WHEN I WAS 16, I went to Berlin─West Berlin, since at that time a wall still divided the city─to live for three months with a family on an exchange program. They were a nice bunch, the mother a teacher, the father an engineer, a pretty and exuberant daughter who'd recently stayed with my family in Toronto and their son, who was a year or two older than I was. All the family members were also, as it turned out, very active members of a group called the Freik?rperkultur, or FKK, which translates as 'Free Body Culture.' In other words, a nudist club.
我16岁时参加了一个交流项目，在柏林──西柏林，因为当时仍有一道 将这座城市分隔开──的一个家庭中住了三个月。他们一家人都很好，母亲是老师，父亲是工程师，漂亮而活力四射的女儿（最近她和我们全家一起待在多伦多），他们的儿子比我大一、两岁。后来我发现，他们家所有人都是一个叫Freik?rperkultur（FKK，翻译过来就是“自由身体文化”）的团体的活跃成员。这个团体说白了就是一个天体俱乐部。
I hadn't expected this when I signed up for a German cultural exchange through my high school; somehow I hadn't been aware I might have to get naked in public. In fact I knew shamefully little about my host country. Yet nudism, as far as I know, is fairly mainstream in Germany to this day (and not, as it is here, the province of hippies and public radio humorists).
当我在高中报名参加一个德国文化交流活动时，可没有料到这些，至少没有意识到我不得不在公共场合赤身裸体。事实上，我对东道国的了解少得可怜。然而就我所知，迄今为止，天体主义在德国都是相当主流的文化（和我们这个盛产嬉皮士和电台笑星的国家不同）。
The nudist outings were going to be pretty much mandatory, my hosts explained to me─much like speaking the language or eating the food. The family felt strongly that, to properly explore their native ways, I needed to join in the nudist activities. If I closed my mind to nudism, I'd prove myself closed to the wonder of life itself. While there would be no punishment if I refused to participate, they implied that such a lapse of courage on my part would signal a deep moral failure─possibly a spiritual one.
主人家向我解释说，裸体郊游是非常有必要的──就像说话和吃东西一样。这家人强烈地感到，为了正确了解本地人的生活方式，我需要加入天体活动。如果我拒绝接受天体主义，就等于拒绝接受生活本身的美妙。尽管我拒绝参与的话不会受到什么惩罚，但他们暗示，我缺乏勇气的表现意味着深层的道德缺陷──可能是心灵缺陷。
At 16, I was more resilient and easygoing than I am now. After a few hours of confusion and mild alarm, I shrugged my shoulders, suppressed my panic and acquiesced.
16岁的时候，我比现在更有弹性、更随和。几个小时的困惑和轻微的担心后，我耸耸肩，压抑住自己的恐慌，默许了。
The good news was that the nudity was mostly a weekend gig. We drove to the 'Free Body Culture' property, which involved a body of fresh water, expanses of bedraggled grass richly festooned with goose and duck droppings and a few stunted trees. We passed through the change rooms, where we divested ourselves of our clothes and left them in unlocked lockers. And then among the shrubs, hundreds of free bodies spread out, picnicking and sunning. I came to understand that a German nudist, in 1984, loved little more than to work on his or her tan.
好消息是，这次天体活动基本上就是一次周末小聚。我们驾车前往“自由身体文化”的活动场地，那里有一片淡水湖，广阔的草地上满是鹅和鸭的粪便，还有几棵矮小的树木。我们经过更衣室，在那里脱下衣服，将它们放在未上锁的储物柜里。然后，数百个一丝不挂的人在灌木丛中伸展四肢，享用野餐、晒日光浴。就在1984年，我开始理解，对于一个德国天体主义者来说，没有比晒太阳更令他们喜欢的事了。
There was a code of eye contact: You didn't ogle people below the neck when you talked to them. You kept your eyes fixed firmly on their faces. But of course you looked later, when you thought no one was paying attention. I remember noticing old and middle-aged bodies and feeling sorry for their owners: how tragic to be so saggy, bulgy and wrinkly. How strange to be apparently proud of the condition, rather than mortified by it.
