蝎子王
In these past few days I made a trip to one of the neighbor provinces of Guangdong. During the trip I met with a local business person most of the afternoon.
前几天里我出差到广东旁边的一个省。在这次旅程中我花了一整个下午和一个老板待在一起。
After a very interesting meeting I was invited to have dinner with him and some of his team members. I was travelling as usual with my assistant Gavin which is by the way not only the GM assistant but also has other important roles and responsibilities as my personal right hand guy.
一个非常有趣的会议之后,他邀请我和他的团队一起共进晚餐。和往常一样,我和我的助理Gavin一起出差。顺便说说,Gavin不只是总经理助理,作为我的左右手,他扮演着其他重要的角色,肩负着其他的责任。
Among his most important responsibilities are of course translating, being the link between me and the sales department and the VP of Sales, but what people do not know is that one of his most important tasks as assistant is to be the “lab rat”, what I mean by this is that he has to taste the food that I am not familiar with, the food that does not look good, food that I have not tried before, etc.
他最重要的责任之一当然是翻译,充当我和销售部门、副总经理之间的桥梁,但是,很多人可能并不知情的是,作为助理,他最重要的责任之一还包括充当“小白鼠”,我这么说的意思是他需要帮我去尝试我不熟悉的食物,那些看起来不好的,我以前没有尝试过的食物等等。
It may seem funny but this responsibility is very important to me. The problem is that Gavin is from Hunan and he eats and likes pretty much everything. So he is not very reliable. Every time I ask him: Hey Gavin what is that? He replies let me ask, and gets back to me and tells me; Boss that is Turtle let me try it and let you know if it is good or not. 99 out of 100 times he says that it is good.
这个看起来好笑的责任对我非常重要。但问题是,Gavin来自湖南,他基本上什么东西都能吃并且喜欢吃,所以他其实不怎么可靠。每次我问他:嘿,Gavin,这是什么?他会回答我说:让我问一下。然后告诉我说:老板,这个是甲鱼,让我先尝下,然后我再告诉你味道怎么样。100次里面有99次,他会告诉我挺好的。
Well, during this dinner we had a lot of different dishes, most of them I was already familiar with but most of the time especially when we travel to other provinces I am not familiar with most of the food. That was the case during this dinner. When they started bringing the food I noticed and actually I was surprised that among the dishes they served scorpions. When Chinese business men know that a foreigner is going to have dinner with them they try not to order weird or too exotic food, this time it did not happen.
好吧,这次晚宴有很多不同的菜,大部分的我都已经见识过。当我们到其他省出差的时候,多数时候我对很多食物都没有概念。这次的情况也差不多。当他们上菜的时候,我惊异地发现其中一道菜居然是蝎子。当中国的生意人知道要和外国人吃饭的时候,他们一般尽量不会点奇怪食物,但是这次的情况显然不是这样。
So guess what happened? I asked Gavin to try the scorpions. To my surprise, he had not had them before. When this happened obviously no one else in the table knew I asked him to do that. Then I asked why scorpions? What are they good for? You know in China every food is good for something and what it is not good for something then they do not eat it.
猜猜发生了什么?我让Gavin去尝蝎子。出乎我意料的是,他之前居然也没有尝过。当然了,桌上的其他人并不知道我让他这么做。然后我问他们,为什么是蝎子?吃蝎子对身体什么地方好?你知道的,在中国所有的食物都对身体有所裨益,如果没有好处的话他们是不会吃的。
They told me that the scorpion is good to prevent cancer, and our client started eating a few of them. I thought then to myself, maybe this is my time! The time that I have to overcome all my fears and conquer one of the exotic foods that are eaten by some Chinese people. To me the top 5 exotic and difficult foods are: Dog, Snake, Cat, Scorpion and Rat. I felt some responsibility that I had to eat some to show him some respect and courtesy.
他们告诉我蝎子有抗癌的功效,然后那个老板就吃了几个。我暗暗告诉自己,也许这是我的时刻了!是时候克服我的恐惧去征服中国的奇怪食物之一了。对我来说,五大最古怪的食物是:狗,蛇, 猫,蝎子和老鼠。我觉得我有责任去吃一些,以显示我对那个老板的尊敬和礼貌。
So, I ordered Gavin to try one. As usual he tried one and said that it tasted like little fried fish and also said actually they are not too bad! I did not know what to do, if to believe him or not. When the company boss saw me that I was committed to maybe eat some he added it is like tasting the flavor of the Hunan Pretty ladies. At that moment I had no choice and grabbed one scorpion (Obviously the smallest one!) and tried it! I had the surprise of my life! Actually it did not taste bad and even had a few more. At that moment I felt something very different in a way I have never felt before. I kind of felt strong, invincible, and fearless. I even called my wife to let her know.
所以,我命令Gavin为我试吃。像往常一样,他尝了一个然后告诉我吃起来就像炒小鱼干,而且味道不算太差!!我不知道应该怎么做了,我应该相信他吗?那个老板看出了我的犹豫以及要吃几个的决心,他补充了一句,这个味道就像湖南美女的味道。这个时候我已经没得选择了,我夹起了一只蝎子(当然了,是最小的那一只!)并且尝了一下!这是我生命中的意外时刻!它们尝起来真的没有那么差,我甚至又多吃了几个。这个时候,我有了一种之前从没有过的感受,我感受到了一些完全不一样的东西。我感受到了强大,不可战胜,无所畏惧。我甚至打了个电话给我妻子告诉她这个事情。
I know that I will this story to my kids and many of my friends. Maybe it sounds simple to you but it was very meaningful to me. “The time that I conquered one of the big five.”
我知道我将会把这个故事讲给我的孩子和很多朋友。也许你听起来觉得简单,但是它对我来说的确是有很多意义。“我克服了五大之一的时刻。”
I hope that it keeps me feeling good, fearless and invincible!
我希望这能让我保持感觉良好,无所畏惧,战无不胜!
I can wait until I get the chance to do it again in front of some of my foreigner friends.
我将会等待再来一次的机会,我要在一些外国朋友的前面表演一次。
I feel like I am the Scorpion King!
我觉得我就是蝎子王!!
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