World Map 1500s
《人类简史》中提到，五百年前的第一版世界地图只有一半是有绘图的，另外一半却是空白。
空白是无知，无知是 “我不知道那里有什么”。无知让人想去看看，让探险家们跨越大洋，发现新大陆，无知让人们不厌其烦的去寻求。
无知使人饥渴，饥渴使人贪婪，贪婪铺垫了世界。
一. Intro
最近看了很多关于学习的视频，其中反响最深的就是本文中想和大家分享的一个前美利坚合众国总统在弗吉尼亚州阿灵顿县韦克菲尔德高中发表的一次开学演讲。
这位总统曾被评为近现代最亲民的总统之一，也是被川普大帝踢出White House（白宫）的第一位 black president （黑人总统）。（引用自我们大名鼎鼎的说唱歌手狗哥Snopp Dogg在一场脱口秀中对川普说的话，“It is not the first time you kick a black person out of his home”意指川普经常会把黑人从他们住宅赶出去，同样在试图抨击种族歧视）
为什么要引用这篇演讲呢？
因为这不单单是一篇学习英语的好素材，更是一个有鸡皮疙瘩的演讲。是一个态度，一个人生观。因为我坚信，不论身在校园或已踏入社会，学习是毕生的功课，我们也一生都是学生。
先附一张经典的
“Me and America don't talk no more"
(这里america表示一个女孩，是一个黑人女性可能会用的名字；同指奥巴马总统不再继续担任美国总统一职。）
灰常坏，有点帅
（图片 Pinterest)
入场好像走错了，再来一遍。
严肃的威容，坚定的眼神
大气沉稳撩倒大江南北
(图片 Nerdy Wonka)
那配这张图下面这段，自然才是本文重点，希望分享给你们每个人。
“你现在在哪里并不会决定你之后去哪里。没有人决定你的命运，因为你会书写你自己的命运，你会创造你自己的未来。这也是所有年轻人正在做的事情。”——奥巴马
(p.s 感兴趣的同学下面留言或者私信我，想听听读后感，想砸鸡蛋扔西红柿的也请往我脸上摔)
二. 演讲全文（没兴趣学习原文的可下滑大概3秒钟抵达译文）：
Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming the President of the United States of America, Barack Obama.
( Applause and cheering 掌声非常热烈 )
( 奥巴马接过演讲席~，咳咳，注意了，班主任有话说 )
Oh hello everybody, thank you, thank you, thank you everybody. All right, everybody go ahead and have a seat. How's everybody doing today? How about Tim Spicer? I am here with students at Wakefield High School in Arlington Virginia and we've got students tuning in from all across America from kindergarten through twelfth grade. I am just so glad that all could join us today and I want to thank Wakefield for being such an outstanding host. Give yourselves a big round of applause.
Now I know that for many of you today is the first day of school. And for those of you in kindergarten or starting middle or high school, it's your first day in a new school so it's understandable if you're a little nervous. I imagine there are some seniors out there who are feeling pretty good right now we've just one more year to go. And no matter what grade you're in, some of you are probably wishing it were still summer, and you could have stayed in bed just a little bit longer this morning. I know that feeling.
When I was young, my family lived overseas. I lived in Indonesia for a few years. My mother, she didn't have the money to send me where all the American kids went to school, but she thought it was important for me to keep up with an American education, so she decided to teach me extra lessons herself Monday through Friday. But because she had to go to work, the only time she could do it was at 4:30 in the morning. Now as you might imagine, I wasn't too happy about getting up that early. A lot of times I'd fall asleep right there at the kitchen table but whenever I complain, my mother would just give me one of those looks, and she'd say this is no picnic for me either buster.
So, I know that some of you are still adjusting to being back at school but I'm here today because I have something important to discuss with you. I'm here because I want to talk with you about your education and what's expected of all of you in this new school year. I've given a lot of speeches about education and I've talked about responsibilities a lot. I've talked about teacher’s responsibility for inspiring students and pushing you to learn; I talked about your parents responsibility for making sure you stay on track and you get your homework done and don't spend every waking hour in front of the TV or with the Xbox; I've talked a lot about your government's responsibility for setting high standards and supporting teachers and principals and turning around schools that aren't working where students aren't getting the opportunities that they deserve. But at the end of the day, we can have the most dedicated teachers, the most supportive parents, the best schools in the world, and none of it will make a difference, none of it will matter unless all of you fulfill your responsibilities, unless you show up to those schools, unless you pay attention to those teachers, unless you listen to your parents and grandparents and other adults and put in the hard work it takes to succeed. That's what I want to focus on today, the responsibility each of you has for your education.
