I'm a veteran of the starship Enterprise. I soared through the galaxy driving a huge starship with a crew made up of people from all over this world, many different races, many different cultures, many different heritages, all working together, and our mission was to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before.
我是进取号战舰的退伍老兵 我飞翔在银河之间 驾驶着巨型的星际飞船 带领着来自全世界的 人类船员 和很多不同文化,不同遗产传承的 其它种族 同心协力 我们的任务是探索陌生的新世界 寻找新的生命和文明 向未知的宇宙洪荒大胆前进
Well — (Applause) — I am the grandson of immigrants from Japan who went to America, boldly going to a strange new world, seeking new opportunities. My mother was born in Sacramento, California. My father was a San Franciscan. They met and married in Los Angeles, and I was born there.
好了 (掌声) 我是来自日本移民的第三代后裔 我的祖父母来到美国 勇敢地进入一个陌生的新世界 寻找新的机会 我的母亲出生在加利福尼亚州萨格拉门托市 我的父亲是旧金山人 他们在洛杉矶相遇并结婚 我就在那里出生
I was four years old when Pearl Harbor was bombed on December 7, 1941 by Japan, and overnight, the world was plunged into a world war. America suddenly was swept up by hysteria. Japanese-Americans, American citizens of Japanese ancestry, were looked on with suspicion and fear and with outright hatred simply because we happened to look like the people that bombed Pearl Harbor. And the hysteria grew and grew until in February 1942, the president of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, ordered all Japanese-Americans on the West Coast of America to be summarily rounded up with no charges, with no trial, with no due process. Due process, this is a core pillar of our justice system. That all disappeared. We were to be rounded up and imprisoned in 10 barbed-wire prison camps in some of the most desolate places in America: the blistering hot desert of Arizona, the sultry swamps of Arkansas, the wastelands of Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, Colorado, and two of the most desolate places in California.
我当时只有4岁 珍珠港 在1941年12月7日被日本轰炸 一夜之间,全世界 陷入了世界性的战争 突然之间,美国充满了 歇斯底里的情绪 日裔美国人 日本人后裔的美国公民 遭到了 怀疑和恐惧 以及赤裸裸的仇恨 只是因为我们碰巧长得像 轰炸珍珠港的那些人 歇斯底里的情绪在不断增长 直到1942年2月 美国总统 富兰克林德拉诺罗斯福 命令美国西海岸的 所有日裔美国人 立即集合 没有罪名,没有审判 未经法律诉讼程序 法律诉讼程序,是我们司法体制的 核心支柱 一切都没有 我们必须被集中起来 被监禁在10个铁丝网围绕的战俘集中营 它们都位于美国最偏远的地区 亚利桑那州酷热的沙漠 阿肯色州潮湿的沼泽 怀俄明、爱达荷、犹他和科罗拉多州的不毛之地 还有两个位于加利福尼亚州最荒凉的地带
On April 20th, I celebrated my fifth birthday, and just a few weeks after my birthday, my parents got my younger brother, my baby sister and me up very early one morning, and they dressed us hurriedly. My brother and I were in the living room looking out the front window, and we saw two soldiers marching up our driveway. They carried bayonets on their rifles. They stomped up the front porch and banged on the door. My father answered it, and the soldiers ordered us out of our home. My father gave my brother and me small luggages to carry, and we walked out and stood on the driveway waiting for our mother to come out, and when my mother finally came out, she had our baby sister in one arm, a huge duffel bag in the other, and tears were streaming down both her cheeks. I will never be able to forget that scene. It is burned into my memory.
