美国国家公共电台 NPR As East Mosul Comes Back To Life, West Mosul Remains In Ruins

 

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

We're going to hear now about the two sides of life in the Iraqi city of Mosul. It has been three months since ISIS was forced out of the city. The fighting reduced one side, the west, to ruins. The eastern side of Mosul, though, is thriving. NPR's Jane Arraf went to look at the city's deep physical and social divisions.

JANE ARRAF, BYLINE¹: This is east Mosul. The streets are full of cars again instead of military vehicles. There are women driving. There are wedding celebrations. And the cafes and the shops are open again, full of all kinds of things that ISIS banned in the three years it ruled the city.

AHMED JAWDAT: (Through interpreter) Most of the things I sell were forbidden by ISIS. Pants for women, party dresses - anything beautiful like this was banned.

ARRAF: That's Ahmed Jawdat. His shop across the river in west Mosul was destroyed, so he opened one here. It's full of sparkly dresses imported from Turkey. He says business is really good.

JAWDAT: (Speaking Arabic).

ARRAF: Jawdat says security in east Mosul now is better than it is in Baghdad. Most of the damage done in the fight against ISIS was quickly repaired here. In the busy shops, and restaurants and bustling² streets, you can see a bit of why Mosul was once Iraq's commercial hub. But the other side of town, across the Tigris River, is a different story.

SADIQ RAMADAN: (Speaking Arabic).

ARRAF: Sadiq Ramadan and a friend are standing³ on the riverbank, snapping selfies. Their backdrop is western Mosul. The tops of the buildings have been blown off. The skyline is monochromatic⁴ - gray concrete rubble⁵ and black scorched⁶ walls. He left six years ago when it started getting dangerous, and he doesn't see himself moving back.

RAMADAN: (Speaking Arabic).

ARRAF: "It was so hard for me to see it like this. It makes my heart hurt," he says.

The west is the historic part of Mosul - centuries old. ISIS found fertile ground here at first in some of the poor neighborhoods. As the battle with Iraqi security forces raged, ISIS dug in here, hiding among civilians⁷ in the narrow streets. U.S. and Iraqi airstrikes and mortars⁸ leveled entire neighborhoods on the west side. A lot of Iraqis believe that people in west Mosul - particularly poorer and less educated than the east side of the city - invited ISIS in.

On the west side of the bridge, Iraqi army sergeant⁹ Mohammad Ahmed asks a driver for his car registration¹⁰. He checks the trunk for weapons. He says thousands of vehicles a day pass through his checkpoint. Most of the traffic is Iraqis who've salvaged¹¹ what they could from their damaged homes in the west. They're leaving again for the east side. There are hundreds and hundreds of trucks piled high with furniture, and mattresses¹² and bulging¹³ plastic bags.

And a lot of these taxis driving by are so loaded with families that one of them that just went past had two young men sitting in the trunk. It's really just a few hundred feet, but this bridge is the link between people's old lives and their new ones.

There are a lot of neighborhoods here so damaged, the government isn't even letting people come back to them. But on the outskirts¹⁴ of the most heavily damaged section of Mosul, the old city, we see one street coming back to life. Basman al Rashadi and his neighbors are hanging out on the corner. There's no electricity in their houses. There's no water supply either, so they've dug wells.

BASMAN AL RASHADI: (Speaking Arabic).

ARRAF: (Laughter).

RASHADI: (Speaking Arabic).

ARRAF: "You won't find the name of this neighborhood on any map," Rashadi tells me. He says it's called the floating neighborhood because during the winter, the streets are filled with mud and dirty water. Buildings are pockmarked with bullet holes. And just down the alley¹⁵, there is an unexploded bomb in a damaged house. But they say it's still better than being displaced in east Mosul. Here, they say, people are poor, but they help each other out. That wasn't the case when they were displaced on the east side.

RASHADI: (Through interpreter) It's like we were coming from another country. They wouldn't even give us a bottle of water. They wouldn't give us water from their wells.

ARRAF: People in Mosul say there's always been a divide between the west and east side of the city. ISIS and the battle against it deepen those divisions. Jane Arraf, NPR News, Mosul.

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1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 bustling   

adj.喧闹的

参考例句：

• The market was bustling with life. 市场上生机勃勃。
• This district is getting more and more prosperous and bustling. 这一带越来越繁华了。

3 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

4 monochromatic   

adj.单色的，一色的

参考例句：

• The resolution of white light into its separate monochromatic components is called dispersion.这种白光分解为各单色成分的现象叫做色散。
• My sister selected a monochromatic color-scheme for her new apartment.我妹妹为自己的新居选择了单一色调的设计。

5 rubble   

n.（一堆）碎石，瓦砾

参考例句：

• After the earthquake,it took months to clean up the rubble.地震后，花了数月才清理完瓦砾。
• After the war many cities were full of rubble.战后许多城市到处可见颓垣残壁。

6 scorched   

烧焦，烤焦( scorch的过去式和过去分词 )； 使（植物）枯萎，把…晒枯； 高速行驶； 枯焦

参考例句：

• I scorched my dress when I was ironing it. 我把自己的连衣裙熨焦了。
• The hot iron scorched the tablecloth. 热熨斗把桌布烫焦了。

7 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。

8 mortars   

n.迫击炮( mortar的名词复数 )；砂浆；房产；研钵

参考例句：

• They could not move their heavy mortars over the swampy ground. 他们无法把重型迫击炮移过那片沼泽地。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Where the hell are his mortars? 他有迫击炮吗？ 来自教父部分

9 sergeant   

n.警官，中士

参考例句：

• His elder brother is a sergeant.他哥哥是个警官。
• How many stripes are there on the sleeve of a sergeant?陆军中士的袖子上有多少条纹？

10 registration   

n.登记，注册，挂号

参考例句：

• Marriage without registration is not recognized by law.法律不承认未登记的婚姻。
• What's your registration number?你挂的是几号？

11 salvaged   

（从火灾、海难等中）抢救（某物）( salvage的过去式和过去分词 )； 回收利用（某物）

参考例句：

• The investigators studied flight recorders salvaged from the wreckage. 调查者研究了从飞机残骸中找到的黑匣子。
• The team's first task was to decide what equipment could be salvaged. 该队的首要任务是决定可以抢救哪些设备。

12 mattresses   

褥垫，床垫( mattress的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The straw mattresses are airing there. 草垫子正在那里晾着。
• The researchers tested more than 20 mattresses of various materials. 研究人员试验了二十多个不同材料的床垫。

13 bulging   

膨胀； 凸出（部）； 打气； 折皱

参考例句：

• Her pockets were bulging with presents. 她的口袋里装满了礼物。
• Conscious of the bulging red folder, Nim told her,"Ask if it's important." 尼姆想到那个鼓鼓囊囊的红色文件夹便告诉她：“问问是不是重要的事。”

14 outskirts   

n.郊外，郊区

参考例句：

• Our car broke down on the outskirts of the city.我们的汽车在市郊出了故障。
• They mostly live on the outskirts of a town.他们大多住在近郊。

15 alley   

n.小巷，胡同；小径，小路

参考例句：

• We live in the same alley.我们住在同一条小巷里。
• The blind alley ended in a brick wall.这条死胡同的尽头是砖墙。