I want to start with the responsibility you have to yourself. Every single one of you has something that you're good at, every single one of you has something to offer, and you have a responsibility to yourself to discover what that is. That's the opportunity an education can provide.
Maybe you could be a great writer, maybe even good enough to write a book or articles in a newspaper but you might not know it until you write that English paper that English class paper that's assigned to you. Maybe you could be an innovator or an inventor, maybe even good enough to come up with the next iPhone or the new medicine or vaccine, but you might not know it until you do your project for your science class. Maybe you could be a mayor or a senator or a Supreme Court justice, but you might not know that until you join student government or the debate team. And no matter what you want to do with your life, I guarantee that you'll need an educationto do it. You want to be a doctor or a teacher or a police officer, you want to be a nurse or an architect, a lawyer, or a member of our military, you're going to need a good education for every single one of those careers. You cannot drop out of school and just drop into a good job. You've got to train for it, and work for it, and learn for it. And this isn't just important for your own life in your own future. What you make of your education will decide nothing less than the future of this country. The future of America depends on you. What you're learning in school today will determine whether we as a nation, can meet our greatest challenges in the future.
You'll need the knowledge and problem-solving skills you learn in science and math to cure diseases like cancer and AIDS,and to develop new energy technologies and protect our environment. You'll need the insights and critical thinking skills you gained in history and social studies to fight poverty and homelessness crime and discrimination and make our nation more fair and more free. You'll need the creativity and ingenuity you develop in all your classes to build new companies. They'll create new jobs and boost our economy. We need every single one of you to develop your talents and your skills and your intellect, so you can help us hold folks of our most difficult problems. If you don't do that, if you quit on school, you're not just quitting on yourself, you're quitting on your country.
I know it's not always easy to do well in school. I know a lot of you have challenges in your lives right now, they can make it hard to focus on your schoolwork. I get it, I know what it's like. My father left my family when I was 2 years old. I was raised by a single mom who had to work, and who struggled at times to pay the bills and wasn't always able to give us the things that other kids had. There were times when I miss having a father in my life. There were times when I was lonely, and I felt like I didn't fit in, so I wasn't always as focused as I should have been on school, and I did some things that I'm not proud of, and I got in more trouble than I should have, and my life could have easily taken a turn for the worse.
But I was I was lucky. I got a lot of second chances, and I had the opportunity to go to college in law school and follow my dreams. My wife, our First Lady Michelle Obama, she has a similar story. Neither of her parents had gone to college. They didn't have a lot of money, but they worked hard and she worked hard so that she could go to the best schools in this country.
Some of you might not have those advantages. Maybe you don't have adults in your life who give you the support that you need. Maybe someone in your family has lost their job and there's not enough money to go around. Maybe you live in a neighborhood where you don't feel safe or have friends who are pressuring you to do things you know aren't right. But at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life, what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you've got going on at home, none of that is an excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude in school. That's no excuse for talking back to your teacher or cutting class or dropping out of school. There is no excuse for not trying.
Where you are right now doesn't have to determine where you'll end up. No one's written your destiny for you because here in America, you write your own destiny, you make your own future. That's what young people like you are doing every day all across America.
Young people like Jazmin Perez from Roma Texas, Jazmin didn’t speak English when she first started school, neither of her parents had gone to college but she worked hard earned good grades and got a scholarship to Brown University, as now in graduate school studying public health on her way to becoming dr. Jazmin Perez. I'm thinking about and Donny Schultz from Los Altos California, who's fought brain cancer since he was three. he's had to endure all sorts of treatments and surgeries, one of which affected his memory, so it took him much longer hundreds of extra hours to do his score, but he never fell behind. he's headed to college this fall. and then there's Chantel Steve from my hometown of Chicago Illinois. Even when bouncing from foster home to foster home in the toughest neighborhoods in the city, she managed to get a job at a local health-care center, start a program to keep young people out of gangs and she's on track to graduate high school with honors and go on to college.
But whatever you resolve to do, I want you to commit to it. I want you to really work at it. I know that sometimes you get that sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work. That your ticket to success is through rapping or basketball or being a reality TV star. Chances are you're not going to be any of those things.