4月20日,是我5周岁的生日 生日之后的几个星期 我的父母把我弟弟 妹妹和我 很早就叫起来 匆忙给我们穿上衣服 弟弟和我坐在客厅里 从窗户向外看 我们看到两名士兵走到门前的车道 他们的步枪上装着刺刀 他们走过门廊 大声地敲门 我的父亲打开门 士兵命令我们离开家 父亲给我和弟弟 一人一个小箱子 我们走出来,站在外面 等着妈妈 我的母亲最后走出来 一只手抱着妹妹 另一只手拿着一个大袋子 她的脸颊上挂着眼泪 我永远忘不了那个场景 它深深地烙印在我的记忆中
We were taken from our home and loaded on to train cars with other Japanese-American families. There were guards stationed at both ends of each car, as if we were criminals. We were taken two thirds of the way across the country, rocking on that train for four days and three nights, to the swamps of Arkansas. I still remember the barbed wire fence that confined me. I remember the tall sentry tower with the machine guns pointed at us. I remember the searchlight that followed me when I made the night runs from my barrack to the latrine. But to five-year-old me, I thought it was kind of nice that they'd lit the way for me to pee. I was a child, too young to understand the circumstances of my being there.
我们被从家里带走 装上一列火车 车上还有其他日裔美国人家庭 每节车厢两端 都有士兵把守 好像我们是罪犯 我们跨越了这个国家四分之三的距离 在摇摇晃晃的车厢中度过了 四天三夜 最终来到阿肯色州的沼泽地带 我依然记得围绕在身边的 铁丝网 我记得高高的哨兵塔 上面架设的机枪瞄准我们 我记得晚间 从兵营跑到厕所时 跟随我的探照灯光 但是对于5岁的我来说 我觉得这还不错, 因为他们在我尿尿时 会为我照亮 我还是个孩子 不能理解我为什么 会待在那里
Children are amazingly adaptable. What would be grotesquely abnormal became my normality in the prisoner of war camps. It became routine for me to line up three times a day to eat lousy food in a noisy mess hall. It became normal for me to go with my father to bathe in a mass shower. Being in a prison, a barbed-wire prison camp, became my normality.
孩子们的适应能力非常强 这些极为反常的安排 反倒成为我在战俘营中 习以为常的日常生活 我习惯了每天三次的列队 习惯了在嘈杂的食堂中吃恶心的食物 习惯了和父亲一起 集体洗澡 在一个监狱中, 一个铁丝网环绕的战俘集中营里 这都是我的日常生活
When the war ended, we were released, and given a one-way ticket to anywhere in the United States. My parents decided to go back home to Los Angeles, but Los Angeles was not a welcoming place. We were penniless. Everything had been taken from us, and the hostility was intense. Our first home was on Skid Row in the lowest part of our city, living with derelicts, drunkards and crazy people, the stench of urine all over, on the street, in the alley, in the hallway. It was a horrible experience, and for us kids, it was terrorizing. I remember once a drunkard came staggering down, fell down right in front of us, and threw up. My baby sister said, "Mama, let's go back home," because behind barbed wires was for us home.
战争结束了 我们也被释放了 每个人领到一张单程车票 可以去美国的任何地方 我的父母决定回家 回到洛杉矶 但是洛杉矶并不友好 我们身无分文 所有的一切都被抢走了 周围的敌意还非常明显 我们第一个落脚地是 城市最下方的贫民窟 与流浪汉、醉鬼 和疯子们住在一起 街道、小巷和走廊中 弥漫着 排泄物的臭气 对我们孩子来说 那是一段可怕的经历 我记得有一次 一个醉汉踉踉跄跄地走过来 就在我们眼前跌倒 然后开始呕吐 我的妹妹说: “妈妈,我们回家吧。” 因为铁丝网的里面 就是 我们的家
My parents worked hard to get back on their feet. We had lost everything. They were at the middle of their lives and starting all over. They worked their fingers to the bone, and ultimately they were able to get the capital together to buy a three-bedroom home in a nice neighborhood. And I was a teenager, and I became very curious about my childhood imprisonment. I had read civics books that told me about the ideals of American democracy. All men are created equal, we have an inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and I couldn't quite make that fit with what I knew to be my childhood imprisonment. I read history books, and I couldn't find anything about it. And so I engaged my father after dinner in long, sometimes heated conversations. We had many, many conversations like that, and what I got from them was my father's wisdom. He was the one that suffered the most under those conditions of imprisonment, and yet he understood American democracy. He told me that our democracy is a people's democracy, and it can be as great as the people can be, but it is also as fallible as people are. He told me that American democracy is vitally dependent on good people who cherish the ideals of our system and actively engage in the process of making our democracy work. And he took me to a campaign headquarters — the governor of Illinois was running for the presidency — and introduced me to American electoral politics. And he also told me about young Japanese-Americans during the Second World War.
