他在太平間里看到的一切仍然使他心有余悸

他在太平間里看到的一切仍然使他心有余悸

In the bowels of a Venezuelan hospital, I took my toughest walk ever.

在委內(nèi)瑞拉的一家醫(yī)院里，我進(jìn)行了一次最艱難的行走。

It was just after dawn on Oct. 17. The corpse of my 81-year-old father lay on a gurney, covered in thick orange sheets. He had just died of a heart attack in his hospital room, on the fifth floor. He was lying in bed next to my stepmother, his companion for the last 20 years. It was four days after doctors had performed a major emergency surgery to repair his large intestine.

當(dāng)時是10月17日黎明剛過。我81歲父親的尸體躺在輪床上，上面蓋著厚厚的橙色床單。他剛剛死于心臟病，在他五樓的病房里。他躺在我繼母旁邊的床上，他過去20年的伴侶。四天前，醫(yī)生們?yōu)樗隽艘淮涡迯?fù)大腸的緊急手術(shù)。

My father's care during his hospitalization was acceptable despite the deterioration in health care services during the current economic crisis. (The staff was quite good, but we had to bring our own water and medications, and there were flies constantly flying around the room.)

我父親在住院期間的護(hù)理是可以接受的，盡管在當(dāng)前的經(jīng)濟(jì)危機(jī)期間，醫(yī)療服務(wù)惡化了。(工作人員都很好，但我們必須自己帶水和藥品，而且房間里蒼蠅不停地飛來飛去。)

After he died, it was another story. I saw firsthand how drastically the quality of my country's medical institutions has declined.

他死后，情況就不同了。我親眼看到我國醫(yī)療機(jī)構(gòu)的質(zhì)量急劇下降。

In Venezuela, when someone dies in a hospital, the body is moved to the morgue until the family can sign papers to claim the body and take it for burial.

在委內(nèi)瑞拉，當(dāng)有人在醫(yī)院去世時，尸體會被移到太平間，直到家屬簽署文件認(rèn)領(lǐng)尸體并將其埋葬。

After my father's death, a male nurse in his early 20s pulled the gurney down a long outdoor corridor at University Hospital of Maracaibo. I followed along because I wanted to stay with my father's body until it reached the morgue, at which point I would go to an office to sign the necessary documents. I was heartbroken, tearing up uncontrollably.

我父親去世后，一名20多歲的男護(hù)士在馬拉開波大學(xué)醫(yī)院的一條長長的室外走廊上推著輪床。我跟在后面，因?yàn)槲蚁牒臀腋赣H的遺體在一起，直到它抵達(dá)太平間，然后我就會去辦公室簽署必要的文件。我心碎了，無法控制地流淚。

Memories of my father were passing through my mind like a high-speed train: I could see him throwing and catching a baseball with me when I was a kid and, years later, holding my 2-year-old baby girl in his arms.

父親的記憶就像一列高速列車一樣在我的腦海中閃過:我可以看到，當(dāng)我還是個孩子的時候，他和我一起扔棒球，接住棒球;多年以后，他把我2歲的小女兒抱在懷里。

And then, as we got about 50 feet away from the main entrance of the morgue, a nauseating smell of putrefaction slapped me in the face. It was the kind of stench that shuffles your stomach.

然后，當(dāng)我們離太平間正門大約50英尺的時候，一股令人作嘔的腐爛氣味撲面而來。那是一種讓你胃里翻騰的惡臭。

The reek vacuumed up all those recollections in a snap.

臭氣一下子把所有的回憶都吸走了。

The young nurse froze at the edge of the doorway. He leaned to the floor, and I thought perhaps he had a pain in his knee. Then I realized he was overcome with a wave of nausea.

Then I, the son of the departed, had to encourage a health worker to go on inside the morgue despite the foul smell.

年輕的護(hù)士在門口呆住了。他跪在地板上，我想他的膝蓋可能有點(diǎn)痛。然后我意識到他感到一陣惡心。

We went down a narrow indoor hallway leading to the morgue, which consisted of five separate rooms. Every step drew me closer to the source of the stench, which I soon discovered was in one of these rooms. This particular room was filled with about a dozen rotting bodies on beds, some piled on top of each other.

我們沿著一條狹窄的室內(nèi)走廊走到太平間，太平間由五個獨(dú)立的房間組成。每走一步都讓我更接近惡臭的來源，很快我就發(fā)現(xiàn)臭味就在其中一個房間里。這個特殊的房間里堆滿了十幾具躺在床上的腐爛身體，有些身體堆放在一起。

The nurse with the gurney proceeded to a different, smaller room where my father's body would stay until I'd signed the papers. Then the nurse left. I was standing in front of a small desk, but as yet there was no staff member there. The door to the large room with the rotting bodies was open. I went in and took a quick tour with a tissue covering my mouth and nose.

拿著輪床的護(hù)士走到另一間小一點(diǎn)的房間，在我簽字之前，我父親的遺體將停放在那里。然后護(hù)士離開了。我站在一張小桌子前，但那里還沒有工作人員。那個尸體腐爛的大房間的門是開著的。我走進(jìn)去，用一張紙巾捂住了嘴和鼻子，很快地游覽了一番。

The scene was creepy, as if extracted from a horror movie. Two big overhead lamps shone upon two corpses. I could see their bones. The little flesh that remained had turned black and rotten.

這個場景令人毛骨悚然，就像從恐怖電影中走出來一樣。兩盞巨大的頂燈照在兩具尸體上。我能看到他們的骨頭。剩下的那一小塊肉已經(jīng)發(fā)黑腐爛了。

One week after my father died, I began making phone calls to learn more about the morgue situation.

父親去世一周后，我開始打電話了解更多關(guān)于太平間的情況。

An NPR request to interview Mervin Urbina, director of the Universitario Hospital, to discuss the situation in the morgue was declined. No reason was given.

NPR要求采訪大學(xué)醫(yī)院院長默文·烏爾比納討論太平間的情況，但遭到拒絕。沒有給出原因。