2022-8-13

一口气读完了李查德崔卡斯基1961年写的《到上海的最后一架飞机》（Last Plame to Shanghai），是几年前村子里的社区大学图书馆下架处理的小说中的一本。描写的是1948年美国新闻记者从上海深入内地采访国共内战期间发生的故事，是传统的爱情噼腿情节，写得引人入胜，欲罢不能。

书中有两个地名，一个是穆克丹（Mukden），大家都知道的，是满语盛京的意思，就是历史上的辽宁奉天和现在沈阳，一个是喀儿干（Kalgan），又叫卡拉根，是大家都未必知道的，是蒙古语关口、关卡和聚会之门的意思，就是现在的河北张家口。

书中另外的一段文字，是描写中国人在公共场所的喧闹和不讲文明，可谓是一针见血，入木叁分，不留情面：

• "See how quiet they are in their hardship," he said with enthusiasm. "Manhood at its best is quiet - if I may quote from Master Kung." Master Kung would be Confucius, the name Kung Fu-tzu rendered into English. I nodded politely, thinking how very few Chinese in my experience were manhood at its best, by the standard of quietness. In Hong Kong, Indonesia, Singapore, every place I had seen them they were the noisiest, most ebullient people I knew, even in abject poverty and near starvation.