我的父母努力工作 养活一家人 我们失去了一切 他们在中年时期 一切重新开始 他们拼命地工作 最终,我们 有足够的钱 在一个不错的街区买一所有三个卧室的房子 那时候我十几岁 对童年时的监禁生活 非常好奇 我阅读了公民教育手册, 其中提到 美国民主的理念 所有的人生而平等 我们有不可剥夺的 生活、自由和追求幸福的权利 这与我童年监禁生活 的经历判若云泥 我遍阅历史书籍 找不到有关这件事的任何描述 于是我在晚饭后找到父亲 与他进行长时间,有时候是激烈的讨论 我们有过很多很多这样的讨论 从中我收获了 父亲的智慧 在监禁期间 他遭受的苦难最深 但他依然理解美国式民主 他告诉我,我们的民主 是人民的民主 人民强大,民主也强大 但它也像人一样会犯错误 他告诉我,美国民主 主要取决于那些善良的人 他们珍爱我们体制的理念 积极地推动 民主的发展 他把我带到一个竞选总部 伊利诺伊州长正在竞选总统 让我开始接触美国选举政治 他还给我讲 年轻的日裔美国人 在二战中的故事
When Pearl Harbor was bombed, young Japanese-Americans, like all young Americans, rushed to their draft board to volunteer to fight for our country. That act of patriotism was answered with a slap in the face. We were denied service, and categorized as enemy non-alien. It was outrageous to be called an enemy when you're volunteering to fight for your country, but that was compounded with the word "non-alien," which is a word that means "citizen" in the negative. They even took the word "citizen" away from us, and imprisoned them for a whole year.
珍珠港遭到轰炸之后 年轻的日裔美国人和年轻的美国人一样 纷纷前往征兵处 志愿为祖国而战 爱国的热情 遭到了当头一棒 我们被拒绝入伍 我们被认为是敌对的非盟友 敌人的称呼让人愤怒 当你志愿为祖国而战 却被冠以“非盟友”的称呼 这个词的意思是 “公民”的对立面 他们甚至剥夺了我们公民的身份 还把他们监禁一年
And then the government realized that there's a wartime manpower shortage, and as suddenly as they'd rounded us up, they opened up the military for service by young Japanese-Americans. It was totally irrational, but the amazing thing, the astounding thing, is that thousands of young Japanese-American men and women again went from behind those barbed-wire fences, put on the same uniform as that of our guards, leaving their families in imprisonment, to fight for this country.
之后,政府意识到 战争期间人手匮乏 就像他们突然把我们抓起来一样 他们又突然向年轻的日裔美国人 敞开了军队的大门 这完全没有道理可讲 但神奇的 令人震惊的是 成千上万 来自铁丝网后面的 年轻日裔美国男女 穿上与守卫同样的军装 离开监狱中的家庭 为祖国而战
They said that they were going to fight not only to get their families out from behind those barbed-wire fences, but because they cherished the very ideal of what our government stands for, should stand for, and that was being abrogated by what was being done.
他们说,他们的战争 不仅仅是为了让家人 走出铁丝网 而且因为他们相信 我们的政府捍卫的理念 他们也要捍卫 被目前行为 所破坏殆尽的理念
All men are created equal. And they went to fight for this country. They were put into a segregated all Japanese-American unit and sent to the battlefields of Europe, and they threw themselves into it. They fought with amazing, incredible courage and valor. They were sent out on the most dangerous missions and they sustained the highest combat casualty rate of any unit proportionally.
