一棵“遭受了精神创伤”的圣诞树，一个衰落的罗马
编辑:给力英语新闻 更新:2017年12月23日 作者:纽约时报(By ELISABETTA POVOLEDO)
罗马威尼斯广场上的圣诞树连续第二年因为在圣诞节到来之前枯萎而给罗马市长弗吉妮亚·拉吉带来麻烦。 Alberto Pizzoli/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Rome’s ‘Mangy’ Christmas Tree Is a Sorry Sight: ‘It Has Clearly Been Traumatized’
ROME — No sooner had workers hoisted a 72-foot tall Norway spruce in Rome’s central Piazza Venezia this month than the mocking began.
罗马——本月，工作人员把一棵72英尺（约合22米）高的挪威云杉摆在了罗马市中心的威尼斯广场上，没过多久，嘲笑就开始了。
The tree was quickly nicknamed Spelacchio, or Mangy, because so many of its dead needles were dropping off, leaving the tree looking a bit bare. Chatter spread quickly on social media where Romans traded jokes about the spruce and criticized its sad appearance.
这棵树很快就有了“Spelacchio”这个绰号，即“疥癣”，因为很多已经枯萎的针叶都掉了，让它看上去有点光秃秃的。相关讨论在社交媒体上迅速传播，罗马民众分享有关这棵云杉的笑话，批评其惨不忍睹的外表。
Insults quickly turned to intrigue as the Italian media plumbed the tree’s costs, questioned how it had been transported to the city and analyzed its state of health.
随着意大利媒体开始探究这棵树的成本，质疑它是如何被运送到罗马的，并分析其健康状况，辱骂迅速变成了好奇。
“It has clearly been traumatized,” one expert declared.
一名专家宣称，“它显然遭受了精神创伤。”
A consumer rights group asked an administrative court, which has oversight over government spending, to investigate what it described as a “shameful spectacle for citizens and tourists” and demanded that the tree be removed immediately.
一个消费者权益组织请求监督政府开支的行政法院调查它所说的“公民和游客遭受的奇耻大辱”，并要求立即将这棵树移走。
Some likened the scruffy tree to a toilet brush. Others unfavorably compared the sparse spruce to its crosstown counterpart in St. Peter’s Square, a lushly-leafed fir donated by Poland to the Vatican that was nicknamed “Rigoglio,” or luxuriant.
一些人把这棵乱糟糟的树比作马桶刷。还一些人说这棵枝叶稀疏的云杉跟市区另一头的圣彼得广场上的一棵树没法比。那是波兰送给梵蒂冈的一棵枝繁叶茂的冷杉，昵称“Rigoglio”，“繁盛”的意思。
Gardiners, botanists and ecology professors were quizzed on whether the tree would make it to Christmas. The jury is still out.
人们问园艺工作者、植物学家和生态学教授这棵树能否撑到圣诞节。目前尚无定论。
And in newspaper commentaries, the tree became a symbol of the Italian capital’s decline, moving the controversy from local news to national front pages.
在报纸的评论文章中，这棵树成为了意大利首都衰落的象征，把这场争议从地方新闻变成了全国性的头版新闻。
“Spelacchio mirrors the decadence of the city,” said Francesca Nava, a television journalist who has lived in Rome for the past 15 years. Intrigued by the intrigue, she had come to check out the tree not as part of her job but as a private citizen.
“Spelacchio反映了这座城市的衰落，”过去15年一直生活在罗马的电视记者弗朗切斯卡·纳瓦(Francesca Nava)说。出于好奇，她以普通公民而不是记者的身份来检查这棵树的情况。
“Without meaning to, this poor tree has become a symbol of Rome today, it is paying the price of this decadent time,” she said.
“无意间，这棵可怜的树成了今日罗马的象征，它正在为这个衰落的时代付出代价。”
周二拍摄的照片显示了威尼斯广场上的罗马官方圣诞树（左）和梵蒂冈圣彼得广场上的圣诞树（右）。 Alessandra Tarantino/Associated Press
A spokesman for Mayor Virginia Raggi of Rome said the city had begun an inquiry to determine whether anyone was at fault.
市长弗吉妮亚·拉吉(Virginia Raggi)的发言人说，罗马已经开始调查，以确定是否有人有过错。
Ms. Raggi hasn’t had an easy time in office. On Tuesday, she told reporters that she would not be running for re-election. Her party, the anti-establishment Five Star Movement, has a two-term limit for political office and she is in her second.