The truth is that being successful is hard. You won't love every subject that you study. you won't click with every teacher that you have. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right at this minute. And you won't necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try. That's okay.
Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who've had the most failures. JK Rowling - who wrote Harry Potter- her first Harry Potter book was rejected 12 times before was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team. He lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career, but he once said, “I have failed over and over and over again in my life, and that's why I succeed."
These people succeeded because they understood that you can't let your failures define you, you have to let your failures teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently the next time. So if you get into trouble, that doesn’t mean you're a troublemaker, it means you need to try harder to act right. If you get a bad grade, that doesn't mean you're stupid, it just means you need to spend more time studying. No one's born being good at all things. you become good at things through hard work. You're not a varsity athlete the first time you play a new sport. You don't hit every note the first time you sing a song. You've got to practice.
The same principle applies to your school. You might have to do a math problem a few times before you get it right. You might have to read something a few times before you understand it. You definitely have to do a few drafts of a paper before it's good enough to hand in.
Don't be afraid to ask questions. Don't be afraid to ask for help when you need it. I do that every day. Asking for help isn't a sign of weakness, it's a sign of strength because it shows you have the courage to admit when you don't know something and that then allows you to learn something new. So, find an adult that you trust, a parent, a grandparent, or a teacher a coach or a counselor and ask them to help you stay on track to meet your goals and even when you’re struggling, even when you're discouraged, and you feel like other people have given up on you, don't ever give up on yourself because when you give up on yourself, you give up on your country.
