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TIMES STAFF WRITER 1
1 DUNHUANG, China—For the growing army of middle-class Chinese with a little extra money to spend, touring their vast country has become almost as natural as breathing. Both activities, it turns out, are harming the ancient Buddhist grottoes that make this place one of China's cultural wonders. 2
2 Carved directly into a cliff face in the Gobi Desert, the Mogao caves contain a millennium's worth of work by travelers along the old Silk Road who turned countless small caves into stunningly painted shrines between the 4th and 14th centuries. 3
3 Wind, rain, sand and Western plunderers have all damaged the caves over the years. But the greatest scourge these days comes from the tourists who swarm here by the busload, bringing destructive amounts of carbon dioxide and moisture into the caves along with their eagerness for a glimpse of ages past.
4 "If I didn't get to see this before I died, it would have been the greatest regret of my life," said Liu Rui, 57. a retiree who made the journey from Shanghai, hundreds of miles away. "They should let as many people see it as possible."
5 It's a nice sentiment, but totally insupportable if the art inside the 492 grottoes is to survive. Many of the murals are already sagging or peeling from the earthen walls, their delicate beauty faded away. Others have deteriorated beyond the repair efforts of Chinese and foreign experts. including workers from the Getty Conservation Institute in Los Angeles.
6 The plight of the Mogao caves is a familiar one in China, where the breakneck rush toward freer markets and greater openness has resulted in an explosion of tourism and a corresponding erosion of some of the world's most precious cultural monuments, from the terra-cotta warriors in Xian to the mighty Great Wall itself.
7 After 20 years of economic reforms, the Chinese government is waking up to the need to preserve the nation's heritage in a systematic, comprehensive way before the sites themselves—and the revenue they rake in 4 —disappear altogether.
8 "Asia's share of tourism growth is the fastest-growing in the world, and the lion's share 5 is in China," said Richard Engelhardt, a regional advisor for the U. N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, known as UNESCO 6 .
9 "Unless we take some measures, we may be in danger of loving our heritage to death," Engelhardt told a conference on cultural conservation in Beijing last month.
10 Although the Communist regime 7 recognizes the challenge, tackling it has turned out to be a relatively slow and haphazard business.
11 At the root of the problem is money. As a poor nation, China has few resources 8 left over for cultural conservation after struggling to overhaul its command economy, dampen rising unemployment, take care of an aging population, put in infrastructure and modernize its massive military.
12 At the same time, precisely because the nation is so poor, local officials have increasingly turned to tourism as a cash cow, often exploiting cultural and natural sites to their limit and threatening sites of inestimable value.
13 In the scenic southern city of Guilin, for example, so many tour boats ply the adjacent river that their churning wake has worn away sculptures erected along the water-way's banks hundreds of years ago.
14 But the material benefits of tourism for local residents are hard to overstate, especially for people long mired in poverty and desperate for a way out.
15 Here in Dunhuang—in Gansu province, one of China's poorest areas—tourist receipts account for a whopping one-third of the revenue for the entire province, officials say.
16 The city is home to two four-star hotels opened in the last five years, a number of other smaller establishments 9 and its own new airport. The latter has eliminated the need to drive hours across inhospitable terrain to reach the site, which 10 helped keep tourist numbers down. Now, souvenir stalls line Dunhuang's sidewalks, all selling the same things, from stuffed animals to tacky jewelry to colorful batik prints.
17 About 300,000 visitors a year, nearly all of them in the summer, converge on 11 this oasis town, which essentially exists to serve the Mogao grottoes.
18 It all adds up to a headache for Fan Jinshi, director of the Dunhuang Academy, who is under constant pressure to grant more tourist access even as she oversees the protection of the caves on a barebones budget funded by ticket receipts and the state.
19 "Preservation is No. 1," she said. "You can't enjoy what's not there."
20 Authorities have tried to lessen tourism's negative effects by rotating and limiting the number of caves open to the public—only about 20 to 30 at a time —and prohibiting photography.
21 Visitors must be accompanied by guides inside the darkened grottoes, which contain astonishingly beautiful paintings of paradise, apsaras (angels) and the patrons who commissioned the various caves.
22 In one cavern sits a Buddha more than 100 feet tall, in the same serene pose of blessing as when it was installed during the Tang Dynasty (AD 618—906). Other caves are cramped spaces barely large enough to hold a few people at a time. The earliest grotto dates from the 4th century.
23 "You can't have a site like that that's open carte-blanche to tourists. They have to be guided and supervised," said Neville Agnew of the Getty Conservation Institute.
24 The Getty has been involved in preservation programs at Dunhuang since 1989 and received an award just this month from the Chinese government for its contributions.
25 Its original work centered on reducing sand and wind erosion and monitoring the environment inside the caves, including changes in humidity, temperature and carbon dioxide levels. Conservators are now concentrating on rescuing Cave 85, another Tang Dynasty grotto, to serve as a model for future restoration.
26 "Tourism and conservation should be good partners," Agnew said. "The problem is... that connection hasn't been made in the mind of the tourist authorities ... The political heads have often not seen that a tourist site is often a nonrenewable resource, like Mogao."
