外籍人员离开北京时是什么感受？美网友评论

What does it feel like for anexpat to leave Beijing?

外籍人员离开北京时是什么感受？

As a North American who has lived in Beijing forseveral years, what does it feel like to move back to the US or Canada?

作为一个住在北京多年的北美人，当你重新回到美国或加拿大生活是什么样的感受呢？

★Isuppose it depends on how you feel about Beijing, and how long you were there.

我觉得这取决于你对北京的感受以及你呆的时间长短

★I was in BJ for over 5 years, from late 2007 until early 2013.  Moved backto the US not because of any lingering issue withChina - although the smog, lack of taxis, increasing cost of living, etc allplayed a part - but because I found a better paying job stateside.  Moneytalks, at least for me.

我从07年到13年在北京住了5年。我搬回美国不是因为雾霾重、的士少及生活成本增加之类等问题，主要还是因为我在美国找到了一份待遇更好的工作。有钱能使鬼推磨，至少对我来说是这样。

★I miss Beijing everyday.  I miss the vibrancy of Ol'Chokey.  I miss the hustle and bustle andfeeling that on any given day, anything could happen (good or bad).  Imiss the booming, if chaotic, restaurant, bar and livemusic scenes.  I miss the food - obviously the Chinese food - the tons ofamazing regional cuisines (whereas here in the US, more often than not, its alljust "CHINESE FOOD" mostly made up of kung pao chicken, sweet n' sourpork, and all the other Americanized dishes)... but also the large selectionthat living in a booming international metropolis brings - great French,Italian, Latin, etc, etc that you don't get in the US except inthe biggest and most metropolitan cities like NY, SF or others.

我每天都想念北京。我想念它的活力四射。我想念它的拥挤和喧嚣，以及那种在任意一天任何事情（不管好坏）都可能发生的感觉。我想念那种朝气蓬勃的或者说有点乱糟糟的饭店、酒吧及其现场音乐。我想念那里的美食——真正的中国美食——无数让人目瞪口呆的各个地方菜系（在美国这里，所谓的“中国菜”经常只不过是一些宫爆鸡丁、糖醋里脊之类以及美国化的菜式）。同时生活在北京这样一个蓬勃发展的国际大都市会给你带来更多的选择——法国菜、意大利菜，拉美菜等等，这些在美国都是难以想象的，除非是像纽约和旧金山这类的大都市。

★Most ofall I miss the default camaraderie that comes with being anexpat.  You meet people and instantly have a common bond that makes iteasy to strike up a conversation, make friends, and have people to do stuffwith.  Back in the states its freaking hard to meet people and makefriends.  There's just not that same sense of common ground that you havewith other foreigners in BJ.  You have to actively hunt out groups -parents usually find friends through their kid's classmates or after schoolactivities, I know people who've joined Meet-Upsaround subjects they find interesting to try to meet folks, etc.  But ingeneral, its just harder.

最让我想念的是作为外籍人士自然而然会产生的一种情愫——与人交往时立刻产生一种共同感受的纽带使谈话、交朋友以及共同做一些事情非常容易。回到美国与人交往和交朋友变得异常困难。没有与其他在北京外国人那样的共同话题。你不得不努力去寻求某些圈子——比如父母经常在他们孩童时的同学中或课外活动中找朋友。我也知道有些人通过参加主题活动发现共同兴趣来寻找志同道合之人。总的说来，回到美国社交方面更加困难。

★My Chinese wife and I go to the part of Atlanta that's heavy with Chineseexpatriates, restaurants and businesses nearly every weekend. There's a huge grocery store that is just likebeing back in China - its loud, packed with pushing and shoving people, smellsfunny... just like back in Beijing.  You couldn't have paid me to go to aCarrefour on a Sunday afternoon in BJ - it's chaos embodied.  Here, I LOVEit.  It feels like "home."  I often tell my wife that myfavorite moments here are in that crowded store, getting bumped around by some'lao taitai' as I pass the stinky tofu stand.  

我的华裔妻子和我几乎每个周末都去亚特兰大一些有很多华人的餐馆及商业的地方。那里有一个很大的食品杂货店，会让我感觉回到了中国——非常的喧嚣，充满了推推搡搡的人，还有一些奇怪的气味…就像回到了北京。在北京的时候，你给我钱让我在星期天下午去家乐福我都不会去，太吵闹了。但是在这里，我却爱上了它，让我有一种“家”的感觉。我经常对我妻子说，我最喜欢的时刻就是在这拥挤的店铺里，走过臭豆腐摊时被一些“老太太”挤来挤去…

★Oh yeah- when I go out to dinner and want another beer, or ketchup for my fries, orthe check... I miss screaming "FUYUAN!" at the top of my lungs, andinstead having to wait politely for someone to happen by.  