The story of America isn't about people who quit when things got tough. It's about people who kept going, who tried harder, who loved their country too much to do anything less than their best.
三. 演讲全译
正式演讲前，荣誉学生先进行了一番介绍，领导要来，体面~
大家早上好，开始之前我希望先给予 abcde和opq和wxy（原谅我的懒惰） 各位领导热烈欢迎，当然我也并没有忘记我的各位同窗们，也欢迎你们的到来。
我非常荣幸的作为荣誉学生代表发言。在过去的三年里，我充分的利用好了学校给予的机会，在学术和课外社会活动上展现了自己。在我印象中，曾经有位教授为我的写作感到失望，并挑战我做的更好。也因此我被重新分班。在那次经历之后，我决定重新做人，并且充分发挥。我想让大家知道的是，在得到优秀的教育的同时，我们应该对我们自己的未来负责任。
女士们，先生们，请和我一起欢迎美利坚合众国总统巴拉克·奥巴马。
掌声响起来，奥巴马走上演讲台
嗨，大家好！你们今天过得怎么样？我现在和弗吉尼亚州阿林顿郡韦克菲尔德高中的学生们在一起，全国各地也有从幼儿园到高三的众多学生们通过电视关注这里，我很高兴你们能共同分享这一时刻。非常感谢给我这个机会为你们演讲，也非常感谢所有人的参与。请给你们自己一个热烈的掌声。
我知道，对你们中的许多人来说，今天是开学的第一天，你们之中有很多刚刚进入幼儿园或升上初高中，对你们来说，这是在新学校的第一天，你们有些紧张是可以理解的。我想也会有许多毕业班的学生们正自信满满地准备最后一年的冲刺。当然，无论你在读哪个年级，你们当中许多人一定还在希望现在还是放假，或者今天不用那么早起床。我可以理解你们这份心情。
小时候，我家在印度尼西亚住过几年。我妈妈没钱送我去其他美国孩子们上学的地方去读书，所以她决定她自己给我上课，时间是每周一到周五。由于她要工作和照料家务，我们每天上课时间就定在了凌晨4点半。显然，我不喜欢那个点起来上课。所以很多时候，我便会在厨房的桌子上睡着。每当我抱怨的时候，我妈都会用同一副厌烦的表情看着我说：“我也不喜欢这样，你最好乖乖的老实点”
所以，我理解你们中的许多人对于开学还需要时间来调整和适应，但今天我站在这里，是为了和你们谈一些更重要的事情。我要和你们谈一谈你们每个人的教育，以及在新的学年里，你们应当做些什么。我做过许多关于教育的讲话，也常常用到“责任”这个词。我谈到过教师们有责任激励你们，督促你们学习。我谈到过家长们的责任是监督你们认真学习并且完成作业，不要没日没夜的坐在电视前或打XBOX。我也很多次谈到过政府的责任是设定较高的标准和要求来协助老师和校长们的工作，并且改变在有些学校里学生得不到应有学习机会的一些问题。但哪怕这一切都达到最好，哪怕我们有最尽职的教师、最好的家长和最优秀的学校，如果你们不去履行自己的责任的话，那么这一切都是白扯。除非你每天准时去上学、认真听讲，除非你将父母和长辈说的话放在心上，除非你肯付出成功所必需的努力，否则这一切都会失去意义。而这就是我今天要讲的主题：你们每一个人在对自己教育中应有的责任。
首先，我想谈谈你们对于自己有什么责任。你们中的每一个人都会有自己擅长的东西，每一个人都是有用之材，而发现自己的才能是什么，就是你们要对自己担起的责任。教育，则为你们提供了发现自己才能的机会。
或许你能写出朗朗上口的文章，优美的文字并刊登在书籍和报刊上，但假如你事先并没有在英语课上练习写作，你可能并不会发现自己有这样的天赋；或许你能成为一个发明家，设计出像iPhone一样的产品，或研制出新的药物与疫苗，但假如你不在自然科学课程上做上几次实验，你不会知道自己有这样的天赋；或许你能成为一名议员或最高法院法官，但假如你不去加入学生会或参加几次辩论赛，你也不会发现自己的才能。而且，我可以向你保证，不管你将来想要做什么，你都需要相应的教育。你想当名医生、当名教师或当名警官？你想成为护士、成为建筑设计师、律师或军人？无论你选择哪一种职业，良好的教育都必不可少，这世上不存在不奋斗就能有好工作的美梦，任何事情都需要你的汗水、训练与学习。不仅仅对于你们个人的未来有重要意义，你们的教育如何也会对这个国家、乃至世界的未来产生重要影响。今天你们在学校中学习的内容，将会决定我们整个国家在未来迎接重大挑战时的表现。你们需要在数理科学课程上学习的知识和技能，去治疗癌症、艾滋那样的疾病，和解决我们面临的能源问题与环境问题；你们需要在历史社科课程上培养出的观察力与判断力，来减轻和消除无家可归与贫困、犯罪问题和各种歧视，让这个国家变得更加公平和自由；你们需要在各类课程中逐渐累积和发展出来的创新意识和思维，去创业和建立新的公司与企业，来制造就业机会和推动经济的增长。我们需要你们中的每一个人都培养和发展自己的天赋、技能和才智，来解决我们所面对的最困难的问题。假如你不这么做——假如你放弃学习——那么你不仅是放弃了自己，也是放弃了你的国家。