拉吉上台后的工作不轻松。她周二对记者表示不会谋求连任。她所在的反建制政党五星运动(Five Star Movement)对政治职位任期的限制是两届，她目前正处在第二任期。
“Getting to the end of this mandate will be a great success,” she told reporters.
“走到这一任期的最后将是巨大的成功，”她对记者说。
Italian media published before and after photos of the fir, demonstrating a drastic decline.
意大利媒体发布了这棵冷杉的前后对比照。照片显示它的情况急剧恶化。
Citizens were also outraged over the cost of the tree operation — an estimated 48,000 euros, or $57,000, to cover the costs of transporting, raising and eventually removing the Christmas tree.
这项圣诞树行动的花费也令民众感到愤慨。运输、摆放和最终移走的费用估计为4.8万欧元（约合40万元人民币）。
The tree itself was donated to the city by the Magnifica Comunità di Val di Fiemme, a collective that manages the forests and pastures of an alpine valley in the Trentino region.
这棵树本身是管理特伦蒂诺地区某高山峡谷森林和牧场的社区组织Magnifica Comunità di Val di Fiemme赠送给罗马的。
Sniffing a scandal, newspapers had published a document showing that the collective would be paid EUR8,000, or $9,500, plus tax. Stefano Cattoi, the director of the collective’s sawmill, explained that the sum covered the costs of prepping the tree for transport.
嗅到丑闻气息的报纸刊登了一份文件，显示该组织将得到8000欧元，含税9500欧元。其下属锯木厂的负责人斯特凡诺·凯多伊(Stefano Cattoi)解释说，这笔钱包括为了运输而给树做准备的费用。
“We chose a beautiful tree and we cut and prepared it with as much care as we possibly could,” he said in a telephone interview. But he said he was unaware of what happened to the spruce once it was out of his care.
“我们选了一棵漂亮的树，砍下来，然后尽可能小心翼翼地做好准备工作，”他在电话采访中说。但他表示，这棵云杉不归他照看后，他就不知道发生了什么。
本月早些时候，人们对着威尼斯广场上亮灯的圣诞树拍照。 Ettore Ferrari/European Pressphoto Agency
“What happened during the trip, or what kinds of lights were used on it, I can’t say,” he said. “But we’ve sent many trees to Rome, and we’ve never had problems before.”
“在路上发生了什么事情，树上用的什么灯，我都不知道，”他说。“但我们给罗马送了很多树，以前从来没出过问题。”
He said the community was still trying to understand what happened to the spruce and said they “did everything right” before it was sent.
他说，该企业仍试图找出这棵云杉出了什么问题，并表示他们在树被送走之前“做了一切该做的事”。
But for some, the criticism had gone too far. To be fair, at night when the lights and ornaments decorating the tree are aglow, it is actually quite beautiful.
但在一些人看来，批评言论太过分了。公平地说，到了晚上，装饰它的灯和装饰品亮起来后，它其实挺漂亮的。
“Enough,” Goffredo Buccini declared in the newspaper Corriere della Sera. “We are all Spelacchio!”
“够了，”戈弗雷多·布奇尼(Goffredo Buccini)在《晚邮报》(Corriere della Sera)上写道。“我们都是Spelacchio！”
The hashtag #Jesuisspelacchio was born, where Twitter users shared their own messages of solidarity with the bedraggled tree.
Twitter上出现了#Jesuisspelacchio的标签，用户纷纷发帖，表示表支持这棵邋遢的树。
On Wednesday, Mattia Feltri, a columnist with the Turin daily newspaper La Stampa, penned a front-page editorial written from Spelacchio’s point of view to his Roman detractors.
周三，都灵《新闻报》(La Stampa)的专栏作家马蒂亚·费尔特里(Mattia Feltri)透过Spelacchio的视角写了一篇头版社论，表达对诋毁它的罗马人的看法。
“You have a dark, chaotic, dirty city, you throw everything on the ground, nothing works and tourists are supposed to think it’s all my fault,” Mr. Feltri wrote. “Look, I am not a metaphor of Italy. It’s you.”
“你们的城市黑暗、混乱、邋遢，你们把什么东西都往地上扔，什么都是坏的，还要让游客认为这都是我的错，”费尔特里写道。“要知道，我不是意大利的隐喻。你们才是。”
翻译：陈亦亭