他是個男人,但卻會燒飯,難道他不該感到羞愧嗎

I didn't make the decision to raise my daughter in Nepal lightly. But the opportunities it presented far outweighed any challenges I could think of: I could do research for my PhD and spend more time with my daughter, Miriam, and she could have a happier childhood, growing up in a country that loves children and gives them room to actually be children. All that proved to be true: Nepal is a very special place.

慎重考慮之後，我決定在尼泊爾撫養自己的女兒。因為它提供的機會遠遠大於我能想象得到的挑戰：我可以為自己的博士學位進行調研，還能花更多時間和女兒米里亞姆在一起，而她的童年可以更快樂，能夠在一個喜愛孩子、讓孩子做真正的自己的國家長大。而這一切都被證實了：尼泊爾是一個非常特別的地方。

But as parents, we don't-or can't-always see all the potential consequences of our actions. When our kids are young, we think we know everything about their world, and it's all too easy to forget that they see things differently than we do.

但作為父母，我們無法一直看到所有行動的潛在後果。孩子還小的時候，我們以為自己知曉孩子的一切，但卻很容易忘記：他們看事情的角度是和我們不一樣的。

For me, the true impact of that big decision only hit me when we were back home, visiting family in Germany three years after we moved. My father had invited us over for dinner. We got there a bit early, so when we arrived, my dad was still busy preparing potato pancakes in the kitchen. It was a nice, uneventful visit. But on the drive back to the hotel where we were staying that night, my six-year-old daughter couldn't stop giggling. When I asked her what was up, she said, "He cooked. He is a man, and he cooked. That is so funny. Isn't he ashamed?"

於我而言，搬家三年後，當我和孩子回德國老家拜訪家人時，這一重大決定的影響開始顯現了。到老家那天有點早，所以當我們都到的時候，我爸爸還在廚房忙著做土豆煎餅。那是一次美好而平靜的拜訪。但回到酒店的路上，六歲的女兒卻忍不住地咯咯笑了。當我問她怎麼了，她說道，"他燒飯哎，他是個男的，但他卻燒飯哎。真是太搞笑了，他難道不羞愧嗎？"

I probed further and, to my horror, discovered that Miriam also thought women couldn't drive motorbikes, girls had to get married as soon as possible, and men should not have to clean anything. Still in shock, I asked, "Why would you think something like that? Who told you that?" Her answer was simple. "No one told me that," she replied. "That is just how things are in Nepal!" Only then did I realize that growing up in a different culture was affecting her on so many more levels than I had imagined.

我進一步的探索她，但卻驚恐的發現，米里亞姆還認為女人不該開摩托車、女孩兒應儘早結婚、男人不用打掃。我十分震驚地問她，"你為什麼會這麼想呢？誰告訴你的？"她的回答十分簡單。"沒人告訴我啊，"她回道。"尼泊爾就是這樣的！"那個時候我才意識到：在不同的文化環境中成長對她造成了很多深層次的影響，而這是我沒有想到的。

Naively, I thought my own influence on my daughter's perceptions would be stronger. I completely underestimated the effects of the broader culture and overestimated her capacity to extrapolate from our personal life. After all, she sees me work and her father cook-in our family, gender roles aren't as rigid.

我天真的認為，我個人會對女兒的認知產生更強的影響，但我完全低估了廣泛文化的影響、高估了她從生活中推斷的能力。畢竟，她看到我工作，她父親做飯--我們的家庭並不存在僵硬的性別角色這回事。