澳大利亚的中国金主 矿业冲击波

PORT HEDLAND, Australia — A lanky, dark-haired surfer, Lee Meadowcroft modeled on the runways of London, Milan and Singapore, then followed his dream of going home to Australia to sell herbal medicines.

澳大利亚黑德兰港——身材瘦长、一头黑发的冲浪玩家李•梅多克罗夫特(Lee Meadowcroft)曾作为模特在伦敦、米兰和新加坡的伸展台上走秀，而后他为了实现梦想回到祖国澳大利亚，做起草药生意。

His store failed — he had chosen the wrong street, he says — and he lost almost all his savings.

他的店倒闭了——他说他不该选在那条街开店——他亏掉了几乎全部的积蓄。

By then, the fashion world had found fresher faces.

而时尚界在那时已经找到了更新鲜的面孔。

So like tens of thousands of other Australians, Mr Meadowcroft went to the mines.

于是，梅多克罗夫特和数万澳大利亚人一样，选择去煤矿工作。

It was late 2004.

那是2004年底。

He plowed his last $4,000 into a two-week course on how to operate a crane.

他上了一个为期两周的吊车操作培训班，把手头最后的4000美元交了学费。

He found companies so desperate for workers that they would send chauffeured cars to pick up prospective welders, electricians and crane operators and deliver them to the nearest airport for their flights to mining country, here on Australia’s remote northwestern coast.

他发现企业对工人极度渴求，以至于会派专车去接这些未来的焊工、电工和吊车操作员，把他们送到最近的机场，然后飞往矿场所在地，其中就包括这里，偏远的澳大利亚西北部沿海地区。

China back then was growing at a breathtaking pace and needed all the Australian rocks it could get.

当时的中国正在以令人惊叹的速度向前发展，希望得到澳大利亚的每一块矿石。

Mine workers like Mr Meadowcroft kept a punishing schedule: 13 consecutive days of 12-hour shifts, a day off, then another 13 consecutive days of 12-hour shifts.

像梅多克罗夫特这样的矿工要超负荷工作：连续工作13天，每天12小时，休息一天，然后再连续工作13天，每天12小时。

Mining fueled Australia’s surging exports to China, which at their peak reached nearly $100 Billion a year — a figure representing $4,300 for every man, woman and child in the country.

矿业推动了澳大利亚向中国出口的猛增，最高时达到一年将近1000亿美元——相当于全国男女老少每个人4300美元。

Resource-rich places around the world prospered thanks to China, and Mr Meadowcroft and his fellow Port Hedland equipment jockeys were no exception.

全球资源丰富的地方都借中国致富了，梅多克罗夫特和黑德兰港的其他设备操作员也不例外。

By 2011 he was earning $250,000 a year.

2011年他的年收入达到25万美元。

He watched idle miners sketch circles in the dust and place cockroaches inside, at times betting more than $100 on which one crawled out first.

他曾见到矿工们闲暇时在地上画个圈，把蟑螂放进去，赌哪只先爬出来，有时候赌注可达100美元以上。

One welder bought a Ferrari 308 sports car, quickly tired of it and sold raffle tickets for $1,000 apiece to get rid of it.

有一个焊工买了一辆法拉利308跑车，很快就厌倦了，于是办了一场1000美元一张票的抽奖把车处理掉。

Everyone just went crazy, Mr Meadowcroft said.

大家都很疯狂，梅多克罗夫特说。

The bust came just as hard and just as fast.

崩溃的到来同样是迅速而猛烈的。

China’s economic slowdown left too many mines to feed too many dormant Chinese steel mills.

中国的经济放缓导致太多的矿场在向太多已经停产的中国炼钢厂供应矿石。

Construction of new mines stopped.

新矿建设项目停工了。

Port Hedland’s economy slumped.

赫兰德港的经济陷入低谷。

Mr Meadowcroft lost his job, then lost a second job.

梅多克罗夫特丢了工作，而后下一份工作也丢了。

Like thousands of others, he went back home.

他和其他几万人一样，回到了家中。

Mr Meadowcroft’s tale could serve as yet another boom-and-bust cautionary tale of the limits of China’s rise.

梅多克罗夫特的经历，是有关中国崛起局限性的又一则盛衰寓言。

From Russia to Brazil, and Nigeria to Venezuela, resource-rich countries that boomed during China’s surge found their economies shaken when Chinese demand slowed.

