比父亲年轻些，与他身材相仿，向我们走来，什么也不说，抢劫我们的财物。
8 “If I ever drop your hand, you’re to walk away,” my father said. “You, your mother and Luciano leave. Just go.”
父亲说：“如果我甩开你的手，你就跑得远远的。你、你妈妈，还有卢西亚诺都走。什么也别管。”
9 “Who will protect you?” I asked.
“那谁来保护你呢？”我问道。
10 He smiled and said, “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”
他微笑着说：“别担心我，我会没事的。”
11 Still, when we rode the Q train over the Manhattan Bridge into Chinatown for dumplings and egg cakes, or when we walked to Fulton Street to shop for sneakers and school uniforms, I was trailed by the fear that someone would interrupt our time together, that our lives would change forever, that my father would have to drop my hand.
尽管如此，当我们乘坐Q号火车穿过曼哈顿大桥去唐人街买饺子和鸡蛋饼时，或是当我们步行到富尔顿街去买运动鞋和校服时，我害怕有人会打断我们在一起的时光，害怕我们的生活从此永远改变，害怕我的父亲不得不甩开我的手，这种担忧如影相随。
12 And although I sneered at people who did not understand Brooklyn, the Fort Greene my father warned us about was real.
尽管我嘲笑那些不了解布鲁克林的人，但是父亲告诫我的那些关于格林堡的事都是真实的。
13 I was reminded when my brother, Luciano, was attacked on the train platform at Nevins Street, or when he came home from playing soccer in the park to report that he had seen one player almost stab another, midgame.
当我的弟弟卢西亚诺在内文斯街的火车站站台被袭击，或是当他从公园踢完球回家告诉我在中场休息时看见 一个队员差点刺伤另一个队员的时候，我会想起爸爸告诫我的那些话。
14 I was reminded when gunshots rang out from Myrtle Avenue, and I crept to the living room on my hands and knees, as I had seen people do in movies. My father laughed and told me to stand; no one was aiming for the 12th floor.
当枪声从默特尔大道传来，我效仿电影里的人用手和膝盖爬到客厅的时候，也会想起爸爸告诫我的那些话。父亲大笑着叫我起来，因为没有人会朝12楼开枪。
15 Despite these fears, my neighborhood was the only place I had ever lived, and everyone I knew lived there or in a neighborhood like it.
尽管有这些担心，但这里却是我唯一生活过的地方，而且我认识的每一个人都住在这里或者住在跟它类似的街区里。
16 I was raised on Fort Greene food: Sicilian slices from Liberty Pizza; multicolored mango ices; greasy Chinese food we ordered when my mother was too tired to cook.
我是吃格林堡的食物长大的：西西里岛的自由比萨、彩色的芒果冰、母亲太累不想做饭时点的油腻的中餐。
17 Fort Greene was getting my hair pulled in the schoolyard, being told I was “Spanish” by the other girls but it not mattering much, jumping Double Dutch and going to the corner store for free quarter waters.
在格林堡，我在校园里被人扯头发，其他女孩说我是“西班牙人”，但这些都不重要，我跳双荷兰舞，去街角的商店买免费的区水。
18 Brooklyn was the photograph of my parents on the day they were married. They are young, wearing pea coats and standing close in the snow, in front of the old Dime Savings Bank.
布鲁克林意味着我父母结婚那天的相片。那时他们都还年轻，穿着粗羊毛呢短大衣，站在雪中老旧的戴埃姆储蓄银行前相互依偎。
19 I knew Fort Greene was other things, too — the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Spike Lee films, the convergence of a dozen train lines as they entered the borough. Even before I could see Fort Greene begin to change and gentrify, I knew it was a place to defend.
我心中的格林堡同时也意味着其他：布鲁克林音乐学院、斯派克·李的电影、进入布鲁克林区的12条铁路的交汇点。甚至在我看到格林堡开始变得高雅前，我就知道，它是一个值得捍卫的地方。
20 When I enrolled in a private school on the Upper East Side, I met girls who considered Bloomingdale’s downtown and Brooklyn another planet. They had never any other part of Brooklyn: poor, black, violent. I gave heard about Fort Greene, but they assumed it was just like up my sometime-habit of saying I was from “Downtown Brooklyn” or “near Brooklyn Heights”. I declared myself proudly. Fort Greene.
