袁家庄村——南湖紫天鹅大酒店

今日徒步： 13.23 英里 / 21.30 公里

累计徒步： 105.07 英里 / 169.10 公里

今日捐款： 12,199.99元

累计捐款： 65,109.99元

“逆境乃前进之母。”

——圣雄甘地（印度民族解放运动领导人、和平倡导者）

1976年7月28日凌晨3点42分，唐山这座工业城市发生了里氏7.6级大地震。正在床上熟睡的人们被倒塌的房屋掩埋。这场骇人听闻的大地震造成240,000人丧生，160,000人受伤，其中许多人伤势严重。1976年的唐山大地震是历史上最具毁灭性的自然灾害之一。

然而，当我们徒步穿过这座城市时，那个致命的夜晚似乎并没有留下一丝伤痕。唐山是一座充满活力的现代化城市，为中国的工业发展提供坚强后盾，也为中国成为世界工业强国奠定了有力基础。这在很多方面让我联想起了我在英格兰东北部的家乡，煤炭、钢铁蓬勃发展，它也是铁路的发源地。唐山是中国最大的钢铁生产基地，这里的人民坚强而友好。

我们在唐山市郊的韩城镇开始徒步，这里与G25长深高速相连，我们首先步行来到了超现代化的唐山火车站。在过去和现在，铁路在唐山城市的发展过程中扮演了的重要的角色。它是中国第二条蒸汽铁路的故乡，启用于1881年，也是第一个使用标准轨距铁路的城市。它逐渐发展成了华北地区最大的铁路网。唐山与英国也有着奇妙的联系，因为英国工程师克劳德·威廉·金达先生帮助设计和建造了第一台蒸汽机车，被称为“中国火箭”。

如今，中国中车（CRRC）也落户于唐山，是世界上最大的铁路机车生产商。目前有一条连接北京和唐山的超高速新铁路正在建造中，它将两地的距离缩短在一个小时以内。此外正在造一条唐山连接比利时安特卫普的新铁路干线，货物海运需要45天时间，通过铁路运输仅需16天。唐山是一座充满活力和自信的城市，从地震中浴火重生，令人折服。

我们沿着南新道一路走来，穿过市中心，然后到达唐山地震纪念馆。雪琳和我看过一部由中国导演冯小刚执导的关于这座英雄城市的电影《唐山大地震》（2010）。上议院的一位同事大卫·普特南勋爵向我们推荐了这部电影，他是英国非常著名的电影制片人，他的《烈火战车》等十几部影片获得奥斯卡奖，他向我们强烈推荐这部电影，认为这是他看过的最好的影片之一。

那年的唐山大地震时，雪琳生活在杭州，虽然年幼，学校的老师动员学生及家长们贡献出家里用不着的衣物和毯子，捐献给唐山灾区人民，那感人的情景雪琳历历在目。虽然我们对那段历史有所了解，但是一看到纪念碑我们目瞪口呆—已经知道的每个遇难者名字被深深刻在了上面，面对它，心理虽然有所准备，但是我们对地震造成的财产损失和人员伤亡还是震惊不已。有一个统计数字实在让人难以接受，大约有7000个家庭无人幸免。在1976年的中国，由于物资匮乏，几代人住在一起很常见，这就意味着7000个大家庭的彻底毁灭。

纪念馆布置得非常细致到位，让人们深刻了解当时的恶劣灾情，以及中国各地的人们如何迅速做出反应，前来支援，寻找失踪者、埋葬逝者和照顾伤者。在许多令人惊讶的灾后重建行动里，有一件事不得不提：煤矿开采在地震发生10天后就重新复工，而当时较小的余震仍时有发生。我曾经在英国东北的煤矿下过井，根本无法想象在这种情况下沿着狭窄的井道进入黑暗的井底需要的何等勇气。

地震纪念馆逐渐把思绪从过去那个遭遇灭顶之灾的夜晚带回了现在这个充满活力的城市。纪念馆很多展示的东西向我们解释了这样的过程，比如：“如果没有这些痛苦的经历，我们怎样能获得重生的信心和坚强的翅膀再次翱翔于天空”。这也展现了中国人民在面对困难时特有的乐观态度，他们没有怨天尤人，而是积极投身重建工作，获得重生——他们没有因为伤痛裹足不前，而是选择面对逆境，越战越勇。

