鄧永鏗:我喜歡探訪墓園

Is it acceptable for companies to require women to wear high heels all day in their jobs

（鄧永鏗爵士爲FT專欄作家，就生活禮儀方面的問題答讀者問。）

This question was highlighted by a case last year where a woman working as a receptionist was told that she must wear high heels while performing her duties at all times. She complained that this was very uncomfortable and caused injuries to her feet, and she jettisoned her heels. Whereupon she was sent home.

你能接受公司要求女員工們整天穿着高跟鞋上班嗎？

I must confess sympathy for the employee. Of course I don’t wear high heels, but I can easily imagine the discomfort if they are worn for several hours on the trot for five consecutive working days, at an incline of almost 45 degrees. It must feel like skiing down a black run all day. I know that even for formal events where women wear stilettos for dinner for three to four hours, they usually breathe a sigh of relief when they eventually feel they are done for the night and are able to take them off. Indeed, I know of many women who go to these glamorous events always with a spare pair of flat shoes, which they change into the moment they can fling off the heels.

這個問題在去年引起了高度關注，起因是一名從事前臺接待工作的女員工被僱主要求必須穿着高跟鞋工作。她抱怨說這很難受，還傷到了她的雙腳，於是她拒絕再穿高跟鞋。但隨後就被公司請回了家。

Maybe employers should ask their female staff to write the company dress codes. In any event, if a company feels that it needs lanky, glamorous-looking receptionists to shepherd clients in and out of its offices, perhaps it should simply employ those who are tall enough already, although this might well constitute illegal discrimination in itself.

我得承認我很同情這名僱員。當然我不穿高跟鞋，但不難想象，如果一週連續五天每天都蹬着將近45度的高跟鞋小跑幾個小時會有多難受，那肯定像一整天都在黑道上滑雪一樣。據我瞭解，即使爲了正式場合，女性們穿着細高跟鞋出席一場三、四個小時的晚宴，當她們感到終於結束了能夠脫下高跟鞋時通常都會長舒一口氣。事實上，我知道很多女性出席這種盛大場面時總會再帶一雙平底鞋，一旦她們脫掉高跟鞋就會馬上換上。

Do you like visiting famous people’s burial places If so, where do you go

也許僱主們應該讓他們的女性員工撰寫公司的着裝規範。無論如何，如果一個企業覺得，他們需要瘦高個兒、濃妝豔抹的前臺迎來送往，那或許他們就該直接僱傭些本來個頭就高的人，雖然如此一來本身就可能構成了非法歧視。

I love visiting necropolises, cemeteries, mausoleums and other burial places, mainly because that’s the nearest I get to meeting people I have admired and loved, and also hated, but whom it is now impossible to meet. So I have seen nasty Stalin’s necropolis at the Kremlin, as well as Lenin’s embalmed body nearby, and that of Mao at Tiananmen Square in Beijing. They all give me the creeps because I can never fathom their crooked minds.

你喜歡探訪名人墓地嗎？若喜歡，你會去哪？

The grandest of burials is possibly that of China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, whose mausoleum in Xian includes a terracotta army of more than 8,000 soldiers. Equally grand, perhaps, is the Great Pyramid of Giza for Pharaoh Khufu. But other than individual burial sites, the cemetery in Vienna and London’s Westminster Abbey have the most interesting selection of dead people.

我喜歡探訪墓園、公墓、陵園和其他墓地，主要是因爲那裏是最接近我曾仰慕和愛戴過的人們的地方，也有些我厭惡的、如今不可能再見的人。所以我曾到克里姆林宮探訪過卑劣的斯大林的墓地，以及不遠處列寧的遺體，還有北京天安門廣場上毛澤東的遺體。他們都讓我覺得毛骨悚然，因爲我永遠不能理解他們扭曲的思想。

Vienna Central Cemetery — said to be “half the size of Zurich, but twice as fun” — contains the graves of Brahms, Beethoven, Czerny, Schubert, Johann Strauss, Josef Strauss, von Suppé, Wolf and Schoenberg. What a resounding graveyard this would be if all the dead bodies came alive! Then there is Westminster Abbey. In its Poets’ Corner alone, there are the graves of Chaucer, Dryden, Sheridan, Spenser, Dr Johnson, Browning, Tennyson, Dickens, Hardy, Kipling; as well as memorials for the three Bront sisters, Jane Austen, Elizabeth Browning, Keats, Byron, Coleridge, Lewis Carroll, George Eliot and TS Eliot. There is no other place on earth within which the ghosts of those who have enriched this earth so abundantly continue to live.

