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I Have to Learm
It was the first time for me to
be there. The tea party was new to me and everyone was new to me,
too. All of them were teachers from colleges. We spoke English,
and sometimes a little Chinese. But an old man working there could
understand bothI began to talk with him.
"Which country are you from?"
I asked in English.
"Poland," he answered in the same language.
"Have you been here long?"
"Oh, yes, over thirty years."
"Did you learn Chinese at school?" I changed to Chinese.
"Oh, I haven't been to any school." His Chinese was
as good as his English.
"Haven't you ever been to school?"
"No, I learned both Chinese and English and other languages
here - from the people here, just like you. I meet over a hundred
people from several countries here every day. And when I'm working,
I'm learning to speak foreign languages. I have to work, so I have
to learn."
"Can you read both Chinese and English?"
"No, neither."
"I can read English much better than I can speak it."
I said at last.
"Ah, for our poor people it's quite different!" He said
and laughed.
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《我必须学习》
我是第一次去那。我既不了解茶会，也不认识一个人。所有参加茶会的都是大学老师。我们讲英语，有时也说点汉语。但是在那里工作的一位老先生既懂英语又懂汉语，于是我便跟他聊了起来。
"你来自哪个国家？" 我用英语问。
"波兰，"他用英语答。
"你在这儿呆很久了？"
"啊，三十多年了。"
"你在学校学过汉语？"我改用汉语问。
"我没进过任何学校。"他的汉语跟英语一样好。
"你从没上过学？"
"是的，我的汉语﹑英语以及其它几种语言都是在这儿学的--在这跟像你一样的人学的。我每天在这都能碰到一百多个来自不同国家的人，因此当我工作的同时也就是在学说外语了。我不得不工作，因此也就不得不学习。"
"英语和汉语你都能看懂吗？"
"不，都看不懂。"
"我读英语要比说英语强。"我最后说。
"哈！哈！对于我们穷人来说，情况正好相反！"他大笑。
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