And for India, that’s really sayingsomething. Discarded bottles and crumpled food wrappers mixed with cow dung –and worse – are simply part of the topography in most of the country. So muchso that prime minister Shri Narendra Modi launched the ambitious “Clean IndiaMission”(Swachh Bharat Abhiyan) in October 2014 with a goal of drasticallysprucing up the country’s major cities by Mahatma Gandhi’s 150 birthday in2019.

对印度而言，这的确值得大书特书。在印度大部分地区，司空见惯的是丢弃的瓶子和皱巴巴的食品包装纸，还有混杂着的牛粪，情况甚至会更糟。正因为如此，印度总理莫迪才于2014 年10 月发起一项雄心勃勃的“清洁印度行动（Clean India Mission）”计划，旨在到2019 年甘地150 周年诞辰纪念日时，让印度各大城市的面貌焕然一新。

Mawlynnong is already way ahead of thecurve, though. It was declared the cleanest village in Asia in 2003 and thecleanest in India in 2005 by Discover India magazine. More recently, Modiacknowledged Mawlynnong as the cleanest village in Meghalaya and a model forthe rest of the county in a 2015 radio address. In May 2016 he highlighted itas “Asia’s cleanest village”in a celebration of the government’s successes(including the Clean India programme).

而在这次清洁浪潮中，Mawlynnong 已经一马当先。在印度《发现》杂志的评选中，该村庄被评为2003 年亚洲最干净的村庄和2005 年印度最干净的村庄。最近，在2015 年的一次广播讲话中，莫迪将Mawlynnong 称为梅加拉亚邦最干净的村庄和全国卫生典范。2016 年5 月，在一次政府庆祝活动中（包括“清洁印度行动”计划）,莫迪强调，Mawlynnong 是“亚洲最干净的村庄”。

This claim to fame stuck, and the villagehas become a regional legend and source of pride. Walk in, and all the typicalrubbish is mysteriously, miraculously absent.

这令这个小村庄名声大噪，成为当地的传奇和骄傲。走进村庄，所有的常见垃圾都踪迹全无，令人不可思议。

So how do you get a community to become amodel of cleanliness and sanitation in a country where this has long been aproblem? The answer, it seems, is to start them young.

那么，在一个长期存在卫生问题的国家，怎样才能让社区成为清洁卫生的典范呢？答案似乎是，卫生要从娃娃抓起。

Eleven-year-old Deity Bakordor starts herday around 6:30 am. Her chore, shared with all the village kids, is thebeautification of the town. Teasel brooms in hand, the children storm thestreets, sweeping up dead leaves and garbage before school. The children are alsoresponsible for emptying the rubbish bins – which are surprisingly pretty,hand-woven, cone-shaped baskets scattered throughout town – and separatingorganic waste from burnable trash. Leaves and other biodegradable waste areburied (and eventually used as fertilizer); everything else is driven far fromthe village and burned. There are also dedicated town gardeners who maintainriots of public plants and flowers that line the footpaths, making a walk hereincredibly pleasant.

11 岁的Deity Bakordor 大约在早晨6:30 开始新的一天。与村子里其他孩子一样，美化村庄也是她要从事的日常事务。上学前，孩子们会用起绒草做的扫帚清扫街道上的落叶和垃圾。孩子们还要负责倒空垃圾箱。垃圾箱为手工编织的锥形篮筐，在村庄各处星罗棋布，漂亮得出乎意料。孩子们会将有机垃圾与可燃垃圾分开。树叶和其他生物可降解垃圾被埋起来（最终作为化肥使用）；其他垃圾则被拉到离村庄很远的地方烧掉。另外，村子里还有专门的园丁负责维护步道两边的公共花草树木，使得在这里散步令人格外愉悦。

I asked Bakordor if she was happy to livein such a clean place. She nodded, shyly. And what if a visitor dropped rubbishon the ground, what would she do? She replied that she wouldn’t sayanything to the visitor directly. But she’d pick it up.

我问Bakordor，她是否愿意生活在这样一个干净的地方。她害羞地点头。我又问，如果有游客在地上丢垃圾，她会怎么做呢？她回答，她不会直接对游客说什么，但她会将垃圾捡起来。

Bakordor explained that in Mawlynnong,there’s normal daily cleaning for children and adults, then extra on Saturdayswhen the village leader assigns out “social work” to be completed for the goodof the town. For her, that might mean helping clean her school. It’s animpressive system, but even more impressive is that this is the norm.Cleanliness is deeply ingrained into living a good life here; it’s just whatyou do.

Bakordor 说，在Mawlynnong，孩子们和大人都要参加日常清洁工作，每逢周六，村子领导人还要分配为村子公益而完成的“社会工作”。对她而言，就是帮助打扫自己的学校。这种体系令人印象深刻，尤其是这已成为村里的规范。维护清洁卫生在这里的良好生活中深入人心；这里的人们就是这样做的。

I peeked at the family’s pristine outdoorcooking area to see the fruit of these labours, and Bakordor’s grandmother,Hosana, held aside the curtain that leads to their two-room home. Sure enough,each area was immaculate: the floors freshly swept, the dishware sparkling,bedding folded.

我悄悄观察这家人的户外烹饪区，想看看他们的劳动成果，Bakordor 的祖母Hosana 将通往他们两居室住处的帘子掀开。当然，到处都完美无瑕，地板干净，餐具闪闪发光，床铺叠得整整整齐齐。