孩子们需要这种美味的冒险

Here's a news story guaranteed to provoke a fusillade of indignant spluttering: German politicians are reportedly planning to ban Kinder Surprise eggs on the grounds that they're a safety hazard.

这条消息注定要成为众矢之的：有报道称德国的政治家们计划彻底禁止“巧克力惊喜蛋”，因为它们对孩子们存在安全威胁。

In case you're not familiar with the concept, the "surprise" inside each Kinder egg is a cheapo little toy housed within a plastic shell. Anyway, the Germans are worried that hungry, gurgling kiddywinks might mistake the gifts for food and wind up choking to death. "Children can't differentiate between toys and nutritional items," said Miriam Gruss, a member of the German parliamentary children's committee.

或许你还不了解这个概念，每个“巧克力蛋”中的“惊喜”是一种塑料壳里包着的一个便宜的小玩具。无论如何，德国人但心那些肚子饿的咕咕作响的小家伙们会错误地把这些小礼物当作食物吞下去，并导致窒息死亡。

“小孩们不能区分玩具和有营养东西。”米尔曼.葛鲁斯说。他是德国议会儿童委员会的一名成员。

What, really? Don't get me wrong - I think children are idiots. But even I find that statement a tad unfair and sweeping. I used to have a spud gun when I was a kid. In case you're not familiar with that concept either, it was a small metal pistol that fired chunks of potato. Not once did I aim the potato at anyone. Or try to deep-fry the gun. And I was thick as shit. I guess it was luck.

果真如此吗？不要误会我--我认为小孩子们是白痴。但我更认为这项决定有点不公正和笼统。我小时候曾有把马铃薯小枪。也许你对此也不太了解，它是一个用来射击马铃薯的小小的金属手枪。我不止一次地对着任何人瞄准马铃薯，或者用油炸这个手枪。我笨得出奇。我猜这是幸运的。

In fact my run of luck was pretty impressive. Other toys I failed to ingest include a Scalextric, several boxes of space Lego, the board games Operation and Mousetrap, and a complete collection of Paul Daniels' TV Magic Tricks - even though the latter included an egg-shaped gizmo called The Magic Egg. Somehow, miraculously, my conker-sized kiddywink brain managed to differentiate it from a real egg. Thus my life was saved by a whisker.

事实上，我对我的好运气记忆深刻。我没有吞下的玩具还包括一个赛车模型，几箱子的乐高积木块，棋子和老鼠夹，普尔丹尼尔的全套魔术道具，甚至后者还包括一个叫做“魔蛋”的蛋形的小玩艺儿。从某种程度上说，这真是奇迹，我的小脑袋能够把它和真正的蛋区分开。这样说来，我曾经命悬一线。

Gruss won't countenance such a slapdash approach to child safety. Not on her watch. "It's a sad fact," she said. "Kinder Surprise eggs have to go."

葛鲁斯不赞成涉及儿童安全的这样的草率决定。并不是出于她的愿望。她说，“这是一个可悲的事，金德惊喜蛋不得不消失。”

As you can imagine, the committee's proclamation has already caused a fair bit of outraged huffing, not least from the manufacturer, Ferrero.

你可以想象，委员会的声明已经引起了较多的公愤，而并不仅仅来其制造商弗列罗公司。

"There is absolutely no evidence that the Kinder Surprise eggs, as a combination of toy and foodstuff, are dangerous," said Ferrero's spokeswoman. Now I'm no fan of Ferrero chocolate, which vaguely tastes like regurgitated icing sugar to me, but I can't help thinking that it would be hugely unfair on the company if an unsubstantiated link between Kinder eggs and danger began to form in parents' minds and sales suffered accordingly. Let's face it, even though Kinder eggs are generally bought for the gift rather than the sickly chocolate shell, and even though many of the toys are so ingeniously designed they could easily be sold on their own, munching through the outside to get at the inedible inside is half the fun.