最宏偉的陵墓當屬中國第一位皇帝，秦始皇(Qin Shi Huang)的陵墓，秦始皇陵位於中國西安市，墓中包含有8000多尊兵馬俑。能和秦始皇陵媲美的，或許就是埃及法老胡夫(Pharaoh Khufu)的吉薩大金字塔(Great Pyramid of Giza)。而除了某個人的墓地外，維也納(Vienna)和倫敦的威斯敏斯特教堂(Westminster Abbey)還有最有趣的名人公墓。

Mind you, the most impressive burial site must be Robert Maxwell’s — on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, from where Jesus Christ ascended to heaven. Was this location chosen for “Bob” to resurrect

維也納中央陵園(Vienna Central Cemetery)——據說“有蘇黎世的一半大，但卻比蘇黎世有意思一倍”——陵園中葬有勃拉姆斯(Brahms)、貝多芬(Beethoven)、車爾尼(Czerny)、舒伯特(Schubert)、約翰施特勞斯(Johann Strauss)、約瑟夫施特勞斯(Josef Strauss)、馮蘇佩(von Suppé)、保魯夫(Wolf)和勳伯格(Schoenberg)。如果這些名人死而復生，那這個墓園將會多麼熱鬧！還有威斯敏斯特教堂。單其詩人角(Poets' Corner)一隅，就埋葬着衆多文豪，其中包括喬叟(Chaucer)、德萊頓(Dryden)、謝里丹(Sheridan)、斯賓塞(Spenser)、約翰遜博士(Samuel Johnson)、布朗寧(Browning)、丁尼生(Tennyson)、狄更斯(Dickens)、哈代(Hardy)、吉卜林(Kipling)；那裏還有勃朗特三姐妹(three Bront sisters)、簡奧斯汀(Jane Austen)、伊麗莎白布朗寧(Elizabeth Browning)、濟慈(Keats)、拜倫(Byron)、柯勒律治(Coleridge)、劉易斯卡羅爾(Lewis Carroll)、喬治艾略特(George Eliot)、TS艾略特(TS Eliot)的紀念碑。世上再沒有哪個地方收容着這麼多曾經極大地豐饒過這個世界的靈魂。

If the US is so “uncivilised” and unfit for living, why do you even visit or do business there

如果美國這麼“不文明”而且不適合居住，那爲何你還去那裏旅遊或做生意？

There are many uncivilised places which do not preclude my visiting or doing business with, because these are not mutually exclusive. Most cities in China are choked with pollution and ugliness, but I still travel there to visit and for business. In Middle America, I find a lot of customs and the behaviour of people, especially mass followers of evangelism, rather disturbing. The west and east coasts are full of intense and obstinate Americans, with Californians utterly intolerant of smokers and Noo Yawkers ruthlessly mercenary, and both over the top with political correctness. And US customs and immigration officials are known for their aggressiveness. I always try to take a little Valium before confronting them. Yet, I love all these differences and never mind being in the US as a tourist or businessman, if only to remind myself of the importance of diversity and absurdity.

有很多不文明的地方，但這並不妨礙我去那裏遊玩或公幹，因爲這並不矛盾。中國有很多城市都污染嚴重、市容醜陋，但我仍不時去那些地方造訪和出差。在美國中部，我發現那裏很多風俗和人們的舉止，尤其是衆多福音傳道的追隨者們，都讓人不勝其煩。東西海岸又滿是熱情又頑固的美國人，加州人對吸菸者一點都不能忍，紐約客們則生性冷漠惟利是圖，而這兩者在政治上卻又都過分正確。聽聞美國海關和移民局官員向來咄咄逼人。跟他們交鋒前我總要先服些安定。然而，我喜歡所有這些分歧也從不介意在美國做一名遊客或是商人，只要我提醒自己想一想多樣化和荒謬的重要性。