对了还有，当我去外面就餐，需要加一瓶啤酒，或番茄酱或买单的时候，我想念那声尽我所能的爽快大喊“服务员！”，而这里不得绅士般的等待服务员默默的路过。

★Enjoy the experience while you can.  You'll undoubtedly cherish it whenyou do eventually return stateside.  China gets into your blood and itssomething that never comes out.  In a few years, when its time to job huntagain, I'll look at China again and see what opportunities exist.  And itsvery much a part of my long-term retirement plans.

当你还置身其中的时候请享受你的经历。当你最终回到美国的时候毫无疑问你会非常珍惜它。中国（文化）已经融入到了你的血液，其中的一些东西再也无法分离。过些年，当该再次找工作的时候，我将会看一下中国看有没有什么机会。中国也将无疑是我长期退休计划中的一部分。

★I thinkthis will probably vary so much from person to person that you're less likelyto get an actualanswer than to get a range.Here's my data point:

我想这个问题没有标准答案，取决于不同人不同角度。我的观点如下：

★I first visitedBeijing when I was 18 and fresh out of high school, and moved there right afterI'd turned 20. My first visit to Beijing was for a summer study program atBeida, and it happened to be a week or two after it was announced that the cityhad won the right to host the 2008 Olympics. For the next seven years there wasan incredible excitement and optimism to the city, a sense that anything waspossible. I haven't found that to be the case in the post-Olympics Beijing, butit's entirely possible and maybe even probable that the problem is with me.

我18岁第一次访问北京，那时刚从高中毕业。我正式搬到北京时我刚满20岁的时候。我第一次访问北京是因为北大的一个夏季学习活动，那时刚好是北京宣布赢得08年奥运举办权的一两星期后。在接下来的七年里，整个城市充满了难以置信的兴奋和乐观，空气中弥漫着一种无所不能的氛围。在举办奥运后的北京我没有发现这种情形，不过也许这很可能是我的问题。

★I leftBeijing on August 1, 2013, and have been back in a major-ish East Coast US citysince then. (Philadelphia.)

我与2013年8月1号离开北京，回到美国后一直呆在东部沿海城市（费城）。

★I miss food. I miss being surrounded by 北京話 -- thoughthese days that's rarely even thecase in Beijing anymore, and in any event I'm still pretty immersed inChinese back here in the States. Once the weather gets warmer I'll probablymiss some of the nicer features of spring in Beijing, but there isn't a wholelot to miss about Beijing winters other than the 糖葫蘆.

我想念美食。我想念被周围北京话坏绕的感觉——虽然这种情况即使现在在北京也很难得，我一有机会还是沉浸在中文里，即便我已经回了美国。当天气转暖，我也会怀念北京春天美好的一面，不过除了糖葫芦北京的冬天没有太多值得怀念的。

★I miss friends -- but many of myfriends, Chinese and foreign, are leaving Beijing too, or have already left, orhave been priced out or smoked out or forced out by tightening visa policies.There are places I miss -- but there's no chance of returning to many of those,either: one of them got knocked down in late 2005; another few changed unalterablybetween about 2007 and 2010. I miss the city that I fell in love with in 2001and 2003 and 2005, but it's been gone for a long time, and the city that tookits place is, I think, a lot less lovable.

我想念朋友们——不过我许多朋友不管是中国人还是外国人也在准备离开北京，或者已经离开，或者因高物价、雾霾或收紧的签证政策不得不离开。我怀念很多地方——但是我再也没有机会回到那些地方：其中一个地方在2005年底被拆迁；其他一些地方在2007到2010年间也日新月异了。我怀念那个我在2001年2003年和2005年深爱的城市，但是它已离我远去。对于现在的这个城市，爱意渐减。

★Mike Cormack I leftBeijing in June 2013, after 3 years in Beijing and 6 years in China.

