I’m an English teacher working in Russia， and for some reason I really don’t like that classroom topic “Talk about Your Family.” Perhaps it’s because everyone studied English from the same book at school. So all the students say: “My family consists of five members. Me， my mother， my father， my brother and my dog.” And so on. As if all families are exactly the same.

It’s such a shame， because our families are unique. All families have their stories， their dramas， their private jokes， nicknames and phrases. They’re the place where our personalities were made. How often have you heard someone with young children complain “Oh， no， I think I’m turning into my parents”?

The other day I found myself turning into one of my grandparents. I was trying to get my daughter (one year and eight months old) to eat her dinner and I said: “That’ll make your hair curl.” Now I don’t think that green vegetables give you curly hair， or even that curly hair is a great thing to have. It’s just a phrase I heard from my granddad a hundred times when I was small. It had stayed in my mind， half-forgotten， until the time I could use it myself. I wonder if he heard it from his own parents? How many other old-fashioned phrases like this stay inside families， when the rest of the world has forgotten them?

Shaking the Family Tree

Talk about your family? “Well…they’re just there.” we say. Our families are so ordinary to us that at times we think they’re boring. But this is far from the truth. Families are the most exotic things on earth. If you dig enough in your own family， you’re sure to come up with all the stuff you could want for a great novel. Surprising characters， and dramatic or funny stories passed down for generations. As 1)genealogists like to say， “Shake your family tree—and watch the nuts fall out.”

My mother started tracing our family tree a few years ago， not expecting to get far. But， digging in old records and libraries， she got back 300 years. She turned up old stories and a few mysteries. What happened to the big family farm? Where did the family fortune go in the 1870s? More to the point—where is it now?

I’m the traveller in my family， and I like to think I got it from a great-grandfather on my dad’s side. He was an adventurous soul. My two favourite family 2)heirlooms are a photo of him on a horse in a desert landscape (1897 in 3)Patagonia) and a postcard home from Portugal complaining that his boat was late because of the revolution in 4)Lisbon. “Dreadful business， they seem to have arrested the King，” he says. If you look at your family， you open a window in the past.

History in Miniature

Start someone talking about their family stories and they might never stop. You’ll find the whole history of your country there， too. When my mother， still putting the family tree together， asked me for a few names from my Russian wife’s family， my wife got on the phone to her own mother just to check a name or two. But they were still talking an hour later， and she’d filled five pages of A4 paper. And so I was introduced to: someone who lived through the siege of

5)Leningrad (but forgot how to read in the process)， a high official in the Communist Party and some rich relations who used to go to Switzerland for their holidays before the revolution. There was also a black sheep of the family (or “white crow” as they say in Russian) who left his wife and children and disappeared in the Civil War—though nobody in the family seemed impossibly exotic to me.

Who Wears the Trousers?

English is rich in idioms to talk about family life. We’ve mentioned the black sheep of the family—that’s someone who didn’t fit in， or caused a family scandal. If you’re loyal to your family， you can say “blood is thicker than water” or “keep it in the family”.

If you share a talent with another family member， you can say “it runs in the family.” You might have your father’s eyes or your

mother’s nose. If you’re like one of your parents， you can say “l(fā)ike father， like son” or you can be “a chip off the old block.”

Who wears the trousers in your family? (Who’s the head of your family?) You might affectionately talk about your bro， your sis or your 6)folks (parents). Or if you like 7)Cockney slang， what about “her indoors” or “the 8)missus” to talk about your wife?

If you want to get more technical， you can discuss the benefits of the nuclear family: a small family; just parents and children living in the same house. If grandparents or other relatives live there too， then you have an extended family. In English we talk about the average nuclear family with the phrase “2.4 children.”

Then there are idioms about children that have left the nest (family home) and gone on to have a life of their own. “You can’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs” means you can’t tell your elders anything they know already. But why would

anyone want to suck eggs anyway? Now here’s a really strange one: “Bob’s your uncle.” It means “the problem is solved.” But I’d love to know who the original Bob was， and why he was such a useful uncle to have.

我是一名在俄羅斯任教的英語(yǔ)教師。不知道為什么，我真的很不喜歡這么一個(gè)課堂討論話題——“談?wù)勀愕募彝ァ?。也許是因?yàn)槊總€(gè)人在學(xué)校里都是從同一本書(shū)里學(xué)的英文，所有學(xué)生都會(huì)描述說(shuō)，“我家有五個(gè)成員——我、媽媽、爸爸、弟弟和我的狗”等等。仿佛每個(gè)家庭都一個(gè)樣。

那樣的描述實(shí)在太讓人感到羞愧了，因?yàn)槲覀兠考颐繎舳际仟?dú)一無(wú)二的。所有家庭都有自己的故事、起落、不為人知的笑話、綽號(hào)和習(xí)語(yǔ)。家庭塑造了我們性格的方方面面。你是不是常聽(tīng)到那些初當(dāng)父母的人怨嘆道“哎呀，糟了，我都變我爸媽那個(gè)樣了”？

有一天，我發(fā)現(xiàn)自己開(kāi)始有點(diǎn)像我的祖父或祖母了。我在努力讓我女兒（一歲零八個(gè)月大）吃飯，我說(shuō)：“吃飯能讓你的頭發(fā)變卷?！逼鋵?shí)現(xiàn)在的我是不會(huì)認(rèn)為那些綠色蔬菜能使頭發(fā)變卷的，甚至也不覺(jué)得卷發(fā)有什么了不起的。那不過(guò)是我小時(shí)候從祖父那聽(tīng)了上百遍的一句話而已。它一直留在我腦海里，處于半被遺忘狀態(tài)，直到能派上用場(chǎng)時(shí)才被喚起。不知道祖父是否也是從他父母那兒聽(tīng)來(lái)的呢？有多少像這樣的老話，盡管被其他人遺忘，卻能在家族內(nèi)一代傳一代？

