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Berlin's image
柏林映像
Losing its cool
风华渐失
The German capital, famous for its edgy urbanity and quality of life, looks tired
以前卫和高生活品质闻名于世的德国首都，如今却是一副倦怠的样子
A disappointing missed opportunity?
错失良机，让人惋惜？
WHEN a magazine proclaims on its cover that a city is the world's “coolest”, it is often a sign that it has peaked. Newsweek did it to London in 1996, just as the city was becoming unaffordable for many cool people. Now it is Berlin's turn. In October Stern, a German magazine, declared the city the coolest, giving special attention to its many great clubs for partying.
如果某家杂志封面上大肆赞美某个城市为世界“最好玩”的城市，那往往预示着这座城市开始衰退。美国《新闻周刊》曾经于1996年夸赞伦敦，而当时这个城市不断增加的消费让很多冷静的人难以承受。如今，轮到柏林上演这一幕了。德国《明星》杂志于10月份宣扬它是最好玩的城市，并特意报导了许多举行派对的大型俱乐部。
The party scene is thriving, drawing tourists from Tel Aviv toStockholmwho fly in for long insomniac weekends. The most famous venue, Berghain, notorious for its arbitrary bouncers, is a world hub for techno music. But true cognoscenti are nostalgic for the rougher, anarchic days just after the Berlin Wall fell, when clubs popped up in abandoned spaces along the former no-man's-land, always several steps ahead of tedious fire regulations. A new book, “Berlin Wonderland”, documents the “wild years between 1990-96” with black-and-white photographs.
派对场面激奋人心，从特拉维夫到斯德哥尔摩的众多海外游客纷纷而至，在这里度过几个漫长无眠的周末。最出名的地方非世界电子音乐中心—柏林“伯根哈因”夜店莫属，其中随心所欲的保安让该店“闻名于世”。但真正的电音行家却一直怀念柏林墙倒塌后那些艰苦混乱的岁月，各种各样的夜店纷纷在之前无人地带的废弃地方出现，总能机智应对冗长乏味的禁火规定。《柏林奇境》这本新书用黑白照片讲述了1990年至1996年期间的癫狂岁月。
Some Berliners' nostalgia goes further back. The hottest museum exhibition is about West Berlin as a freedom-loving, libertine and yet parochial island surrounded byEast Germany. These days, by contrast, locals are annoyed by throngs of expats and westerners gentrifying formerly edgy neighbourhoods like Prenzlauer Berg.
还有一些柏林人则怀念更加久远的年代。当时最受欢迎的博物馆展览主题一般是关于被东德环绕，地域狭小但崇尚自由，无拘无束的西柏林。相比之下，如今当地人却对不断涌入的移民和西方游客颇为恼怒—他们让以往棱角鲜明的普伦茨劳贝格街区变得更优雅了。
Berlinis still fascinating. Nowhere are the scars of history—holocaust, war, destruction, division—so visible. And rents and prices remain low. A Facebook post by an Israeli expat in Berlin, called Olim le Berlin (“ascend to Berlin”), has launched a small exodus of Israelis who come for affordable fun and find Germany's dark past more intriguing than repulsive.
柏林依旧迷人。历史之殇无处不在—大屠杀、战争、毁灭、分裂—皆历历在目。租金和物价仍然处于低水平。一位以色列裔柏林人在脸书上发表一个名为“进柏林记”的活动—该活动吸引了少许追求享乐的以色列人，并且让他们发现相比德国曾经的黑暗历史，柏林纸醉金迷的生活更有诱惑力。
Yet rents have been rising for years, and locals and creative types complain about being priced out (even as they oppose any attempts to build new housing). Worse, much of the city has been made unusable or ungainly because of construction. The most notorious project of all isBerlin's new airport, originally due to open in 2011 but repeatedly delayed (to 2017 on the latest estimate). It is now the butt of jokes.
然而，租金连续几年增长，当地人与创作型的人埋怨迫于高房价而离开柏林（即使他们始终反对建造新住房）。更为不妙的是，城市的很多地方由于施工建设而无法使用或丑陋不堪。其中臭名昭著的工程当属柏林新机场，原计划于2011年投入使用，但却一再地延迟（据最新预计于2017年建成）。它成了当今时代的一大笑柄。
Even more telling is a huge building-site in the city centre, where the former castle of the Prussian kings (damaged in the war, razed by the communists) is being rebuilt to house a cultural forum. After years of controversy, most Berliners have decided that it is boring, retrograde and a missed opportunity. And there may be too little money left to make three of the fa?ades look like the old castle, so the edifice could end up disappointing even its fans.
更值得说道的是在市中心进行的一项遗址修复工程，该遗址原是普鲁士国王的城堡（在战争中受损，被共产主义分子摧毁），重建后用于举办文化论坛。历经多年的争议，大部分柏林人一致认为，这一遗址工程的是让人厌烦，落后的并且已经失去最好的时机。并且，项目资金可能也不足以支持让城堡的三面都恢复原状，再这样继续下去可能会最终让工程的支持者们都失望万分。
For Berliners with children, schools are the biggest problem. The centre-left Social Democrats who runBerlin's government have fiddled about with no fewer than 23 school reforms, most of them ideologically tinged to level down rather than foster excellence.Berlincomes last in the school rankings amongGermany's 16 states. Now the government is harassing the international (ie, English-taught) schools with new regulations, which will anger many expats and cosmopolitan locals.
对于有孩子的柏林人来说，学校成了最头痛的问题。柏林的执政党中左翼社会民主党先后进行了多达23次的学校改革，结果一事无成，他们当中大部分人只是在思想上轻描淡写，想以此来消除差距，而非培育英才。柏林在德国16个州的学校中排名倒数第一。现在政府采取的新法规让国际性（英语教学）学校烦恼不已，也会触怒许多旅居于此的外国人和来自世界各地的当地移民。
It is symbolically fitting that Klaus Wowereit, the gay and flamboyant Berliner who famously described his city as “poor but sexy”, has just retired after 13 years as mayor, to be replaced by a relatively grey protégé, Michael Müller. After decades of being subsidised byGermany's richer states,Berlinnow balances its budget. It is like an adolescent who has grown up and wants to prove he's responsible. Hence its bid to host the Olympics in either 2024 or 2028. WithinGermanyand evenEuropeit is still hard to find a more exciting city. And yet, as the new nostalgia suggests,Berlin's best days may already be behind it.
恰如前柏林市长克劳斯?沃维雷特所说，这是一个“贫穷又性感”的城市—他是一个个性分明的同性恋者，刚刚从长达13年的市长之位上卸任。下一届出任的市长为稍显黯淡的门徒米哈尔·米勒。柏林经受了德国发达州市数十年的欺辱，如今预算平衡。它像是刚成年，急于证明自己能有担当的青年人。因此，它申办2024年或2028年奥运会。在德国，甚至是欧洲，依然难以找到一座更激奋人心的城市。然而，如新一代怀旧者所言，柏林的巅峰时光已经一去不复返。译者：石海霞 校对：曾擎禹
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