所有的人生而平等 于是他们挺身而出,为祖国而战 他们被安排在一个单独的 日裔美国人作战部队 被送往欧洲战场 他们投身战争 以异乎寻常的勇气 和毅力作战 他们执行最危险的任务 平均各作战部队的情况 他们的伤亡率最高
There is one battle that illustrates that. It was a battle for the Gothic Line. The Germans were embedded in this mountain hillside, rocky hillside, in impregnable caves, and three allied battalions had been pounding away at it for six months, and they were stalemated. The 442nd was called in to add to the fight, but the men of the 442nd came up with a unique but dangerous idea: The backside of the mountain was a sheer rock cliff. The Germans thought an attack from the backside would be impossible. The men of the 442nd decided to do the impossible. On a dark, moonless night, they began scaling that rock wall, a drop of more than 1,000 feet, in full combat gear. They climbed all night long on that sheer cliff. In the darkness, some lost their handhold or their footing and they fell to their deaths in the ravine below. They all fell silently. Not a single one cried out, so as not to give their position away. The men climbed for eight hours straight, and those who made it to the top stayed there until the first break of light, and as soon as light broke, they attacked. The Germans were surprised, and they took the hill and broke the Gothic Line. A six-month stalemate was broken by the 442nd in 32 minutes.
有一场战役说明了这一点 那是哥特防线的一场战役 德国人被困在 山坡的一侧 一面是高耸的峭壁 一面是坚不可摧的山洞 三个盟军营 已经连续进攻了 6个月 双方陷入僵局 442营得到命令 进入战场 442营的士兵 有了一个异想天开 又极为危险的想法 山的后面 是一个岩石峭壁 德国人认为对方绝不可能 从后面发动进攻 442营的士兵决定把它变成可能 在一个星月无光的晚上 他们开始测量峭壁的高度 超过1000英尺 全副武装的士兵 花了整整一晚 攀登这座峭壁 在黑暗中 一些人由于失手 或者失足 跌入下面的深渊 坠亡 他们无声无息地落下 没有一声叫喊 以免暴露行踪 士兵们攀爬了8个小时 到达顶部的人 在等待清晨的第一缕阳光 破晓时分 他们发动了进攻 德国人无法想象 他们占领了山头 突破了哥特防线 6个月的僵局 被442营 在32分钟内打破
It was an amazing act, and when the war ended, the 442nd returned to the United States as the most decorated unit of the entire Second World War. They were greeted back on the White House Lawn by President Truman, who said to them, "You fought not only the enemy but prejudice, and you won."
这是一次极为成功的行动 战争结束后 442营士兵回到美国 他们是二战中 功勋最为显著的部队 他们在白宫草坪,得到杜鲁门总统 的接见,他说: “你们不但与敌人作战 还在与世俗的偏见和你们自己作战。”
They are my heroes. They clung to their belief in the shining ideals of this country, and they proved that being an American is not just for some people, that race is not how we define being an American. They expanded what it means to be an American, including Japanese-Americans that were feared and suspected and hated. They were change agents, and they left for me a legacy. They are my heroes and my father is my hero, who understood democracy and guided me through it. They gave me a legacy, and with that legacy comes a responsibility, and I am dedicated to making my country an even better America, to making our government an even truer democracy, and because of the heroes that I have and the struggles that we've gone through, I can stand before you as a gay Japanese-American, but even more than that, I am a proud American.
他们是我心目中的英雄 他们沐浴着这个国家闪亮的理念 爬上了峭壁 他们证明,美国人的称号 不仅仅属于一部分人 美国人并不是一个种族的名称 他们重新定义了美国人的概念 其中也包括了那些 被人怀疑和仇恨的日裔美国人 他们促成了未来的变化 他们给我留下了 丰厚的遗产 他们是我的英雄 我的父亲是我的英雄 他了解民主的含义 引导我走出迷惘 他们留给我的东西 让我形成了一种责任感 我下定决心 让我的国家 成为一个更好的美国 让我们的政府 变得更加民主 由于我心目中的那些英雄 由于我们经历的那些苦难 我可以作为一个日裔美国同胞 站在你们的面前 更重要的是 我是一个自豪的美国人
Thank you very much.
非常感谢
(Applause)
(掌声)