搖搖族譜大樹(shù)

談?wù)勀愕募彝?？“嗯……就是那個(gè)樣子”我們回答道。家對(duì)我們來(lái)說(shuō)是那么的平凡，有時(shí)我們會(huì)覺(jué)得自己的家很沉悶。但事實(shí)遠(yuǎn)非如此。家庭是地球上最奇特的東西。如果你對(duì)自己的家庭研究得夠深入，你肯定會(huì)找到一部偉大小說(shuō)需要的所有素材。出人意表的角色、跌宕起伏或妙趣橫生的故事代代相傳。就像系譜學(xué)家喜歡說(shuō)的那樣：“搖搖你家的族譜大樹(shù)——看它掉下滿地果實(shí)。”

我母親幾年前開(kāi)始研究我們的族譜，并不指望研究得很深入。然而，在舊記錄、書(shū)庫(kù)中埋頭翻查后，她了解到近300年的家族史，發(fā)現(xiàn)了不少老故事和一些神秘事件——家族的大農(nóng)場(chǎng)發(fā)生了什么事？19世紀(jì)70年代時(shí)的家族財(cái)產(chǎn)去哪了？問(wèn)得更直接一點(diǎn)——現(xiàn)在這些財(cái)產(chǎn)在哪兒？

我是家里最?lèi)?ài)旅行的，我總覺(jué)得這是從父親那邊家族，我的曾祖父那兒遺傳下來(lái)的。曾祖父有著一顆熱愛(ài)冒險(xiǎn)的心。我最喜歡的兩件傳家寶分別是一張他在荒野騎馬的相片（1897年攝于巴塔哥尼亞）和一張寄自葡萄牙的明信片，上面抱怨說(shuō)里斯本在鬧革命，所以他的班船晚點(diǎn)了。“真是可怕的事件，他們好像已經(jīng)逮捕了國(guó)王。”他寫(xiě)道。如果你好好看看自己的家族，就會(huì)打開(kāi)一扇通往過(guò)去的窗戶。

歷史縮影

讓某人講他們家的故事，很可能一開(kāi)了頭就停不下來(lái)了。從中，你還可以看到國(guó)家的整個(gè)歷史演變。母親在拼湊族譜時(shí)，問(wèn)我要我那俄羅斯妻子家里一些人的名字。我妻子打電話給她母親，只是想問(wèn)一兩個(gè)人名。但一個(gè)小時(shí)過(guò)去了，她們還在電話里聊著，最后妻子還做了5頁(yè)A4紙的記錄。雖然家族里沒(méi)什么讓我覺(jué)得奇特得讓人難以想象的人，但我還是知道了這么幾個(gè)人物：某個(gè)生活在整個(gè)列寧格勒被包圍時(shí)期的人（忘記他/她的名字怎么念了）；一個(gè)共產(chǎn)黨高官，一些在大革命前常去瑞士度假的富親戚；其中也有一只“黑羊（敗家子）”（俄羅斯語(yǔ)中稱(chēng)為“白烏鴉”），他撇下妻兒，在內(nèi)戰(zhàn)時(shí)期失蹤了。

誰(shuí)穿褲子？

英語(yǔ)里用于談?wù)摷彝サ牧?xí)語(yǔ)很豐富。我們已經(jīng)提到了家庭里的“black sheep（敗家子）”——就是那些在家里不合群或是令家族蒙羞的人。如果你忠于你的家庭，你可以說(shuō)“blood is thicker than water（血濃于水）”或者“keep it in the family（讓它成為家族秘密）”。如果你和另一個(gè)家庭成員有著同一種天賦，你可以說(shuō)“it runs in the family（一脈相承）”。你可能眼睛像父親的，鼻子像母親的。如果你長(zhǎng)得像父親或母親，你可以說(shuō)“l(fā)ike father， like son（有其父必有其子）”，或者說(shuō)你是“a chip off the old block（和他們一個(gè)模子印出來(lái)的）”。

Who wears the trousers in your family（你家誰(shuí)穿褲子？即“誰(shuí)是你家里的頭頭”）？你可能會(huì)親切地談?wù)撈鹉愕男值?、姐妹或你的親屬（父母）?；蛘呷绻阆矚g倫敦佬講的俚語(yǔ)，談?wù)撈鹉闫拮訒r(shí)，你可以用“her indoors（內(nèi)人）”或 “the missus（太太）”。

再要深入到一些術(shù)語(yǔ)的話，你可以討論“核心家庭”的好處，核心家庭即小家庭，只有父母和孩子居住在同一套房里的家庭。如果祖父母或其他親戚也一起住在那兒，那么你就有個(gè)大家庭。在英語(yǔ)中，我們用“2.4 children（2.4個(gè)孩子）”來(lái)描述一般的小家庭。

另外還有些習(xí)語(yǔ)，說(shuō)孩子離巢（家），去過(guò)屬于自己的生活?！癥ou can’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs（你不能教你祖母怎么吃雞蛋）”意思是別在長(zhǎng)輩面前班門(mén)弄斧。但為什么會(huì)說(shuō)“吃雞蛋”？接下來(lái)這才真是句奇怪的俗語(yǔ)：“Bob’s your uncle.（鮑勃是你的叔叔）”。它的意思是“問(wèn)題解決了?！钡俏业瓜胫雷畛醯哪莻€(gè)鮑勃是誰(shuí)，為什么那個(gè)叔叔如此有用。