大学体验英语第三册Unit8-Passage A

Return from the Cage
It was the open space in Austin that initially¹ overwhelmed me. I couldn't adjust to it. The ease with which I could get in a car and drive to any place left me bewildered and confused. Where were the military checkpoints? Where were the armed soldiers asking for my identification papers? Where were the barricades² that would force me to turn back?
　I had just returned to the United States after an absence of 11 years, during which I lived in a refugee camp in Bethlehem, the town where Christ was born. I was not used to freedom of movement, nor to going more than a few miles without encountering military checkpoints.
　Getting comfortable with my sudden freedom in Austin was going to take time. I had to adjust to no longer feeling like an animal inside a cage. Most days, I felt utterly³ dazed. I would spend hours sitting on a stone bench at the University of Texas, staring at the squirrels and the birds. The green lawns brought tears to my eyes.
　My mind would drift to the refugee camp in Bethlehem, and to 3-year-old Marianna, my delightful⁴ ex-neighbor. Marianna has never seen a green lawn in her life and has never seen a squirrel. She lives confined to Bethlehem, forced to remain a prisoner behind the checkpoints and the military barricades. The distance between Marianna's house and Jerusalem is no further than the distance from my South Austin home to downtown. Yet Marianna has never been to Jerusalem and is unlikely to go there anytime in the near future, because no Palestinian can venture into the Holy City without a special Israeli-issued permit, and those permits are almost impossible to come by.
　But adjusting to my sudden freedom paled in comparison to overcoming my fears and my nightmares. When I left Bethlehem, the second Palestinian uprising against Israel's military occupation was already two months under way. The sound of bomb explosions, gunfire and Apache helicopters overhead lingered in my mind. Hard as I tried, I couldn't shake the sounds away. They were always there, ringing inside my head.
　Now, in Austin, there were nightmares. I would dream either of friends being shot dead, or see pools of blood spilling from human bodies, or that I myself was the target of gunfire. I would wake up in a sweat, terrified of going back to sleep. During the day, the sound of police or ambulance sirens made me jumpy. Helicopters flying overhead made me uneasy. I had to constantly remind myself that these were most often civilian⁵ and not military helicopters. I had to remind myself that the ambulances were not rushing to the wounded demonstrators.
　I looked around me, and I wondered if anyone realized, or even knew, that the Apache helicopters being used by the Israeli military to shell innocent Palestinian civilians⁶ are actually made in this country! As a writer in Palestine, I had regularly visited bombed-out houses in search of stories. The home of a young nurse sticks out in my mind. A few miles away from the stable in Bethlehem where Christ is said to have been born, her house came under attack by Israeli tanks and was completely burned. I held the remains⁷ of some of the tank shells in my two bare hands and read the inscription⁸: "Made in Mesa, Arizona."
　I wanted to stand on a chair and scream this information to everyone walking through the mall. The tear gas civilians inhale⁹ in the Palestinian Territories is made in Pennsylvania, and the helicopters and the F-16 fighter planes are also made in the USA. Yet here in this society, no one appears to care that their tax money funds armies that bring death and destruction to civilians, civilians who are no different from civilians in this country.
　And I worry about the indifference¹⁰ in this country. I worry because someday, young American men will find themselves fighting another Vietnam War - this time possibly in the Middle East - without a notion of what it is they are doing there. And we will have a repetition of history: Mothers will lose sons and wives will lose husbands in an unnecessary war. I have been repeating this warning in all the talks I have been giving in the past nine months. No one took me seriously. I couldn't understand why young Americans, with their whole futures¹¹ ahead of them, should go to die in a war they will not understand.

1 initially   

adv.最初，开始

参考例句：

• The ban was initially opposed by the US.这一禁令首先遭到美国的反对。
• Feathers initially developed from insect scales.羽毛最初由昆虫的翅瓣演化而来。

2 barricades   

路障，障碍物( barricade的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The police stormed the barricades the demonstrators had put up. 警察冲破了示威者筑起的街垒。
• Others died young, in prison or on the barricades. 另一些人年轻时就死在监牢里或街垒旁。

3 utterly   

adv.完全地，绝对地

参考例句：

• Utterly devoted to the people,he gave his life in saving his patients.他忠于人民，把毕生精力用于挽救患者的生命。
• I was utterly ravished by the way she smiled.她的微笑使我完全陶醉了。

4 delightful   

adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的

参考例句：

• We had a delightful time by the seashore last Sunday.上星期天我们在海滨玩得真痛快。
• Peter played a delightful melody on his flute.彼得用笛子吹奏了一支欢快的曲子。

5 civilian   

adj.平民的，民用的，民众的

参考例句：

• There is no reliable information about civilian casualties.关于平民的伤亡还没有确凿的信息。
• He resigned his commission to take up a civilian job.他辞去军职而从事平民工作。

6 civilians   

平民，百姓( civilian的名词复数 )； 老百姓

参考例句：

• the bloody massacre of innocent civilians 对无辜平民的血腥屠杀
• At least 300 civilians are unaccounted for after the bombing raids. 遭轰炸袭击之后，至少有300名平民下落不明。

7 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

8 inscription   

n.（尤指石块上的）刻印文字，铭文，碑文

参考例句：

• The inscription has worn away and can no longer be read.铭文已磨损，无法辨认了。
• He chiselled an inscription on the marble.他在大理石上刻碑文。

9 inhale   

v.吸入(气体等)，吸(烟)

参考例句：

• Don't inhale dust into your lung.别把灰尘吸进肺里。
• They are pleased to not inhale second hand smoke.他们很高兴他们再也不会吸到二手烟了。

10 indifference   

n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎

参考例句：

• I was disappointed by his indifference more than somewhat.他的漠不关心使我很失望。
• He feigned indifference to criticism of his work.他假装毫不在意别人批评他的作品。

11 futures   

n.期货，期货交易

参考例句：

• He continued his operations in cotton futures.他继续进行棉花期货交易。
• Cotton futures are selling at high prices.棉花期货交易的卖价是很高的。