从俄罗斯到巴西，从尼日利亚到委内瑞拉，随着中国崛起而繁荣的资源大国，也因中国需求放缓而遭到经济打击。

Except something unexpected has happened to Australia: It has withstood the global rout.

不过在澳大利亚发生了一些意想不到的事情：它没有被全球崩溃打倒。

Most mines — lower-cost compared with mines elsewhere — have stayed open.

这里的矿场成本比别的地方低，多数矿依然在作业。

But Australia has also kept thriving, against all expectations, with a different kind of money flowing in from China.

而澳大利亚的这种出人意料的持续繁荣，还因为有另一种完全不一样的资金正从中国流向这里。

Attracted by clean air, a strong education system and worries about China’s future, more Chinese are spending their money in Australia.

在清洁的空气、优质的教育系统吸引下，再加上对中国未来的担忧，越来越多的中国人正把钱花在澳大利亚。

Thousands of Chinese families have sent their children to study at costly Australian universities, and Australian food exports to China have boomed.

数以万计的中国家庭把子女送到昂贵的澳大利亚大学读书，澳大利亚向中国的食品出口也在猛增。

Chinese investment in Australian real estate has increased at least tenfold since 2010; Chinese investors have purchased up to half the new apartments in downtown Melbourne and Sydney.

中国在澳大利亚的房地产投资自2010年以来增加了至少10倍；在墨尔本和悉尼市中心的新住宅单位有近一半被中国投资者买下。

That has led to some soul-searching about the role of Chinese money in the country’s political and economic life.

这让一些人开始反思中国资金在这个国家的政治、经济生活中所扮演的角色。

Businesses linked to China have become sizable donors to Australian political parties, and a company said to have links to the Chinese military obtained a 99-year lease last year for a port next to a base that often houses United States Marines.

与中国有关联的企业向澳大利亚的政党做出了可观的捐献，一家据称与中国军方有关联的公司，去年拿到了一个港口的99年期租约，而港口就在一个经常驻扎着美国海军陆战队的基地附近。

But for people like Mr Meadowcroft and others in Western Australia who were cut loose by the mining slump, Chinese money is a blessing.

但是对梅多克罗夫特这样的人以及西澳大利亚州其他因矿业衰落而失去生计的人来说，中国的钱是一种赐福。

He now lives in the Western Australia capital city of Perth and works as an apprentice plumber in new housing developments aimed at Chinese buyers.

现在他住在西澳大利亚州首府珀斯，在一个瞄准中国买家的新住宅开发项目中做水管工学徒。

He earns just $21,000 a year, but that could double or triple when he finishes his apprenticeship.

他一年只能挣2.1万美元，不过出师之后，他的收入可能翻两三倍。

When visitors from China enter his construction site, he knows they may be the eventual buyers.

当中国游客进入他工作的建筑工地时，他知道，他们可能是最终的买家。

If you see a group of Chinese people, he says, they’re the money.

如果你见到一群中国人，他说，那你就是见到了金主。

The Color of Prosperity

繁荣的颜色

In Port Hedland, the color of money is pinkish red.

在黑德兰港(Port Hedland)，钱的颜色是粉红色的。

At the docks, the salmon-hued dust coats everything, from the yellow railings atop the cranes to the rims of the fast-moving conveyor belts that hurtle rocks toward the bellies of giant cargo vessels.

码头上所有的东西都蒙上了鲑鱼色的尘土，从起重机顶部的黄色栏杆到快速转动的传送带的边缘——传送带把岩石快速送入巨型货轮的肚子里。

When the mining boom started 50 years ago, it covered the streets, too.

50年前采矿业兴起时，这里的街头也蒙着这样的尘土。

It made all your clothes go pink, said Julie Arif, a city council member who was still a girl when workers began digging mines in the nearby Pilbara desert and hills.

它把你所有的衣服都变成粉色，市议会议员朱莉•阿里夫(Julie Arif)说。当年，工人们开始在附近的皮尔巴拉沙漠和山丘上挖矿时，她还是个小女孩。

Pilbara pink, we used to call it.

我们过去称它为皮尔巴拉粉色。

Back then, local leaders did not mind.