弗列罗公司发言人说，“绝对还没有证据表明这种玩具和食物相结合的出奇蛋是危险的。”现在我并不是弗列罗巧克力的追捧者，这种巧克力的奇妙味道像是冰糖的回味样。但我忍不住想对于公司而言这是一个巨大的不公，一个未经证实的奇异蛋与危险相关联的概念一旦在父母们的脑海里形成，其巧克力的销售会相应地遭秧。让我们来面对这一事实，假如奇异蛋总体来说是作为礼物而非粘滑的巧克力外壳被购买，而其许多玩具也是设计精巧，单独卖也很好卖，通过吃掉包装来获得其中不能吃的部分，也占一半的乐趣。

What's more, jittery, neurotic parents don't need any more false scares to piss their pants over. They're already raising their twatty little offspring like mollycoddled prisoners: banned from playing outdoors in case a paedophile ring burrows through the pavement and eats them, locked indoors with nothing but anti-bacterial plasma screens for company, ferried to and from school in spluttering rollcaged tanks... Christ, half these kids would view choking to death as a release.

更为重要的是，那些神经过敏的父母们不想冒任何不利的风险。他们对自己的宝贝孩子一向如笼中鸟样娇生惯养：孩子们被禁止在室外活动，以免被从马路边的地洞钻出来的恋童廦们吃掉，被锁在家中只有抗菌的等离子电视屏幕相伴，每天上学放学由封闭严密的大车子接送...天啊，有一半的孩子会因得到放松而窒息的。

No wonder they grow up to become tiresome whooping advocates for extreme sports. If I'd spent the first 18 years of my life doing time in a joyless cotton-wool cell, listening to some angsty bloody parent banging on about how precious and special I was every pissing day, I'd snowboard off a cliff at the first opportunity too. Under those circumstances, tumbling down a rockface and cracking your skull open must feel like a declaration of independence .

怪不得他们会因剧烈运动而累得气喘吁吁。如果我人生中的头18年是在一个毫无乐趣的舒适的小窝里度过，听着激动得血脉膨胀的父母大声谈论我的每一次撒尿是多么珍贵和特别，我一定也会在第一时间乘着雪撬从悬崖上滑下去。在那种环境中，因磕着岩石摔倒并摔破脑壳似乎就是一种独立宣言。

How did we get to this point? Our sense of self grew too strong. We gazed up our own bums for so long, we each became the centre of the universe. We're not mere specks of flesh, jostled by the forces of chance. We're flawless deities, and we deny - deny! - the very existence of simple bad luck. If we trip on the pavement, someone else is to blame. Of course they are. And we'll sue them to prove it if necessary.

我们为什么这样说？我们的自我意识太强了。我们关注自己太多，每个人成了宇宙的中心。我们是完美的女神，我们拒绝，坚决拒绝任何一个微小的不幸的存在。如果我们流浪街头，一定是某人的罪过。当然，就是他们。如果必要的话，我们将起诉他们以证明这一点。

In a bid to pre-empt our self-important litigiousness, armies of risk assessors scan the horizon, dreaming of every conceivable threat. You could bang your head on that branch. Crack a rib on that teaspoon. Choke to death on that chocolate egg.

 在试图避免我们可能惹上对我们很重要的诉讼中,考虑到到每一种可以想到的威胁.可以发现我们身边潜在太多的风险.可能被树枝撞破头,可能被茶勺伤了肋骨,可能因吃巧克力鸡蛋而窒息死亡.

Well, it stops here. And it stops now. I'm launching my own range of Kinder eggs. They're called Unkinder Eggs. And they don't contain sweets. They contain specially designed hazards. Spiked ball bearings. Spring-loaded razor-blade traps. Flimsy balloons filled with acid. Miniature land mines powerful enough to punch holes in your cheeks and embed your teeth in the wall. The idea is to carefully nibble away all the chocolate without incurring a serious injury. Thrills! Tension! Chocolate! It's the confectionery equivalent of extreme sports. You'll love it.

好，到此为止。到目前为止。我在思考我自己的一系列的“金德蛋”。他们叫“非金德蛋”。它们不含甜点。它们含有特别设计的陷井。锥形的滚轴，带有发条的旅行剃须刀。装有酸物的软汽球。其威力足可以把脸面颊打穿，把牙齿嵌入墙内的地雷模型。这个点子是要你十分小心地吃掉所有外面的巧克力而不遭致严重的伤害。惊险！紧张！巧克力！这是糖果店里极限运动。你们会喜欢的！

And hey - that's not just cocoa butter and milk solids you're savouring. It's better than that. It's the great taste of risk.

嘿！那不仅仅是你喜欢的橄榄油和牛奶做成的固体。它比那些更好。这是一种伟大的味觉冒险。

Guardian News Service