和全世界第二噁心的旅遊景點說再見

William Ward sells a lot of gum. He works at a newspaper stand just around the corner from a bizarre attraction called the gum wall near Pike Place Market just off the waterfront here, and people show up unprepared. He also sells a lot of hand sanitizer.

威廉·沃德(William Ward)賣出了許多口香糖。他的報刊亭就在稀奇古怪的“口香糖牆”景點的拐角，位於河畔派克農貿市場(Pike Place Market)附近。人們來這通常都沒什麼準備。他同時也賣出了很多洗手液。

“I tell people it’s the second-most disgusting tourist attraction in the world,” Mr. Ward, 31, said. In his view, only the Blarney stone in Ireland, which millions of tourists actually kiss, can top the gum wall on the gross-out scale.

“我常跟人說這是全世界第二噁心的旅遊景點，”32歲的沃德說。在他看來，只有愛爾蘭的“親吻巧言石”(Blarney stone)能與之媲美，在那裏，成千上萬的旅客真的在現場親吻那塊石頭。相比之下，噁心規模可以勝過一籌。

But gum, in a dozen or so varieties — helped by the sign out front, “We sell gum!” — still flies off the shelves. In most cases, he said, the gum is destined for only the briefest of chews before commemoration or deposit or whatever it is that people do, usually with a photo, in making the wall one of this city’s strangest destinations.

但是因爲店前寫着“口香糖有售！”的招牌，十幾種口味的口香糖依然飛快地銷售一空。沃德說，通常這些口香糖的宿命，只是被飛快咀嚼幾下，然後成爲一種祭奠或存念，或是別的什麼東西——通常要拍張照片，把這座牆變成了城市裏最奇怪的一個地方。

Now, the gum is coming down, after accumulating for 20 years in a deeply encrusted pointillist display of perhaps a million pieces — and about 2,200 pounds of sugary, cavity-inducing weight that Pike Place officials say threatens the integrity of the 115-year-old brick wall. Crews on Tuesday morning started to remove the gum with garden rakes and superheated water, 260 degrees Fahrenheit, in a three-day display of industrial-strength dental hygiene.

20多年來，這幅彷彿出自點彩派畫家之手的斑斕傑作，在牆壁上結成了硬殼。現在，派克市場的管理人員認爲，這2200磅甜膩的、讓人覺得要蛀牙的重物，對這座擁有115年曆史的磚牆構成了安全威脅，應該被剷除。從週二早上起，工作人員開始用園用釘耙和260華氏度的過熱水清理口香糖。三天的清除，如同一場工業級的牙科清潔技術展示。

In the days before the cleaning, there was a rush of last-minute visits and gum-themed selfies. People like the Fergus family, visiting from Phoenix this week, even stopped at Costco before leaving home to load up on supplies for a visit.

在清理開始前，一大批想趕上末班車的遊客蜂擁而至，專程前來和口香糖牆熱烈合影。像這周從鳳凰城趕來的費格斯一家，甚至在出發前到好市多超市採購物資，爲此行做準備。

“Five packs, 15 sticks in each,” Christie Fergus said. She and her husband, Brian, and their two children, Michael, 8, and Rachel, 3, chewed their way through the arsenal at a stop at the wall on Monday afternoon, then spelled the family’s name in large bright green spearmint.

“五包，每包15條，”克里斯蒂·費格斯(Christie Fergus)說。她和丈夫布賴恩帶着兩個孩子——8歲的邁克爾和9歲的瑞切爾，在週一下午抵達前一路都嚼着口香糖。他們用薄荷味的口香糖，在牆上拼出自家碩大的姓氏。

“It was pretty disgusting, but also a really interesting and fun family activity,” said Ms. Fergus, a pharmacist. Michael, she said, gets credit for the family name idea.

“這真的挺噁心。但是作爲一項家庭娛樂，也很有趣，”職業是藥劑師的費格斯解釋道。她說拼出姓氏這個主意是孩子邁克爾想出來的。

Pike Place Market officials initially tried to protect the wall from gum after it began appearing there in the 1990s, added by people waiting to enter an improvisational comedy club. But after several cleanings, and the realization that mentions of the wall in tourist guidebooks like Frommer’s were spurring people on, they surrendered. A spokeswoman for the market, Emily Crawford, said she expected people would resume the practice the moment the wall was once again blank.

1990年代，排隊準備進入一家即興喜劇俱樂部的人們，隨手將口香糖黏在牆上，逐漸形成了這座口香糖牆。最開始，派克農貿市場的管理人員企圖保護牆壁。但經過數次清理，再加上像弗羅默旅行指南(Frommer’s)一樣的旅行手冊紛紛提到這堵口香糖牆，吸引了無數人前來參觀，讓管理人員放棄了繼續清理的想法。市場的發言人艾米莉·克勞福德(Emily Crawford)稱，她估計牆壁清理一空後，人們還會繼續來黏口香糖。

“It’s a crowdsourced piece of public art,” Ms. Crawford said. “We don’t need to promote it.”

“這是一件衆籌的公共藝術作品，”克勞福德稱。“我們不需要做宣傳。”

Chris Borgen, 31, a firefighter from a Seattle suburb who had never visited before, said he was prompted to come by his mother, who told him about the cleaning. He was there on Monday, holding up his son, Abbott, who is almost 2, for photos.

31歲的克里斯·博格斯(Chris Borgen)是來自西雅圖郊區的一名消防隊員。此前他從未參觀過這座牆壁。他說，是他母親告訴他現在的口香糖將被清除，催促他來看看。週一，他帶着兩歲的兒子艾伯特來到這裏，拍照留念。

Mr. Borgen said he imagined coming back for a kind of time-lapse series as the gum gradually comes back and Abbott grows up.

博格斯說，隨着日後牆壁上的口香糖重新多起來，艾伯特也慢慢長大，他打算帶兒子重返舊地，拍一些見證時光流逝的照片。

Donna Prust, a retired technology worker, was taking photos on Monday of Ed the Clam, a smiley-faced clamshell character that has become a kind of “Kilroy was here” figure for many people, who post pictures of him on his Facebook page. Ms. Prust, 68, who has taken photos of herself and the clam in various places around the world, pressed the figure into the gum, which was several inches thick in spots, then pasted on a blue bubble as though Ed was chewing bubble gum.

唐娜·普魯斯特(Donna Prust)是一名退休的技術人員，週一，她帶着她的卡通玩偶Ed the Clam來拍照。她的這個擺出笑臉的蛤殼卡通玩偶，就像“Kilroy到此一遊”的卡通形象一樣，很多人拿着它在各處拍照，再把照片發到Facebook上。68歲的普魯斯特曾經和Ed the Clam在全世界許多地方合影。這次，她把玩偶按進牆壁上的口香糖裏（牆壁上有幾處口香糖有幾英寸厚），還在牆壁上貼了一個藍色的泡泡，假裝是玩偶自己在吹口香糖。

“Hand sanitizer!” she said, rifling through her purse when the task was done.

等做完這一切，她一邊嚷着“洗手液”，一邊在手袋裏使勁翻找着。

Thanks to the scale of their gum deposit, and perhaps the gross-out factor as well, Ms. Fergus said the family’s visit to the wall had just about exhausted their desire for gum.

由於口香糖的量非常大，再加上確實也挺噁心，費格斯說全家此行後，算是徹底沒有嚼口香糖的慾望了。

“I think we will take a break from chewing gum for a while after that,” she said in a telephone interview as they prepared to head home.

“我覺得，這之後我們得有一陣子不嚼口香糖了，”當他們準備回家時，她在電話裏這麼說。