27 Agnew said he was shocked last year when he visited Taishan, one of China's major religious sites, and discovered "cable cars and junk and crass commercialism and so on. That's the most sacred mountain in China."
28 Similarly, at the Great Wall outside Beijing, tourists can mount the wall on cable cars, then whoosh back down on toboggan slides.
29 Fierce competition for tourist dollars, which in China (including Hong Kong) equaled $21.1 billion last year, has accelerated the degradation of cultural monuments.
30 In Lijiang, a postcard-pretty mountain village in Yunnan province, greed risks destroying some of the very beauty and ethnic flavor that tourists come to experience.
31 Near the city, rushing waters thunder through the Tiger Leaping Gorge, a favored destination of hikers and backpackers. For those who prefer convenience and comfort, however, a road has been carved along one side of the gorge to make way for cars and buses.
32 Not to be left out of the tourist boom, local officials on the other side of the river are blasting their own road through the gorge, to the dismay of those who want to keep the area as pristine as possible.
33 "To build a highway on the other side of the river may not seem in tune with 12 the natural beauty, but it brings visitors convenience and safety," said Yao Ruixiong, director of Lijiang's preservation bureau. "If not for that highway, travelers would have to walk a long way and climb hills to enjoy the scenery"—which for many hikers is precisely the point 13 .
34 In the town of Lijiang itself, a UNESCO World Heritage site famed for its snowcapped peaks and classic Chinese architecture, souvenir shops have proliferated in the Old City, as have canned performances for tourists that purport to showcase indigenous life 14 .
35 Lijiang hosted 2.8 million visitors in 1999, and some experts think that's too many.
36 "At any given time, visitors may well outnumber local inhabitants," said Engelhardt, the UNESCO advisor. "When the carrying capacity of a historic site is exceeded, it is impossible to maintain its conservation up to expected World Heritage standards."
37 But Yao wants evsen more tourists—up to 10 million, if they'll come.
38 "Yes, the increasing number of tourists has affected the Old City, but we have to keep our door open to every tourist," he said. "Economic development here depends on it." (From Los Angeles Times, August 23, 2000)
New Words
backpacker /ˈbækpækə/ n. one who goes walking or camping carrying backpack 背着背包徒步旅行者
breakneck /ˈbreiknek/ adj. extremely and often dangerously fast
cable car 缆车
carbon dioxide /ˌkɑːbən daiˈɔksaid/ n. 二氧化碳
carte-blanche /ˈkɑːtˈblɑːnʃ/ n. complete freedom to do whatever you like in a particular situation, esp. to spend money
churn /tʃəːn/ v. to produce large quantities of sth, esp. without caring about quality
cramp /kræmp/ v. to keep in a narrow space; to hinder or prevent the movement
crass /kræs/ adj. behaving in a way that shows you do not care about others
dampen /ˈdæmpən/ v. to make sad or dull
grotto /ˈɡrɔtəu/ n. a small natural or man-made cave
haphazard /ˌhæpˈhæzəd/ adj. accidentalhumidity /hjuˈmiditi/ n. 湿度lessen /ˈlesən/ v. to make or become less
mire /ˈmaiə/ v. to involve sb in problems or difficulties
mural /ˈmjuərəl/ n. a painting that is painted on a wall, either inside or outside a building
overhaul /ˌəuvəˈhɔːl/ v. to examine thoroughly
ply /plai/ v. (of ships, buses, etc.) to go regularly to and fro
pristine /ˈpristiːn/ adj. pure; undamaged; fresh or clean
sag /sæg/ v. to sink or bend downwards and away from the usual position
scourge /skəːdʒ/ n . sth that causes a lot of harm or suffering
shrine /ʃrain/ n. a place that people visit and respect because it is connected with a famous person or event; a holy place that people visit to pray
tacky /ˈtæki/ adj. cheap looking and of very bad quality
terracotta /ˈterəˈkɔtə/ n. hard, reddish-brown pottery
toboggan /təˈbɔɡən/ n. 长橇；木制滑橇
wake n.（船航行时留下的）尾流，伴流
whoosh /wuːʃ/ v. to move very fast with a soft rushing sound
whopping /ˈwɔpiŋ/ adj. very large
Notes
1．Henry Chu, TIME STAFF WRITER—Henry Chu是本报撰稿人。
2． Both activities ... one of China's cultural wonders．—It refers to too many tourists and their breathing
这里，tourism对保护文化古迹不利可以理解，但呼吸有什么害处呢？我们只要看到第三段，作者就说明carbon dioxide和moisture对壁画的损害。若能这样从字里行间联系起来看书，就能看懂有的词语和意思了。
3．Carved directly into a cliff face... the 4th and 14th centuries—直接在戈壁沙漠的峭壁上雕刻而成的莫高窟是丝绸之路的旅行者经历了千年之久才创造的艺术成果。从公元4世纪到14世纪，他们把不计其数的小洞穴接连成令人瞠目的绘画神殿。
a. a millennium's worth of—sth that takes a 1,000 years to happen, do, or use
b. work—here result
4．rake (sth) in—(fig.) earn or make much money
5．the lion's share (of)—the largest part of sth
6．UNESCO/juːˈneskəu/—abbrev. United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, a UN agency set up in 1945 to promote the exchange of information, ideas, and culture. Its headquarters are in Paris. （联合国教科文组织，美英两国分别于1984和1985年退出，2003年美国又重返该组织。）
7．the Communist regime—西方记者和编辑在用词上对不同于西方国家体系的外国政府常用“Communist regime”（共产党政权），“totalitarian state”（极权国家），“rogue state”（流氓国家）等字眼。“regime”，“totalitarian”和“rogue”均为贬义词，对有的记者来说，“Communist”也是贬义词。由此可见，这些报纸的政治倾向性和舆论的导向性是很明显的。
8．resources—here "money"（见“语言解说”）
9．smaller establishments—较小的旅馆或旅游设施（见“语言解说”）
10． which helped keep tourist numbers down—a relative pronoun, referring to "the need to drive... reach the site."