当时，当地领袖也并不介意。

We’ll worry about our dust when it clogs the cash registers, said the city’s mayor in the early 1970s, according to Ms Arif, who also runs the town’s small history museum.

据阿里夫讲，在20世纪70年代初，该市市长曾说，尘土把收银机堵塞了，我们才会担心。阿里夫也主管该市的一座小型历史博物馆。

The pink dust comes from iron ore.

那些粉色尘土来自铁矿石。

And nobody sends more iron ore abroad than the state of Western Australia.

西澳大利亚州出口海外的铁矿石数量比澳大利亚其他任何一个州都要多。

Iron ore transformed Port Hedland.

铁矿石改变了黑德兰港。

Named Marapikurrinya by the local Aboriginal people, it subsisted for years on wool exports and a few pearls gathered from oysters at low tide.

原住民称这个港口为Marapikurrinya，有过去很多年时间里，它的经济全靠羊毛出口以及从落潮时的牡蛎中采集的少量珍珠。

Until the mining boom, its claim to fame was a late-1940s three-year strike by nearby ranch workers that became a pivotal moment in the assertion of Aboriginal rights in Australia.

在矿业兴起之前，它出名是因为20世纪40年代末附近的农场工人举行了持续三年的大罢工，那成为澳大利亚原住民争取权益的关键时刻。

The iron ore deposits were far from Australia’s steel industry on the country’s southern coast.

这些铁矿距离澳大利亚南部沿海的钢铁工业区路途遥远。

But the Australian government began allowing large-scale iron ore exports in the 1960s, opening up the region to buyers from Japan and Europe.

不过，20世纪60年代，澳大利亚政府开始允许大规模铁矿石出口，向日本和欧洲的买家开放这个地区。

As foreign money trickled in, Port Hedland remained rough around the edges.

尽管外国的资金慢慢来到了黑德兰港，但它依然很简陋。

When Cyclone Joan flattened half of Port Hedland in 1975, the state government replaced the shattered hospital with a prefabricated structure propped up on the dirt with thin, foot-high steel poles.

1975年，热带气旋琼(Cyclone Joan)将一半黑德兰港夷为平地，州政府用一英尺长的细钢杆在废墟上支起一个预制构件式建筑，替代遭到摧毁的医院。

It stayed in use for nearly 40 years before it was abandoned, and now stands vacant on its oceanfront site.

这个医院又使用了近40年才遭废弃，如今海边的这幢建筑还空置着。

For entertainment, there were the skimpies — stripper shows by young women who barely complied with state regulations against full nudity at the start of each evening, and were even less likely to comply as the hour grew late.

娱乐方面有skimpies——也就是年轻女子的脱衣舞表演，她们几乎从不遵守夜晚降临后不得全裸的州法规定，随着夜色渐深，更是不可能遵守。

The ore is mined several hours’ drive into the desert from Port Hedland.

从黑德兰港往沙漠里驱车数小时，才能到达开采铁矿石的地方。

Workers use explosives to shatter the rock at open-cut mines, then scoop it up with huge bulldozers.

工人们用炸药在露天矿山上炸开巨石，然后用大型推土机把它们铲起来。

The ore is crushed and sorted by machines bigger than a house, then hauled to Port Hedland either by train or by enormous trucks — so-called road trains — pulling three or sometimes four trailers.

矿石粉碎后，用比房子还大的机器进行分类，然后用火车或巨型卡车（也就是所谓的公路火车，它能挂三到四个拖车）运到黑德兰港。

During a crimson Indian Ocean sunset at Port Hedland’s Utah Point berth recently, a conveyor belt dumped iron ore into one of the seven large holds of a Chinese-owned freighter held in place by mechanical suction cups the size of minivans.

前不久，在黑德兰港的犹他点(Utah Point)泊位，一条传送带在印度洋深红色的晚霞中，把铁矿石倒入一艘中国货轮的七个大货舱中。货轮用小型面包车大小的机械吸盘固定。

A red gravel torrent rocketed downward at two tons a second, in a low, dull roar.

红色碎石流以每秒两吨的速度倾泻而下，发出沉闷的轰隆声。

Each hold was big enough for a capacious American home, with room to spare.

每个货舱都很大，面积相当于一栋宽敞的美国家庭住房，还能留出些空间。

The crane lurched to one side, stopped disgorging iron ore, rumbled sideways to a position over a different hold, near the middle of the vessel, and resumed pouring.

