《美食祈禱和戀愛》Chapter 86 (201):聆聽訴說

I stayed there in Wayan's shop for the next five hours, talking with my new best friend about her troubles. She cleaned up the infection in my knee as I listened to her story. Way-an's Balinese husband, she told me, was a man who "drink all the time, always gamble, lose all our money, then beat me when I don't give him more money for to gamble and to drink." She said, "He beat me into the hospital many times." She parted her hair, showed me scars on her head and said, "This is from when he hit me with motorcycle helmet. Always, he was hitting me with this motorcycle helmet when he is drinking, when I don't make money. He hit me so much, I go unconscious, dizzy, can't see. I think it is lucky I am healer, my family are healers, because I know how to heal myself after he beats me. I think if I was not healer, I would lose my ears, you know, not be able to hear things anymore. Or maybe lose my eye, not be able to see." She left him, she told me, after he beat her so severely "that I lose my baby, my second child, the one in my belly." After which incident their firstborn child, a bright little girl with the nickname of Tutti, said, "I think you should get a divorce, Mommy. Every time you go to the hospital you leave too much work around the house for Tutti."

其後五個小時，我待在大姐的店裏，和新好友談她的問題。她清洗我的膝蓋傷口，我聽着她的故事。大姐告訴我，她的巴釐丈夫"成天喝酒，一天到晚賭博，賭輸我們所有的錢，我不再給他錢賭博喝酒，他就揍我，好幾次他把我揍到送醫。"她撥開頭髮，讓我看頭上的疤，說："這是他拿機車頭盔揍我的結果。他老是拿頭盔揍我，在他喝酒的時候，在我沒賺錢的時候。他揍得很用力，使我失去知覺、頭暈、看不見。我有幸身爲醫生，我的家人都是醫生，所以在他打我之後，我知道如何治療自己。要不是我自己是醫生，可能老早沒了耳朵，變成聾子；或沒了眼睛，變成瞎子。"她告訴我，她在遭到痛打，以致"肚子裏的第二胎流產"之後離開他。事情過後，他們的第一個孩子——小名圖蒂的聰明小女孩說："我覺得你早該離婚，媽咪。每次你進醫院，都把太多家事留給圖蒂。"

Tutti was four years old when she said this.

圖蒂在四歲的時候說這句話。

To exit a marriage in Bali leaves a person alone and unprotected in ways that are almost impossible for a Westerner to imagine. The Balinese family unit, enclosed within the walls of a family compound, is merely everything—four generations of siblings, cousins, parents, grandparents and children all living together in a series of small bungalows surrounding the family temple, taking care of each other from birth to death. The family compound is the source of strength, financial security, health care, day care, education and—most important to the Balinese—spiritual connection.

在巴厘島走出婚姻而孤獨無依，在西方人來說難以想象。封閉在圍牆內的家庭單位，在巴厘島，是生活的一切——四代親屬同住在環繞家庭祠堂的一間間小平房，照料彼此，從生到死。家宅是力量、財務保障、健康、日間看護、教育，以及——對巴厘島人最爲重要的——信仰的源頭。

The family compound is so vital that the Balinese think of it as a single, living person. The population of a Balinese village is traditionally counted not by the number of individuals, but by the number of compounds. The compound is a self-sustaining universe. So you don't leave it. (Unless, of course, you are a woman, in which case you move only once—out of your father's family compound and into your husband's.) When this system works—which it does in this healthy society almost all the time—it produces the most sane, protected, calm, happy and balanced human beings in the world. But when it doesn't work? As with my new friend Wayan? The outcasts are lost in airless orbit. Her choice was either to stay in the family compound safety net with a husband who kept putting her in the hospital, or to save her own life and leave, which left her with nothing.

家宅的重要性，使巴厘島人將它視爲活生生的人一般。巴厘島的村落人口數，傳統上並非以人數，而是以家宅數量計算。家宅是自給自足的宇宙。因此你離不開它。（當然除非你是女人，你只須搬動一次——從父親家搬入丈夫家。）這種系統若是奏效——在這健全的社會中幾乎一向如此——即培育出全世界最健康、安穩、平靜、快樂、平衡的人類。若不奏效呢？就變得像我的新朋友大姐一樣，這些棄兒迷失在缺乏空氣的軌道中。她只有兩個選擇，要麼是選擇留在家宅的安全網內，繼續與把她揍到送醫的丈夫待在一起，不然就選擇自救離去，卻從此一無所有。

Well, not exactly nothing, actually. She did take with her an encyclopedic knowledge of healing, her goodness, her work ethic and her daughter Tutti—whom she had to fight hard to keep. Bali is a patriarchy to the end. In the rare case of a divorce, the children automatically belong to the father. To get Tutti back, Wayan had to hire a lawyer, whom she paid with every single thing she had. I mean—everything. She sold off not only her furniture and jewelry, but also her forks and spoons, her socks and shoes, her old washcloths and half-burned candles—everything went to pay that lawyer. But she did get her daughter back, in the end, after a two-year battle. Wayan is just lucky Tutti was a girl; if she'd been a boy, Wayan never would have seen the kid again. Boys are much more valuable.

事實上，並非真的一無所有。她帶着博大的醫療知識、善良之心、工作道德和圖蒂——由她努力爭取而來的女兒。巴厘島到底是父權社會，在罕見的離婚案例中，孩子自動歸屬父親所有。爲了爭取圖蒂，大姐必須散盡所有的一切去聘請律師。我是說——"所有的一切"。她不僅賣了傢俱和珠寶，還賣了刀子、湯匙、襪子、鞋子、舊抹布和燒過的蠟燭——爲了付清律師費用而賣掉一切。經過兩年的交戰，她最後確實爭取到女兒。圖蒂是個女孩，這是大姐的幸運；因爲倘若圖蒂是男孩，大姐甭想再見到這個孩子，男孩寶貴得多。