[国际新闻] 泰晤士报：一个“洋妞”的自白

我从一部名为《洋妞在北京》的电视剧里学会了“脱裤”这个中文词。拍戏时，姚导演命令我“脱裤”。在北京喜来登长城饭店的床上，我翻着一本像是文革时《毛主席语录》的红色薄字典。我查到了“脱”和“裤”这两个字。
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“你在开玩笑！”我有些自言自语地说。我在剧中扮演一个叫杰西的美国人。这个轻佻的姑娘勾引了一个已婚中国男人。她爱上了他，为他牺牲了一切。那时，我刚从纽约一所大学毕业，来中国已经两个月，为一家美国公司工作。在一次聚会上，一个小伙子靠近我，对我说：“我一个朋友在拍洋妞在北京的电视剧。”

那时，我还不太听得懂中国话，试图弄懂他的意思。“妞”是“姑娘”、“女孩”或“芭比娃娃”的意思，而我听成了“牛”。我站在那里，大惑不解。他赶紧解释：“你是白人，想上电视吗？”

就这样，我开始拍电视了。我在一部中国肥皂剧里几乎半裸出镜，说着诸如“我爱你，咱们还等什么呢？”这样的台词。' t2 K! |$ y# D$ w) @3 [

洋妞的身份使我得到一些特别的机会。我扮演一个来自异国的女人。观众多达６亿，绝对超出想像。它给大街上的人们提供了大量谈资，让人一窥发生在中国人与西方人之间的罗曼史。( G& }+ h. s- R

上世纪９０年代，我在北京住了６年。在那段时间里，我过着一个外国女人的生活，同时又在电视上表演着中国人对那种生活的看法。要解释这两种完全平行的视角着实困难，因为必须弄明白中国人如何看待西方，和西方女人以及为何有这种看法，而这对我来说并非易事。- R& o# B: I3 ~7 p. C
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北京人喜欢杰西，因为她爱上了中国男人，她自信、性感，有着十足的美式做派。十几岁的青少年和他们的祖母在市场里跟着我，杰西买什么，他们就买什么----仿冒普拉达包、电源线以及鱼丸等等。csuchen.de3 ?  `# m) ?4 F  y8 P) R

中国人之所以对西方女人如此感兴趣，部分原因在于我们被认为是“性开放”以及“自由恋爱”的提倡者。在中国没有这样的观念，它们完全来自美国。有一次，我指出没有美国人会穿毛皮大衣或者大声嚷嚷“我能成为你的情人吗”。制片人的回答是：“我们不看重你怎么想。”

在喜来登长城饭店，我想在字典里找“脱”、“下”、“裤子”这几个字的其他意思，但徒劳无益。之后，和我演对手戏的健壮男演员也脱光了。那时，我被强烈的灯光照着，姚在一旁指挥：“摸他的背。”
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我照他说的做了，轻轻地，甚至还划着圈。房间里安静极了。当时我想，这个场景肯定能让我们的观众兴奋起来。但现在我知道了，他们会觉得很震惊，会想是不是外国女孩都那样。
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我说：“如果姚导演也裸体的话，我会觉得舒服些。”大家都惊呆了。这是个没有结果的要求，我试图向他们解释，杰西和我并不是一个人，而且我们俩谁也不能代表所有的西方人。姚导演耸耸肩，很严肃地声明：“在这里，我们都是工作人员。”为了表示他的友情和忠诚，他脱下了裤子。8 {* m9 v$ s1 D/ r4 i9 j% t2 p- l; b
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“谢谢。”我说。他说：“没关系，我能理解你的要求。现在，我们都一样了。”他叫“开拍”之后，我激情四溢地抓着男演员的背，希望这样能弥补自己的错误。摄影师对他的助手低声说：“看见了吧？洋妞都是老虎。”
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February 10, 2007

True confessions of a Beijing babe
Fresh out of college and with only a tenuous grip on the language, Rachel DeWoskin was at a party in Beijing. That’s how she found herself naked in front of 600 million people7 ~8 C: U+ {7 W. i7 s& R& j
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I LEARNT THE CHINESE FOR “drop trou” on the set of a television drama entitled Foreign Babes in Beijing. Yao, the director, gave the order tuoku. Perched on a bed in the Great Wall Sheraton Hotel, Beijing, I thumbed through a red, laminated dictionary that looked suspiciously like a Mao primer from the Cultural Revolution. I found it. Tuo, “peel off”, ku, from kuzi, or “pants”. " y9 Q' o5 R* H+ T/ F  G