这里有一条目光接触守则：当你和别人聊天时，不应注视对方脖子以下的部位。你应将目光牢牢固定在他们脸上。当然，当你认为没人注意时，会趁机偷看。我记得我注意到中老年人的身体很难看：如此皮肤松弛、身材臃肿、皱纹遍布是多么可悲。为此感到骄傲而不是窘迫可真奇怪。
It was a little odd to be naked in the company of the teenage son, whom I'd only met days before. But he was so casual and good-natured that I almost forgot how freakish it would have been to blithely disrobe among the boys I knew back home.
和主人家十几岁的儿子一起裸露着身体有点奇怪，我可是几天前才认识他的。但是他状态很放松，脾气很好，我几乎忘掉了在我认识的这些男孩中轻率地脱掉衣服有多奇怪。
My main complaint about the sunbathing afternoons proved not to be self-consciousness. It was simple boredom. I wondered what these people were doing, sitting around naked, chitchatting now and then. Were they waiting for something to happen?
事实证明，对于在下午晒日光浴，我主要的不满不是难为情，而是觉得这样做很无聊。我奇怪这些人赤身裸体地坐着闲聊要干什么。他们是等待着什么事情发生吗？
I was definitely waiting for something, especially when I felt a chill breeze sweep up from the water. I was waiting to be allowed to put my clothes back on. The tan-giving sun was all very well; actual comfort was far better. 'I'm cold,' I plaintively expressed, more than once, but each time my obvious constitutional weakness was met with strict disapproval.
我绝对是在等待着什么，尤其是当我感到一阵寒冷的微风从水面上吹来时。我等待着可以穿上衣服的那一刻。能晒黑皮肤的阳光很好，不过实实在在的舒适感更好。“我冷”，我不止一次哀怨地表示，但弱不禁风的我每次都遭到了严辞拒绝。
It wasn't all sunbathing and small talk. We also swam naked─I remember an actual swim meet─and played basketball. The basketball was the worst.
那天也不全是日光浴和闲聊。我们还裸泳──我记得有一次真正的游泳比赛──并打了篮球。打篮球的经历是最糟糕的。
We wore nothing but sneakers. No brassieres, no jockstraps. There was flopping, and there was pain. There was the sight of nude people, bouncing and swinging above bulky white athletic shoes. Could this be the wonder my German family had talked about, the beauty of the unclad human form? Was this jiggling, dangling dance with a large, orange ball indeed our highest, purest identity?
我们除了运动鞋什么都没穿。没戴胸罩，也没穿弹力护身。我们笨重地摔倒，痛苦不已。你所看到的就是赤裸的人们穿着笨重的白色运动鞋跳来转去。这就是我的德国交换家庭所说的赤裸人类形态的美妙之处吗？这种拍着一个橙色大球、摇摇晃晃的舞蹈真的是我们至高至纯的特性吗？
I tried to open my mind as I jumped and flopped. I'd jam it open if I could. Open, O Mind! Open right now! I'll prise you open with a clawhammer!
我一边蹦蹦跳跳，一边试图敞开心扉。如果我可以，我会尽全力打开它的。快打开！我的心灵！现在就打开！我会用木工锤把你撬开的！
And yet, in the end, the Germans were absolutely right. The Free Body Culture gave me a gift I might never have received had I refused to play along. It left me with an acute sense of the absurd─one I still cherish─to be there among my fellow apes, awkward and less than half-willing, aiming and missing, leaping, landing and wincing.
结果证明，这些德国人是绝对正确的。“自由身体文化”给了我一份如果我拒绝参与就可能永远得不到的礼物。它让我有一种强烈的荒诞感──与猿类同伴共处的荒诞感──至今我仍珍视这种感觉，这种尴尬而不情愿、瞄准又错过、跳起、着地和闪避的感觉。