11．converge on—gather and move toward (sth or sb) from different directions
12．seem/be in tune with—agree with
13． which for many hikers is precisely the point —
a. which—a relative pronoun, referring to "travelers would have to walk... the scenery"
b. point—the aim or purpose of sth
14．as have canned performances... indigenous life—and canned（预先录制好的）performances for tourists have also proliferated...
as—a conjunction, used to avoid repetition in the predicate: e. g. Henry is very tall, as are his brothers. (... and his brothers are also very tall.)
Questions
1．What activities are harming ancient Buddhist grottoes?
2．Who turned the caves into the painted shrines?
3．Are murals in good shape?
4．Why is it difficult for the authorities to prevent them from being destroyed?
5．Does the Chinese government value the preservation of those historical and cultural sites?
6．Why did Mr. Neville Agnew say "tourism and conservation are good partners"?
resources和establishment是报刊中常用的多义词，我们不能一见到它们就想当然认为只是“资源”或“建立”这单一词义。
本课中的例句：At the root of the problem is money. As a poor nation, China has few resources left over for cultural conservation after struggling to overhaul its command economy, dampen rising unemployment, take care of an aging population, put in infrastructure and modernize its massive military.
有经验的读者看到此句中的“resources”，就知道作者为避免用词重复而用来指上句中的“money”。下面再举3例：
1．设施
These people will tend to flood the cities, exacerbating already strained urban resources.
2．物力
The head of state treasured manpower and resources.
3．人力和财力
On top of his supposed rhetorical failures, Mr Clinton stands accused of starving the drugs war of resources. When he arrived in the White House, Mr Clinton cut the staff of the drug tsar's office by 83%. He also cut money devoted to interdicting cocaine at the border. In the last two years of the Bush administration, the interdiction budget came to around $2 billion a year; this year it stands at a mere $1.3 billion. (The Economist)
这里的resources从下文看显然指的是人力和财力，因为缉毒人员和预算都减少了。
如果以上4例都将resources译为“资源”，显然读来拗口，听来别扭，表达含糊，因为不合乎汉语的习惯表达。
1．界。作“界”讲，在美语里已成了贬义词，在英国却不同，见本书第18课第2段例证。
Intelligence establishment became intelligence community because establishment became pejorative. (The New York Times Magazine)
2．建立起来的机构，单位
a. The hotel is a well-run establishment. (Los Angles Times)
b. "It is truly regrettable. It is deplorable that a diplomatic establishment has been mistakenly hit," Keizo Obuchi was quoted as saying by Kyodo News Agency. (AP)
3．编制，建制
The Pentagon argues for a leaner military establishment... (Time)
4．当局，当权派，官方，统治集团
a. Indeed the West German establishment, like the Polish and East German governments, seems to be cordially displeased with Judge Stern's judgment. (Newsweek)
b. Khomeini's curious blend of mysticism and activism still made him slightly suspect in the eyes of the Islamic Establishment—as a holy man who tried to run around with the Mob, one might say—but his following was growing steadily. (Time)
c. Some establishment figures remain wary of Byrne because she defeated their candidate, but the new mayor has moved to patch up differences. (Time)
5．权势集团，社会既成权力机构；门阀，财阀
a. Despite his contribution in the field of social progress President Johnson "was never accepted by the liberal Eastern Establishment," Carter said. "I don't know why. " (Washington Star News)
b. The Church of England is the official (established) church of the United Kingdom, created in the 16th century as a protestant church by the Act of Supremacy. Its secular head is the sovereign, and its religious head, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Its senior clergy—archbishops, bishops and deans —are appointed by the Prime Minister. It is one of the main forces of the Establishment in Britain. (Adrian Room)
6．当权派；实力集团
a. But Dole had the near-unanimous support of the GOP establishment and wrapped up the nomination after a shaky start. (The World Almanac)
b. Several senior strategists recommended that the White House adopt an anti-Establishment strategy, taking on organized labor, civil-rights groups, feminists and other GOP foils. (U. S. News & World Report)（详见《导读》二版）