当我入读上东区的一所私立学校时，遇到一些女孩子，她们认为布鲁明戴尔的市中心和布鲁克林简直就是另一个星球。她们以前从来没有听说过格林堡，但是她们想当然地认为格林堡和布鲁克林的其他地方一样：贫穷、黑暗、 暴力。我以前有段时间习惯说我来自“布鲁克林市区”或是“布鲁克林高地附近”。后来，我摒弃了这种习惯，骄傲地说，我来自格林堡。
21 At Yale, when I introduced myself as a Fort Greene girl, I faced the same question from fellow students and job recruiters, “How did you get here?”
在耶鲁，当我介绍自己是来自格林堡的女孩时，我会面临来自同学和招聘人员问的同一个问题：“你是怎么成功走到这一步的？”
22 But when I returned for holiday breaks and summers, I felt my neighborhood being eclipsed by change. The area had been gentrifying for a long time, but only after being away did I see how rapidly the neighborhood was being remodeled: white faces, modern condos, demolition and reconstruction were indisputable evidence that after I graduated I would not be able to afford to move back to my Fort Greene.
但是当我假期和夏天回来时，我感觉我的街区因变化而黯然失色。在很长一段时间里，这个地方一直在改善， 但是只有离开一段时间后，我才发现街区正发生着迅猛的变化：白人面孔、现代公寓楼、拆除和重建毋庸置疑地表明在我毕业以后，我将无力搬回我的格林堡了。
23 I had changed, too, on the Upper East Side and at Yale. Back home, I felt dwarfed by new buildings, new neighbors and new shops, but I had learned how to engage with strangers and what to order in a café. I could navigate the new emerging culture that was not mine because of the years I had spent away.
在上东区和耶鲁时，我也变了。回到家，新建筑、新邻居和新商店让我觉得自己特别矮小，但是我已经学会怎样 与陌生人打交道，并且知道在咖啡店该点些什么。因为多年在外，我能够驾驭不属于我的这种新兴文化。
24 In recent years, I have been invited by former classmates to have drinks or dinner in the neighborhood. These invitations make me worry that Brooklyn is dying and that I am somehow a part of it. I worry that although the brownstones and trees and rolling hills of Fort Greene Park will remain, the soul of the neighborhood will be gone, transformed into something that I can understand but cannot feel.
近年来，我以前的同学常邀请我在这街区喝茶或吃饭。这些邀请让我担心布鲁克林正在消亡，从某个方面来说，我也是如此。我担心尽管格林堡公园的褐色沙石、树木和绵延起伏的山丘将保留，但街区的灵魂将不复存在，变成一些我可以理解却无法感受的东西。
25 My parents, now retired, are among the lucky ones; their apartment is rent-stabilized and they have been able to stay. Everyone else is gone, except for a few neighbors who managed to buy their apartments. My parents never bought their apartment, and now they never will.
我的父母现在已经退休，他们是幸运的人。他们住的公寓租金稳定并且能够长住。除了少数能够买得起房子的邻居，其他人都走了。我的父母从没买过房子，以后也不会买了。
26 Now, when I tell someone I am from Fort Greene, there are no groans or raised eyebrows or easy dismissals. There is not the hush of awed respect, but rather an exceedingly pleasant, “How lovely!” or “Great area.”
如今，当我告诉别人我来自格林堡时，他们不再发出不屑的声音，或者皱眉头，抑或轻易解雇我。也没有令人敬畏的沉默，取而代之的是异常愉悦的话“不错的地方”或者“好地方”。
27 When people tell me Fort Greene is a wonderful neighborhood, I say, I know. I have known for a long time. My mother knew, and so did my father —— even when he told me to be proud of where I come from, but to be ready to run and leave him behind.
当别人告诉我格林堡是个极好的地方时，我说，我知道。我很久以前就已经知道了。我的母亲知道，我的父亲也知道——即使他告诉我要为自己的家乡感到骄傲，但应准备好前行，然后离开他。
