14. Summer holiday 暑假 (1977)

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The summer holiday was going to be a problem for me and Barbara. Going to school ensured us that we could see each other every day. It also made it possible to tell each other where we were going to be on the days when there was no school. And of course school was good fun, well at least the parts where we didn't have to follow lessons.

But in the summer holiday Barbara had to work in the fish and chip shop. Only Mondays would be her day off. It wasn't sure if she could see me on that day, this depended on what her mother wanted to do. Barbara was also going away with her mother on a two week holiday to the English coast.

Since we met we have never been separated for more than two days, this summer holiday was going to a challenge for us.
My father had his principles. One of them was that if his sons wanted to do something special, they have to pay for it themselves. If I wanted to go out or ride a bike or go on holidays, I had to work for it. He also wanted us to work in order to get some experience in low paid jobs. He hoped that this would stimulate us to finish our studies and not start work too early. His principles worked so well for me that I was 29 years old before I had my first serious job.

My father was one of the directors of a large company in Cambridge (Pye Unicam). He arranged for me a job at his company, in the fabrication department. It was a boring and dirty job. I didn't mind to work as it was only during the summer holidays and I used (or took advantage of) the privileges of being the bosses son. Like chatting with his secretary for a long time or drinking coffee with my father or his business partners. My foreman didn't dare to correct me on that. Also there was not much else to do as our friends worked as well or went home to their home country.
The problem was that my job was during the day and Barbara had work at lunchtime and in the evening. There were little opportunities tfor us to see each other.

In first week of the holiday Barbara told her mother that school was still going on and I arranged not to work that week, therefore we could see each other the whole week. The weeks after that Barbara had told her mother that she was following a summer art course on Mondays. That way we could see each other at least once a week. As I had to work on Monday she would be waiting for me at lunch time the outside the factory in a little park, we saw each other half an hour then. Then after work she was waiting for me again in the same park.

All the other days at the lunchtimes I went to the same park in the hope to find Barbara waiting for me. It was of course a bit stupid but I kept hoping she might turn up. It never happened, it was just wishful thinking. We tried to meet in weekends but that was always problematic and uncertain.

When Barbara went on the two week holiday with her mother it was a very difficult time for me. Later she showed me the photo's of that vacation, in all of them she was looking sad. When I asked her about it she said very annoyed 'What do you think, you know why!".

暑假

暑假对于我和翁美玲来说都是个难题。到学校可以保证我们两人都能见面。告诉对方今天没课时我们将在哪里也成为可能。当然，学校里很有意思，嗯，至少当我们不去上课时。
但是在暑假里，翁美玲必须在炸鱼薯条店里工作。只有周一她能放假。但是不能保证她能与我想见，要取决于她母亲希望干什么。同时，翁美玲随她母亲去英国海岸参加两周的度假。自从我们相识后，我们从未分开有两天这么久，这个暑假对于我们来说是个挑战。
我父亲有他的原则。其中一条是，假如他的儿子想做特别的事情，他必须为自己支付。如果我想出去玩或者骑自行车，度假，我必须为此而工作赚钱。他同时希望我们劳动以适应低收入工作。他希望这样能使我们完成学业，不至于过早的工作。他这些原则在我身上很好的发挥作用了，我第一份正式工作是在我29岁时开始的。
我父亲是剑桥一家大公司的董事（PyeUnicam）。他为我在公司里安排了个工作，在制造部门。那是个很无聊，很脏的工作。我不在意在这里工作，因为只是暑假而已，同时我利用（或者说占优势）我是老板儿子这个特权。比如，和他秘书聊很久的天，或者和父亲及他的生意伙伴一起喝咖啡。我的领班不敢在此纠正我的错误。同时，由于我的朋友们都在工作，或者回到他们的国家，我也没有其他事情去做。

问题是，我的工作都是在白天，而翁美玲在午餐和晚上都要工作。我们只有很少的机会能见面。

在放假的第一周，翁美玲告诉她妈妈，学校仍然有课。同时，我安排那周不工作，因此我们能互相与对方相见一周。那周之后，翁美玲告诉她母亲，她周一要上暑假的艺术课程。这样，我们至少能一周见面一次。由于我周一要工作，她就要在午餐时在我们工场外的小公园里等我了，我们彼此想见半小时。工作完了后，她又在同样的地方等我。

其余的几天，在午餐时间，我都去那个公园的同一个地点，希望能找到等待我的翁美玲。这当然显得我很傻，因为翁美玲中午必须要工作。因此，我从未遇见她，这只是一种很好的祝愿而已。我们也试着在周末见面，但是那同样有问题，并且充满了不确定。

当翁美玲和她母亲在两周度假期时，我感到时间非常难过。之后，她给我展示了她在旅行中的照片，所有的照片，她都显得悲哀。当我问她问什么时，她很不耐烦的说，"你怎么想呢，你知道原因的！"。

(translated by Zhi)