我在北京呆了3年，在中国一共呆了6年。我于2013年七月离开北京。

★I miss

我怀念的:

The sense ofpossibility everywhere 

到处都是一切皆有可能的氛围

So damn easy to geta job 

太TM容易找工作了

Too easy to meetpeople 

非常容易与人交往

Vast culturalpossibilities 

深厚的文化

Loads of smartpeople doing cool things 

有许多聪明人做酷酷的事情

The openness andlack of cynicism (in a personal way) 

开放，不愤世嫉俗

Xinjiang/muslimrestaurants 

新疆/穆斯林餐厅

People striving toimprove themselves 

人们努力奋斗改变自己

Easy to cyclemost places 

很容易骑车去很多地方

Street food (sweetpotato in winter, for example)

路边摊美食（比如冬天的烤红薯）

★Ireally don't miss

我不怀念的:

Pollution 

污染

Public transport

公共交通

Ugly buildings

难看的建筑

Food anxiety

食品安全

People with littlesense of personal space 

人们缺乏私人空间概念

Common attitude of "fuckeveryone else, I got mine" 

普遍的“各人自扫门前雪，哪管他人瓦上霜”态度

Smoking everywhere无处不吸烟

Hard to make realfriends 

很难交到真正的朋友

Vastly overpricedhousing 

房价高的离谱

Overpriced importfood 

进口食品价格离谱

★Frank Fradella I onlylived in China for a total of 6 months, but when I arrived,it was with the intention tostay. That kind of defined my mindset — that this was a permanentmove — and the sudden departurewas horrible and cruel and unwelcome.

我在中国仅仅呆了6个月，但是当初我来的时候我是打算在留下来。在我脑中已经形成了一个固定的思维——这次是我永久的定居，后来突然的离开对我来说是非常的可怕和残忍的

★Coming back to theStates when I'd just gotten accustomed to life in Beijing was really jarring.Everything was too expensive, the politics here drive me nuts, and I miss thefood like crazy.

当我刚习惯北京的生活后回到美国时，一切让人烦躁。所有的东西都是那么贵，政治让人抓狂，还有我超级无敌怀念中国的美食。

★But… as others havesaid… from the time I first visited China in 2007 to the time I moved there in2009, there was already much about China to be missed. It's tobe expected in a place that's changing so rapidly, but I suppose mymessage here is to think of Beijing like Earth in Haldeman'sForever War. Leave for just six months and whenyou return, it will be as though 50 years have passed.

但是…就像其他人所说…当从我2007年第一次访问中国到我2009年搬到那里，已经错过了许多关于中国的东西。众所周知，这里发展变化非常迅速，但我还是想传达一个信息——北京就像乔·霍尔德曼科幻作品《千年战争》中描述的一样：当你离开6个月后回来，这里就像已经过了50年。

★David Schoonewolff Firstof all, let me just say that I am not either from the US or Canada. I’mColombian, but teaching English has been my bread and butter all my life, and Ilived in China for about 4 years, being Beijing the last place I stayed at.

首先得说我既不是来自美国也不是加拿大。我来自哥伦比亚，但是我是靠教英语吃饭的。我在中国呆了四年，北京是我在中国的最后一站。 

★The realizationthat I had to leave sunk in hard. Since I had arrived in China (earlyMay 2008) I wanted to go work in a big city, and Beijing was a goal after myfirst week or so in South China. I finally arrived in Beijing to live and workin September 2011, but I got a pretty rough deal with the tight visa policies.As I mentioned to a dear friend of mine, the type of visa that got me intoChina was precisely the kind that got me out of China.

不得不离开的现实让我陷入困境。我于08年五月初到达中国，我想在大城市工作，我在抵达一星期左右我就把北京作为我的目标。我最终在2011年9月开始在北京生活和工作，不过严格的签证政策让我苦不堪言。就像我对一个好友所说，对我的中国生活而言成也签证败也签证。 

★At the end of myjourney, I remember having this mixed, love-hate feeling about China. I lovedit for all the things I learned about the country, its culture, about myselfand life in many instances and the friends I made, butI hated it for all that I was going through at that time –it was hard for me tofind a job being a non-native speaker of English-, for all the things that Icouldn’t change about my situation at the time and about myself, always feelingthat the regulations were about to change for theworse, or that I was risking myself for deportation.

