[2008.12.30]Go for big chests and slim waists 挑胸大腰细的

 
OPPORTUNITIES are sparse  for China’s small-time  speculators . So it was with a certain ebullience  that 7,000 residents of Wuhan recently gathered at the Orient Lucky City racecourse  to indulge in what the central leadership terms a “social evil”. They were the first people in mainland China to be given official approval to win money from horse races since the Communist Party outlawed gambling in 1949.

对中国的小额投资人来说，机会可谓是凤毛麟角。所以当七千武汉市民聚集在“东方马城”沉浸在被中央称为“社会痼疾”的活动中时，其情景是相当热烈。自1949年中共在大陆将赌博定为非法以来，他们是第一批经官方许可可以通过赛马赢钱的人。

To the disappointment of hardened  punters, depravity  was lacking. No gambling, as such, was allowed. Racegoers could pick a horse for nothing in two of the five races and, if it won, were awarded 20 lottery scratch cards, giving them the chance to win 30,000 yuan ($4,400). One lucky winner scooped 4,000 yuan; most won less than a taxi fare home. The big hitter s who had flown in from Sichuan could be heard cursing the impotence of their bulging wallets.

让那些铁杆儿赌徒感到失望的是，这并不是堕落，赌博同样不被允许。观众可以从五场比赛中的两场中选一匹马，如果这匹马赢了，奖品是20张彩票刮刮卡，这样他们就有机会赢得三万元奖金（USD4,400）。一个幸运儿“捞”到了4000元，大多数人赢的钱连打车回家都不够。那些从四川飞来的“大手笔”的投注人埋怨有钱没处花。

Tentative as it was, the race meeting in November was a significant move towards opening the country’s vast betting market. In the same month the World Poker Tour introduced Chinese poker, or Tuo La Ji, to television viewers. As the economy falters, the incentives for the government to trade ideology for profit are compelling. A Chinese researcher has claimed that a nationwide betting industry for horse racing would create 3m jobs and 40 billion yuan in tax revenues. And the government might also rescue some of the estimated $700 billion lost to illegal betting each year.

这场十一月举行的赛马会虽是实验性的，但却是中国庞大的博彩市场走向开放的重要一步。同月，世界扑克巡回赛向电视观众展示了中国扑克“拖拉机”的玩法。在经济不稳定的情况下，政府以意识形态换利润的动机尤为明显。一位中国专家宣称，一个全国范围的博彩业，仅赛马一项，就能创造三百万个就业机会和四百亿元的税收。政府还可挽回每年因非法赌博造成的约七千亿元的损失。

But the Communist Party’s conservative factions will need persuading. They regard horse-race betting as immoral for the masses, a challenge to social stability and a throwback to colonialism: British merchants plying  the Yangzi River set up racing in Wuhan in the early 1900s.

但中共的保守派却需要说服。他们认为对民众来说，赛马博彩是有失道德水准的，并且威胁社会稳定，是向殖民主义的倒退：因为在二十世纪初期，在长江上往来的英国商人曾在武汉组织过赛马。

Wuhan’s new racing crowd has been converted. One spectator, a teacher-turned-entrepreneur, trotted out a bit of wisdom from Deng Xiaoping to dismiss the morality debate: “No matter if it is a white cat or a black cat; as long as it can catch mice, it is a good cat.” Others enthusiastically followed the advice of the course commentator who compared picking a winning horse to finding a pretty woman (“Look for a big chest and slim waist”).

在武汉，新的马迷群体已经形成。一位观众引用邓小平的至理名言来消除道德上的争议：“不论黑猫白猫，抓到耗子就是好猫”，这位观众曾经是名老师，后来“下海”。其他人则热捧场地解说员的建议，他将挑选冠军马比作找靓妹（“挑胸大腰细的”）

The racecourse operator, Orient Lucky Horse Group, owned by Jacky Wu, a Hong Kong businessman, enjoys rare central-government backing—the vice-minister of sports opened the meeting—but is terrified by government fickleness. With a stud farm and a training facility under construction, Mr Wu has a lot to lose (as do the 93 students who are studying for a degree in horse racing at a local university). The group has seen racing operations shut down in the past as unauthorised betting went too far, notably in Beijing in 2005. Caution is now its prime policy.

马场的运营商是东方神马集团，由香港商人Jacky 吴所有，中央政府也难得支持，体委副主任宣布赛会开幕，但运营商还是对政府的喜怒无常倍感忧虑。一座种马场和训练设施正在兴建当中，如果出问题，吴先生将损失惨重（93名在地方大学学习赛马专业的学生也同命相连）。2005年集团的赛马生意曾经被叫停，原因是未经许可的博彩活动太过猖獗，引起了北京的注意。运营商当前的首要策略是保持警惕。