奧巴馬總統之妹寫書介紹母親

During his run for the presidency, Barack Obama often talked about his mother, Ann Dunham, and the lessons she taught him through her work with poor rural communities around the world. Dunham died of cancer in 1995, before any of her Grandchildren were born.

奧巴馬在競選總統期間常常談到他的母親安·鄧納姆，以及他和妹妹瑪雅·蘇託洛從母親在世界各地貧窮的鄉村社區所做的工作中學到的東西。鄧納姆1995年因癌症去世時，她的孫輩們還沒有出生。

Now the president's sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, has written "Ladder to the Moon," a children's book that attempts to connect her young daughter, Suhaila, with the grandmother she never knew.

瑪雅·蘇託洛想通過《通向月亮的梯子》幫助女兒瞭解她從未見過的外祖母。

The book’s title was inspired by a picture post card Dunham gave Maya as a child. It features a painting by Georgia O’Keeffe which depicts a ladder floating against the night sky, with a half-moon high above it.

這本書的書名是瑪雅在兒時母親送給她的一張明信片中得到的靈感。那是喬治亞·奧基夫的一幅畫，畫面上有一架梯子漂浮在夜空，梯子上懸掛着半輪月亮。

In the book, little Suhaila asks her mother what her grandmother was like. "Like the moon," her mother replies. "Full, soft and curious." Suhaila longs to meet her, and one night, her wish comes true. A golden ladder appears at her window and Grandma Annie invites the girl to come along on a magical journey.

蘇海拉在書中問，外祖母是什麼樣，母親回答說：“象月亮一樣，圓滿、溫柔並具有好奇心。”蘇海拉渴望見到外祖母。一天晚上，她的夢想終於實現了。一架金色的梯子出現在窗口，外祖母邀請她一起去進行一次神奇的旅行。

"The book is about an evening spent helping others to come up to the moon after natural disaster and religious strife and conflict," says Soetoro-Ng. "And the moon becomes a sanctuary, an imagined place to heal and rest in hammocks until we’re laughing loudly again."

瑪雅說：“書中講述自然災害和宗教衝突過後，他們一整個晚上都在幫助別人到月亮上去，月亮成了一個避難所，一個夢幻世界，人們在那裏療傷，休息，直到再次開懷大笑。”

It seemed natural for Soetoro-Ng to connect her daughter and Grandma Annie through the moon. Her late mother, she says, always loved the moon because it was the same for everybody, no matter where in the world they were. Under the glow of the moon, she recalls, her mother shared her most meaningful tales with her children.

瑪雅認爲，通過月亮把女兒和外祖母安妮連在一起，非常自然。她說，母親生前非常喜愛月亮，因爲它對所有的人都一樣，無論他們居住在什麼地方。瑪雅還記得，在皎潔的月光下，母親給孩子們講故事。

That’s how Soetoro-Ng says she and her brother, President Obama, remember their mother - as a great story teller and great role model.

在瑪雅和哥哥奧巴馬的記憶中，母親是一位了不起的講故事人，也是一位偉大的榜樣。

"Like me, he feels that she’s someone who gave us a strong moral compass, that she gave us compassion and desire to recognize the things that are common to all humanity and reach out across the divides even when doing so is hard," she says. "That’s something tremendously valuable."

瑪雅說：“哥哥和我都同樣感到，母親給了我們牢固的道德準則，給了我們認識人類共有的事務以及跨越分歧的同情心和願望，即使這麼做很困難。這是非常有價值的東西。”

It wasn’t just her mother’s tales that shaped who she and her brother have become. Soetoro-Ng says what parents do is more important than what they say. Dunham, who had a PhD in anthropology, worked in rural development in some of the poorest places in the world.

瑪雅說，不僅是母親所說的故事幫助塑造了他們的爲人，父母所做的比他們所說的更重要。安·鄧納姆擁有人類學博士學位，她在世界上一些最貧窮地方從事鄉村發展工作。"I recognize, for instance, that in making sure that we came along to villages and to her work, that our mother was trying to get us to see that these village people were just as important and powerful and loving and had just as much to teach as upper class, well-educated people."

Although her goal was to introduce her mother to her daughter, Soetoro-Ng says "Ladder to the Moon" has something to say to other young readers, and older ones as well.

儘管瑪雅寫書的目的是把自己的母親介紹給女兒。但是，她表示，《通向月亮的梯子》一書也向其他年輕讀者和老年人傳達了信息。

"Slow down and think about the lessons of the elders. I think it’s true we look forward to enormous amounts of information, but I think we would be better off if we thought about the kinds of wisdom and thoughtfulness that we need in order to handle the amount of information ahead."

瑪雅說：“讓我們慢下來思考一下老年人的經驗。不錯，我們都希望得到大量的信息，但是，假如我們能夠思考我們需要有什麼樣的智慧來處理這些信息，我們的情況就會更好。”

Although Suhaila never knew her grandmother, Obama and Soetoro-Ng knew theirs. Their mother's mother had an enormous influence on them.

"Our grandmother was a formidable woman, very practical and very strong, very smart. She was for me a balancing, steadying force. She took care of us. Both my brother and I lived with her for a time and she allowed us to be brave because we knew that she would always take care of us, that there would be a safety net beneath us. And that was an important feeling to have. It was a great gift."

Other messages present in "Ladder to the Moon" are that all people are intertwined and that service is important. Soetoro-Ng says children need to know they are strong enough to take responsibility for themselves and others.

《通向月亮的梯子》傳遞的信息還有，所有人都互相交錯在一起，要有奉獻精神。瑪雅說，孩子們需要知道，他們足以強壯，可以爲自己和他人承擔責任。

"We need to teach our children empathy and care and love and communication and social responsibility in preparation for adulthood. We can’t afford to live in isolation and we need to teach our kids that the things that they do not only matter to others far away, but impact others who live far away and there are ripples of effect. So that means we need to be responsible and thoughtful about our actions, about our relationship to the environment, about the way that we communicate and we ought to do so kindly."　

她說：“我們需要教導孩子們具有同情心，知道去關愛別人，懂得與人溝通並承擔社會責任，以便爲他們進入成年作好準備。我們經不起離羣索居，我們要教導孩子們，他們做的事不僅關係到，而且影響到在遙遠地方生活人們，會產生漣漪效應。這意味着，我們需要承擔責任，要對我們的行動、與環境的關係以及我們交往的方式三思而行，而且採取友善的態度。我們需要提醒他們，他們很堅強，可以做很多事給世界帶來積極的影響。”

Soetoro-Ng hopes "Ladder to the Moon" triggers conversations between parents and children about the values and tools the young generation needs to have a positive impact on the world.

瑪雅說，年輕一代如果要對世界產生積極的影響，就需要具有相應的價值觀和工具。她希望《通向月亮的梯子》一書能夠開啓父母和孩子之間在這方面的對話。