“You must be kidding,” I said, to no one in particular. 人在德国社区/ u2 w8 P2 F, [1 w
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I was playing Jiexi (Jessie), the manipulative American hussy who seduces a married Chinese man, falls in love, then sacrifices everything for him. Fresh from university in New York, I had been in Beijing for two months, working for a US company and trying to use nerdy college Chinese. Then a guy approached me at a party and said: “My friend is filming foreign niu in Beijing.”
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I heard Chinese words unclearly back then; listening to people speak was like standing on my tiptoes and trying to catch their gist with a butterfly net. Niu, which means “girl” “chick”, or “babe”, sounded like “cattle” to me. I stood there, bewildered.
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“You’re white,” he clarified. “You want to be on TV?”
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And so I found myself half-naked on the set of a Chinese soap, delivering lines such as: “I love you; what are we waiting for?” csuchen.de: |4 ^, G# G' n8 L! y% g

Foreign Babes gave me several unique opportunities. I got to play an exotic femme fatale (in this case an American temptress, exchange student, and homewrecker). Against all expectation, it was watched by 600 million people. So it inspired lots of fodder for conversation in the streets, and insight into the fraught romance between China and the West. 人在德国社区! K6 M, o: ?9 ^# `, n

During my six years in Beijing in the 1990s, I both lived the life of a foreign woman and played the Chinese idea of that life on TV. Charting the parallel courses of those two versions was a worthwhile lesson in how China thinks about the West and Western women — and why.

Beijingers loved Jiexi for her commitment to Chinese men, her bravado, libido, and American style. Teenagers and their grandmothers followed me through markets, buying whatever Jiexi bought— fake Prada purses, extension cords or fish paste. . R& w  p+ A1 W5 Q
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Everyone wanted to be a liberated, unapologetic babe. Foreign Babes carried the delicate pretence of a socialist message (that foreign imports are corrupting), but was actually an advert for all things Western.
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Western women were the subject of tremendous interest, partly as a result of our reputation for being “open-minded” importers of libido and free love. This stereotype did not originate in the Chinese imagination, but as an American import. If the only contact you have had with a Western woman is Dynasty or Baywatch, you may think that foreign women are sluts. I once pointed out that no Americans actually wore fur coats or shouted: “Can’t I just be your lover?” and the producer replied: “We don’t care what you think. You look American! Like Dallas!” 0 w& O7 [6 N4 s( T2 R+ `1 O

Daily life in Beijing was a study in perception and a constant language lesson. Chinese has density and ambiguity, made richer by my evolving but always uncertain grip on its edges. While I was looking up dialogue and accidentally announcing in casual conversation that American professors castrate students (who would know that a tonal mistake in the word “strict” could turn it into “castrate”?), actual discourse in China was shifting. Modern words stretched Chinese stroke marks: Maidanglao, melodious Chinese McDonald’s, caifu, a newly minted term for peasants who get rich quick. Kekou Kele (Coca-Cola) contains, in four cleverly transliterated syllables, both a mimic of the original and homonyms for thirst, delight and quenching. It flaunts the compressed power of Chinese to contain multiple meanings in single syllables.
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In the Great Wall Sheraton, after I had searched unsuccessfully for alternate interpretations of “peel”, “off”, or “your pants”, my unstoppably macho co-star Wang Ling and I stripped.Under normal circumstances, I would have thought him fabulous. But I was panicked in the hot lights, and Yao was directing. “Rub his back.” 8 w" O3 @& `. q1 N5 o- \$ t
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So I did, in small, even circles. The room went silent. I thought the scene might be exciting for our immediate audience, but now I know that they were astonished, wondering if Western girls do it like that. I was supposed to be writhing in ecstasy, but had missed a vocabulary clue and given a chaste backrub. csuchen.de% v& B0 O: m9 V! U7 t# n

“You know,” I said. “I’d be more comfortable if Director Yao were also naked.” Everyone inhaled. It was a request born of desperation. But later, when I tried to convince people that Jiexi and I were not the same person, and that neither of us represented the entire West, I would regret asking Yao to tuo his ku.   ]4 u. Y6 P  G( f8 L( E9 w2 s

He shrugged. “We’re all professionals here,” he announced. And in a gesture of tremendous camaraderie and allegiance, he dropped his pants.

“Thank you,” I said.
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“No problem," he said. “I can understand this request. Now we are dou yiyang, all the same.” When he said “action”, I tried to redeem myself by clawing Wang Ling’s back enthusiastically. The cameraman whispered to his assistant: “See what I mean? Foreign babes are tigers.”

Foreign Babes in Beijing: Behind the Scenes of a New China by Rachel DeWoskin is published by Granta (£7.99, offer £7.59. inc p&p from 0870 1608080)

DeWoskin.jpg (12.1 KB)

True confessions of a Beijing babe

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