起重机突然转向一边，停止倾泻铁矿石，轰隆着挪到靠近货轮中间位置另一个货舱的上方，继续倾泻。

Iron ore sometimes means dangerous work.

铁矿石有时也意味着危险。

Mr Meadowcroft once saw a taut, inch-thick steel cable snap and sweep a man into a pile of steel pipes.

有一次，梅多克罗夫特看见一根绷紧的一英寸粗的钢索突然断裂，把一名男子扫进一堆钢管中。

Another time, he saw a 50-pound steel cable block fall on a worker, shearing off part of his face and shoulder and hurling him to the floor.

还有一次，他看见一个50磅重的钢索滑轮砸到一个工人身上，削掉了他的部分脸和肩膀，并将他击倒在地。

It bounced him off the ground like a basketball, Mr Meadowcroft said. There was a lot of blood.

滑轮把他从地上弹起来，就像篮球那样，梅多克罗夫特说，现场流了很多血。

But life was mostly quiet — and inexpensive.

不过，那时候这里的生活总的来说很平静，生活成本也不高。

The town had eight amateur baseball teams, and many of the workers played after their shifts.

该市有8支业余棒球队，很多工人下班后就会去打棒球。

Housing was affordable.

房价也能承受。

Sharon Ramirez, 40, remembers that her parents had a chance in the late 1980s to buy the bungalow they were renting for $20,000, but decided not to.

40岁的莎伦•拉米雷斯(Sharon Ramirez)还记得，她的父母在80年代末曾有机会以2万美元买下他们当时租住的平房，但最后决定不买。

We didn’t jump at it, she said, because it was a lot of money in those days.

我们没有欣然接受那个价格，她说，因为在当时，那还是挺大一笔钱的。

China Shock Wave

中国冲击波

Everyone in Port Hedland has a story about a moment when the boom struck them.

黑德兰港的每个人都有一个关于矿业繁荣对他们造成冲击时刻的故事。

For Mrs. Ramirez, it was when that rental home sold to an out-of-town investor for $1 million.

对拉米雷斯来说，那个冲击时刻是当她家租住的房子以100万美元卖给一个外地投资者的时候。

For Dave McGowan, it was when four of the eight baseball teams disbanded because workers were putting in 12-hour shifts instead of eight-hour shifts.

对戴夫•麦高恩(Dave McGowan)来说，是那8支棒球队中有4支因为工人的轮班从8小时变成12小时而解散时。

For Daniel Connors, it was when a local garage, short on workers, told him that he had to make a reservation four months in advance to get the oil in his car changed.

对丹尼尔•康纳斯(Daniel Connors)来说，是当地汽车修理厂因为缺少工人而告诉他必须提前4个月预订才能给他的汽车换机油时。

China was changing — and it changed Port Hedland.

当时中国在变化——它也改变了黑德兰港。

Three decades of economic reform in China, plus lower trade barriers after the country joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, lit a fire under the economy there.

中国30年的经济改革，再加上2001年加入世界贸易组织(World Trade Organization)后贸易壁垒的减少，给中国经济点了一把火。

Skyscrapers blossomed by the hundreds in obscure cities.

连一些不出名的城市都冒出很多的摩天大楼。

The nation has built 77,000 miles of expressway, almost all of it since 1997 and two-thirds more mileage than the Interstate highway system in the United States, on which China’s network is modeled.

该国修了7.7万英里的高速公路，几乎全是1997年之后所建，这比美国的州际高速公路系统还长三分之二——中国的高速公路网就是以美国为样本的。

All that construction meant China produced and consumed last year almost as much steel as the rest of the world combined.

所有这些建设意味着，中国去年生产和消耗的钢铁几乎是世界上其他国家的总和。

To supply its steel mills, China needed Australia’s iron ore.

为了给钢铁厂提供原料，中国需要澳大利亚的铁矿石。

Iron ore prices surged tenfold.

铁矿石的价格增长了十倍。

Big companies like BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Fortescue Metals Group rushed to build mines and add port berths as fast as possible.

必和必拓公司(BHP Billiton)、力拓矿业集团(Rio Tinto)和福蒂斯丘金属集团(Fortescue Metals Group)等大公司竞相修建矿场，尽可能快地增加港口泊位。