唐山精神在最后一块石碑上得到淋漓尽致地展现：“这座城市通过无私奉献、团队合作、坚韧不屈得以重生，从此以后，唐山精神就意味着这些高尚品质。”我们到此祭奠逝去的生命也赞叹如今英雄的唐山人民，希望在今后的徒步旅程中，“唐山精神”能激励和伴随我们走得更远。

原文 / 麦克·贝茨勋爵

翻译 / 杨梦

翻译校对 / 陈必萍

微信编辑 / 李璟瑶

总校对 / 李熙琳、雪琳

贝茨勋爵日志英文原文如下：

Walked: 16.59 miles

Total: 91.83 miles

Today raised: ¥ 12,199.99

Total raised: ¥ 65,109.99

"Adversity is the mother of progress."

——Mahatma Gandhi (activist for peace and Indian independence from British rule)

At 3:42am on the morning of 28 July 1976 a massive 7.6 magnitude earthquake struck the industrial city of Tangshan. Homes collapsed with people asleep in their beds. 240,000 people lost their lives and 160,000 were injured many of them seriously. It was one of the most devastating natural disasters his history.

Yet as we walked through the city it bore few of the scars of that fateful night. It is a vibrant modern city. An industrial powerhouse for China but also for the world. It reminded me in many ways of my home region in the North East of England whose prosperity was built on coal production, steel production and the birthplace of the railway. Tangshan is China's largest steel producing city. Its people are tough but friendly.

We began our walk at Hanchenzheng a suburb of Tangshan where it connects with the G25 and walked first to the ultra modern Tangshan Railway Station. Railways have an important part in Tangshan's story past and present. It was home to the second steam railway in China, opened in 1881, and the first to use the standard gage. It grew into the great Imperial Railroad of North China. There is a fascinating connection with Britain too as it was a British engineer--C.W.Kinder who helped design and build the first steam locomotive 'The Rocket of China'.

Today Tangshan is home to CRRC the largest rail rollingstock manufacturer in the world. There is a major new superfast high speed rai line under construction connection Tangshan to Beijing in under an hour. There is even a new rail connection all the way to Antwerp in Belgium which cuts the transport time for goods down from 45 days by sea to 16 days. This is a vibrant and confident city which has literally risen from the ashes of the destruction of the earthquake.

We walked along Nanxin Road and through the city centre before turning down towards the Tangshan Earthquake Memorial Museum. Xuelin and I had watched a powerful movie about the earthquake called 'Aftershock' (2010) by the Chinese director Feng Xiaogang. It had been recommended to us by a colleague in the House of Lords--Lord David Puttnam himself a great Academy Award (Oscar) winning film producer 9Chariots of Fire) who recommended it to us as one the best films he had ever seen.

Xuelin was of course very aware of the earthquake growing up in Hangzhou where they gathered clothing and blankets to send to the city. So we knew something of what had happened but nothing prepared us for the sight of the great memorial--a wall almost as far as you could see with every known victims name etched into the marble. We were stunned by the magnitude of the loss. One statistic was difficult to comprehend and that was that 7000 families had been competed wiped out by the disaster with no know survivors. China was very poor at that time and it was normal for multiple generations to be sharing one property.

The memorial museum is sensitively arranged with detail and insight as to not only what happened but how people responded and came to help search for the missing, bury the dead and care for the living. Among the many amazing facts were that the coal mines re-opened just 10 days after the earthquake struck and whilst smaller aftershocks were still taking place. I have been down coal mines in the North East and I can't imagine the courage required to travel down the narrow shafts into the dark in such circumstances.

Gradually though the memorial museum takes you from the past through to the present and the emergence from the destruction of a very successful and dynamic city. There were display signs explaining the transition such as 'How could we obtain the rebirth confidence and the strong wings to fly without these painful experiences.' It is indicative of the characteristic optimism with which the Chinese approach difficulties, they chose not to devote their energies to assigning blame but to rebuilding better--not to focussing on victimhood but to celebrating victory over adverse circumstances.

This spirit was captured in the final sign which read: 'The city was rebuilt through selflessness, teamwork, toughness an perseverance and from this time forward these qualities were known at the Tangshan Spirit.' We came to honour the past suffering but also to marvel at the resilience of the people of Tangshan and hopefully left for the remainder of our walk strengthened by that 'Tangshan Spirit.'

来源：贝茨勋爵

投稿：职教城宣传部

制作：李璟瑶

责编：李  倩