在我中国旅程的接近尾声的时候，我对中国既爱又恨。我爱从这个国家学到的一切、它的文化、生活中许多美好的时刻以及遇到的很多朋友。我也恨它，因为那个时让我饱受煎熬——对于我这个非英语母语的人非常难找到工作；也因为那时我对改变自身的境况无能为力，总感觉相关的签证政策每况愈下，对自己被驱逐出境风险的担忧与日俱增。

★I leftwith a bittersweet feeling. I would reunite with my family that I hadn’t seenin four years, and I would be going back home, where I didn’t have to worryabout visa rules or the PSB or all the red tape, but Iwas also leaving a place that I learned to call home despite all thedifficulties. I will miss the baozi with soymilk in the morning, or the McD’sbreakfast (here in my city it is not common to have breakfast at McD’s), theXinjiang restaurants, the people I met and the fact that I was witnessing a nationbloom in all its glory. I will not miss the Beijing winter, or thepollution. Probably, the bad feelings about China had to more do with myself,and the unrealistic expectations I had about the city,something like: “It is not you, it’s me.”

我离开时带着一种悲喜交加的情绪。我终于要与我四年未见的家人团聚了，我将回到家里，不用再担心签证政策、公安局以及那些所有的红色印章，但是我也要离开一个我曾逐步尝试称为“家”的地方，尽管在那里历经困难。我会怀念早晨的包子和豆浆、麦当劳的早餐（我家乡的城市麦当劳很少提供早餐）、新疆的餐馆、我遇见的人以及我亲眼见证了一个充满历史荣耀国家的日益昌盛。我不会怀念北京的冬天或者污染。也许，关于中国不好的感受更多与我自身有关。 

★I still miss a lotof things, though, and I know I would gladly go back to visit Beijing.

我仍想念很多东西，我知道如有一天我能再回北京我一定会喜不胜收。

★Anonymous I thinkthis depends on many factors, but age in particular. 

我觉得这个取决于很多因素，特别是年纪

★I can answer thisas someone who left Beijing as a late teen, having lived in the city center forroughly eight years (2000-2008). Leaving was very difficult for me, and not mychoice. Leaving friends at school, the bustling chaos of Beijing and movingsomewhere with a different climate and different culture was not easy, despitethe fact that it was my 'home country'. 

作为一个十几岁离开北京的人我能回答这个问题，我在北京市中心生活了大约8年（2000-2008）。离开对我来说很艰难，但我也毫无选择。离开学校熟悉的朋友，离开喧嚣的北京，来到一个气候和文化不同的地方对我来说不是一件易事，尽管事实上这是我的“祖国”。

★At my new school Iwas overly protective of China, and denied or avoided any criticismsof it made by my new classmates. Although I knew that much of what was beingsaid was probably true, I did not like it that people who had never bothered tovisit China, or at least read about it - beyond the negative articles writtenin the press - pushed me to validate what they had read.

到了新学校后，我总是极度为中国辩护，否认和避免一切来自我新同学对中国的批评。虽然我知道他们说的某些事可能是存在的，但是我不喜欢那些从来没有去过中国或只读一些新闻报道负面文章的人无端指责，这经常迫使我去验证他们所读的是否属实。

★I missed the excitement of living in Beijing, the food, notunderstanding everything being said around me (it made people far lessannoying).

我怀念生活在北京的激情、美食，以及听不懂我周围人说的一切（这样不会使人那么烦恼）

★As much as I(mostly) loved growing up there, I don't think that Beijing is a particularlygood place for expat children to grow up. It's horribly polluted, andexpat children (who attend international schools) live in a bubble.I don't miss these two things.

尽管我很享受在那长大，不过我认为北京不是一个特别适合外籍小孩成长的地方。它的污染太严重，还有外籍儿童（在国际学校上学）像是生活在泡泡里。我不喜欢上述两件事。

★I alsomiss the squat toilets - I'd take one over theurine splattered cracked toilet seats of public toilets here any day!

我也怀念中国的蹲式厕所——比起这里尿液四溅和破烂的马桶座圈的公共厕所，我随时都更愿意选择蹲式厕所！

★Nadja Malashich Everyword is true! When we moved to London I terribly missed every minute of my lifein China. We have lived there for 6 years and I pushed my husband to bring meback there. Now we are back to China.. But the truth is - my China haschanged............ It's different ..... So did I..

以上各楼皆对！当我移居到伦敦，我非常想念我在中国的每一分钟。我在那里住了6年，我不停的催我丈夫带我回去。现在我终于回到了中国…不过事实是——我的中国已经改变了…面目全非…而我也不复当年…