当然，我明白，读好书并不总是件容易的事。我知道你们中的许多人在生活中面临着各种各样的问题，很难把精力集中在专心读书之上。我知道你们的感受。我父亲在我两岁时就离开了家庭，是母亲一人将我们拉扯大，有时她付不起帐单，有时我们得不到其他孩子们都有的东西，有时我会想，假如父亲在该多好，有时我会感到孤独无助，与周围的环境格格不入。因此我并不总是能专心学习，我做过许多自己觉得丢脸的事情，也惹出过许多不该惹的麻烦，我的生活岌岌可危，随时可能急转直下。但我很幸运。我在许多事上都得到了重来的机会，我得到了去大学读法学院、实现自己梦想的机会。我的妻子——现在得叫她第一夫人米歇尔了——也有着相似的人生故事，她的父母都没读过大学，也没有什么财产，但他们和她都辛勤工作，好让她有机会去这个国家最优秀的学校读书。你们中有些人可能没有这些有利条件，或许你的生活中没有能为你提供帮助和支持的长辈，或许你的某个家长没有工作、经济拮据，或许你住的社区不那么安全，或许你认识一些会对你产生不良影响的朋友，等等。但归根结底，你的生活状况，你的背景都不是疏忽学业和态度恶劣的借口，这些不是你去跟老师顶嘴、逃课、或是辍学的借口，这些不是你不好好读书的借口。
你现在在哪里并不会决定你之后去哪里。没有人决定你的命运，因为你会书写你自己的命运，你会创造你自己的未来。这也是所有年轻人正在做的事情。
德克萨斯州罗马市的Jazmin Perez，刚进学校时，她根本不会说英语，她住的地方几乎没人上过大学，她的父母也没有受过高等教育，但她努力学习，取得了优异的成绩，靠奖学金进入了布朗大学，如今正在攻读公共卫生专业的博士学位。我还想起了加利福尼亚州洛斯拉图斯市的安多尼，他从三岁起就开始与脑癌病魔做斗争，他熬过了一次次治疗与手术。这自然影响了他的记忆，因此他得花出比常人多几百个小时的时间来完成学业，但他从不曾落下自己的功课。这个秋天，他要开始在大学读书了。又比如在我的家乡，伊利诺斯州芝加哥市，身为孤儿的 Shantell 换过多次收养家庭，从小在治安很差的地区长大，但她努力争取到了在当地保健站工作的机会、发起了一个让青少年远离犯罪团伙的项目，很快，她也将以优异的成绩从中学毕业，去大学深造。贾斯敏、安多尼和香特尔与你们并没有什么不同。
和你们一样，他们也在生活中遭遇各种各样的困难与问题，甚至可能比你们更糟糕。但他们拒绝放弃，他们选择为自己的教育担起责任、给自己定下奋斗的目标。我希望你们中的每一个人，都能做得到这些。因此，在今天，我号召你们每一个人都为自己的教育定下一个目标。并在之后，尽自己的一切努力去实现它。你的目标可以很简单，像是完成作业、认真听讲或每天阅读——或许你打算参加一些课外活动，或在社区做些志愿工作；或许你决定为那些因为长相或出身等等原因而受嘲弄或欺负的孩子做主、维护他们的权益，因为你和我一样，认为每个孩子都应该能有一个安全的学习环境；或许你认为该学着更好的照顾自己，来为将来的学习做准备……当然，除此之外，我希望你们都多多洗手、感到身体不舒服的时候要多在家休息，免得大家在秋冬感冒高发季节都得流感。
不管你决定做什么，我都希望你能坚持到底，希望你能真的下定决心。我知道有些时候，电视上的节目会让你产生这样错觉，似乎你不需要付出多大的努力就能名利双收，你会认为只要在街头当个rapper、打篮球或参加真人秀节目就能坐享其成，但现实往往是你没有可能走上其中任何一条道路。
因为，成功很难。你不可能对要读的每门课程都兴趣盎然，你不可能和每名带课教师都相处顺利，你也不可能每次都遇上看起来和现实生活有关的作业。而且，并不是每件事，你都能在头一次尝试时获得成功。That's okay.
在这个世界上，最成功的人们往往也经历过最多的失败。J.K.罗琳的第一本《哈利·波特》被出版商拒绝了十二次才最终出版；迈克尔·乔丹上高中时被学校的篮球队刷了下来，在他的职业生涯里，他输了几百场比赛、投失过几千次射篮，知道他是怎么说的吗？“我一生不停地失败、失败再失败，这就是我现在成功的原因。”
他们的成功，源于他们明白人不能让失败左右自己，而是要从中吸取经验。从失败中，你可以明白下一次自己可以做出怎样的改变。假如你惹了什么麻烦，那并不说明你坏，而是在告诉你，在将来要对自己有更严格的要求。假如你没考好，那并不说明你就比别人差，而是在告诉你，你们得在学习上花更多的时间。没有哪一个人一生出来就擅长做什么事情的，只有努力才能培养出技能。任何人都不是在第一次接触一项体育运动时就成为校队的代表，任何人都不是在第一次唱一首歌时就找准每一个音，一切都需要熟能生巧。
对于学业也是一样，你或许要反复运算才能解出一道数学题的正确答案，你或许需要读一段文字好几遍才能理解它的意思，你或许得把论文改上好几次才能符合提交的标准。这都是很正常的。
不要害怕提问，不要不敢向他人求助。我每天都在这么问问题。求助并不是软弱的表现，恰恰相反，它说明你有勇气承认自己的无知，并愿意去学习新的知识。你要记住，哪怕你表现不好、哪怕你失去信心、哪怕你觉得身边的人都已经放弃了你，永远不要自己放弃自己。因为当你放弃自己的时候，你也放弃了自己的国家。
因此我希望你们在今年能够认真起来，我希望你们尽心地去做自己着手的每一件事，我希望你们每一个人都有所成就。请不要让我们失望，不要让你的家人、你的国家和你自己失望。你们要成为我们骄傲，我知道，你们一定可以做到。
成功是再难也不放弃。
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