旅行的藝術(shù):動機 Ⅲ 異國情調(diào)-1

1

1

在阿姆斯特丹斯希普霍爾機場下飛機，進(jìn)入航站才幾步，我就被一塊天花板下懸著的指示牌吸引住了。這是一個指明通往迎賓廳、出口和簽轉(zhuǎn)柜臺的方向指示牌，鮮亮的黃顏色，長2米，高1米。指示牌設(shè)計也簡單，鋁制的箱框，鑲著塑料的指示牌，通過小鋼柱連接，從電纜線和空調(diào)管路密布的天花板掛下來。指示牌很簡單，甚至太過普通，但它卻讓我快樂。用“異國情調(diào)”來形容這種快樂也許有些不同尋常，卻是合宜的。指示牌上有好幾處顯出這種異國情調(diào)，如Aankomst（荷蘭文，迎賓廳）一詞中的兩個并置a；Uitgang（荷蘭文，出口）一詞中字母u和i連在一起；除了荷蘭文，指示牌上還標(biāo)有英文副標(biāo)：用balies（荷蘭文，柜臺）來表述desk（英文，柜臺）的意思，還采用了一些實用新潮的字體，如Frutiger體或Univers體等。

On disembarking at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport, only a few steps inside the terminal, I am struck by a sign hanging from the ceiling that announces the ways to the arrivals hall, the exit and the transfer desks. It is a bright yellow sign, one metre high and two across, simple in design, a plastic fascia in an illuminated aluminum box suspended on steel struts from a ceiling webbed with cables and air-conditioning ducts. Despite its simplicity, even mundanity, the sign delights me, a delight for which the adjective 'exotic', though unusual, seems apt. The exoticism is located in particular areas: in the double a of Aankomst , in the neighbourliness of au and an i in Uitgang , in the use of English subtitles, in the word for desks, balies , and in the choice of practical modernist fonts, Frutiger or Univers.

這個指示牌之所以讓我快樂，原因之一在于它是第一個肯定的見證，表明我已經(jīng)到達(dá)了一個“別的地方”。它是異國的一個標(biāo)志。也許對那些不太注意的人來說，這指示牌并不顯眼，但在我的國家里，這類指示牌是決不會以此種形式出現(xiàn)的。首先，它的黃色不會如此鮮亮，上面的字體可能會柔順些，并更多懷舊色彩；其次，它也不會考慮外國人是否會弄不清方向，不會加上其他語言的提示或副標(biāo)，而且單從語言上看，指示牌上也不會出現(xiàn)并置的字母a，這種特別的重復(fù)，說不清為什么，讓我感覺到自己正置身于另一種歷史和另一類民族心態(tài)之中。

If the sign provokes such pleasure, it is in part because it offers the first conclusive evidence of having arrived elsewhere. It is a symbol of abroad. Though it may not seem distinctive to the casual eye, such a sign would never exist in precisely this form in my own country. There it would be less yellow, the typeface would be softer and more nostalgic, there would-out of greater indifference to the confusion of foreigners-probably be no subtitles and the language would contain no double a s-a repetition in which I sensed, confusedly, the presence of another history and mindset.

一個電源插座，一只浴室水龍頭，一個果醬瓶，或是一個指示牌傳遞出的一些信息，可能連它的設(shè)計者也沒有想到，譬如說，它可能會表明其制造者的國籍。顯然，制作斯希普霍爾機場指示牌的民族似乎同我的民族相距甚遠(yuǎn)。一個大膽的、具有民族性格和特色的考古學(xué)家也許會將指示牌上字體的影響追溯到20世紀(jì)早期的風(fēng)格派運動 [1] ，從醒目的英文副標(biāo)考求出荷蘭人對外來影響的開放性，進(jìn)而追溯到1602年東印度公司的建立；并從指示牌整體上簡單的風(fēng)格看出加爾文主義的審美情趣，這種審美情趣在16世紀(jì)尼德蘭聯(lián)邦 [2] 和西班牙交戰(zhàn)期間就已成為荷蘭國民性的一部分。

A plug socket, a bathroom tap, a jam jar or an airport sign may tell us more than its designers intended, it may speak of the nation that made it. And the nation that had made the sign at Schiphol Airport seemed very far from my own. A bold archaeologist of national character might have traced the influence of the lettering back to the De Stijl movement of the early twentieth century, the prominence of the English subtitles to the Dutch openness towards foreign influences and the foundation of the East India Company in 1602 and the overall simplicity of the sign to the Calvinist aesthetic that became a part of Holland's identity during the war between the United Provinces and Spain in the sixteenth century.

從一個指示牌便能看出兩地間巨大的差異，這正可以作為一個簡單卻讓人愉悅的想法的注腳：一旦跨越國界，腳下便是一個不同的國度，風(fēng)俗人情和生活習(xí)慣亦必大異其趣。然而僅有差異，尚不足以引發(fā)快感，即便是有了快感，也不會長久。只有那些有助于我們自己國家自我完善的差異方可引發(fā)長久的快感。我認(rèn)為斯希普霍爾機場的指示牌具有異國情調(diào)，是因為它隱約傳達(dá)出了一種強烈的信息：制作這個指示牌的、就在uitgang之外的國度，有可能在相當(dāng)程度上比我自己的國家更投合我的性情與興趣。這指示牌預(yù)示著我在這個國度里的快樂。

That a sign could evolve so differently in two places was evidence of a simple but pleasing idea: that countries are diverse and practices variable across borders. Yet difference alone would not have been enough to elicit pleasure, or not for long. Difference had to seem like an improvement on what my own country was capable of. If I called the Schiphol sign exotic, it was because it succeeded in suggesting, vaguely but intensely, that the country which had made it and which lay beyond the uitgang might in critical ways prove more congenial than my own to my temperament and concerns. The sign was a promise of happiness.