Surnames stick to you. Like skin, you can’t actually change them. You get tanned or bitten by insects, but cells are always there to remind you that this is your shape for ever and ever.
姓氏留在你身上。 就像皮肤一样，你实际上无法改变它们。 你被昆虫晒黑或咬伤，但细胞总是在那里提醒你，这是你的形状，永远是。
Surnames just stay with you, even if you legally change them. Is it a burden? A sin? A blessing? I always keep in mind how huge the fights were in the past around surnames and caste. How huge a matter it was for a patriarch to ensure that his lineage was maintained as long as he could live and breathe. I understand that, both in the case that you are special and unique or that you are the most common one. I respect it.
即使你合法地更改了姓氏，姓氏也一直和你在一起。 这是负担吗？ 罪过？ 祝福？ 我总是牢记过去围绕姓氏和种姓的争吵有多大。 对于一个族长来说，只要他能活着和呼吸，确保他的血统得到维持是多么大的事情。 我理解，无论是你是特别和独特的，还是你是最常见的人。 我尊重它。
So, I have always been a double “E” and a double “T”.
所以，我一直是一个双“E”和双“T”。
I’ve always been somebody that since the very beginning of her talkative life, should have articulately repeated her last name letter by letter. It is actually not that big of a matter in Italian, you don’t really need spelling in Italian. You only need to pronounce it clearly because every letter has its own sounds, so there are no mistakes. But when you’re just a little girl who is a few years old trying to introduce herself to adults, and they consistently ask you to repeat your surname, well… then you just wish to delete it. Forget it. Just call me by my simple-four- letters-name, I’m fine.
从她健谈生活开始，我就一直是一个应该逐字逐字地清楚地重复她的姓氏的人。 这在意大利语中其实并不重要，你真的不需要在意大利语中拼写。 你只需要发音清楚，因为每个字母都有自己的声音，所以不会出错。 但是，当你只是一个几岁的小女孩，试图向成年人介绍自己时，他们总是要求你重复你的姓氏，嗯……那么你只是想删除它。 算了吧。 用我简单的四个字母的名字叫我，我很好。
Daddy felt embarrassed as well. By then, he was a chubby short boy, he was struggling with Italian. He would have preferred to speak his dialect since he came from a modest countryside family. Well, his problem was even worse, since his first name was as troublesome as our surname. He was a shy overweighted impossible-to-be-pronounced-name boy. What a nightmare.
爸爸也感到尴尬。 那时，他是一个胖乎乎的矮男孩，他正在用意大利语挣扎。 他更愿意说他的方言，因为他来自一个不起眼的农村家庭。 嗯，他的问题更糟糕，因为他的名字和我们的姓氏一样麻烦。 他是一个害羞、超重、无法发音的男孩。 真是一场噩梦。
Very often he would remind me how hard his youth was because of this double “E” and double “T”. How messy papers were if his voice was too low to make it clear to the receiver. How heavy those letters were, at the beginning.
他经常会提醒我，由于这个双“E”和双“T”，他的青春有多艰难。 如果他的声音太低，无法让接收者听清楚，那文件是多么的凌乱。 一开始，那些信是多么沉重。
Once he told me that he had desperately wished more than once to have just one simple silly name. “Bu”, (which in English would be pronounced Boo). Something like, “Hi, chubby puffy little cutie lovely boy, what’s your name?”. And he would just say, “Bu”. Two letters; just one “B” one “U”, no mistakes. I know how stupid this seems. But trust me, I totally sympathised with him by then; we felt the same shameful vibration every time we heard that question, the one which every social life begins with.
有一次他告诉我，他不止一次地迫切地希望有一个简单愚蠢的名字。 “Bu”，（在英语中发音为Boo）。 比如，“嗨，胖乎乎的小可爱男孩，你叫什么名字？”。 他只会说，“Bu”。 两个字母；只有一个“B”一个“U”，没有错误。 我知道这看起来有多愚蠢。 但相信我，到那时我完全同情他；每次我们听到这个问题时，我们都会感到同样可耻的振动，这个问题是每个社会生活开始的。
How did he grow up with this? Well I think that at some point, you just do it.
他是怎么带着这个长大的？ 好吧，我认为在某些时候，你只是去做。
To me it was like being the only one. Yes, I was special not only because of that awkward sound, but because unlike every other friends of mine, I had my grandma’s surname.
对我来说，它就像是唯一的。 是的，我之所以特别，不仅是因为那尴尬的声音，还因为与我的其他朋友不同，我有我奶奶的姓氏。
You didn’t really have much of a choice if you got knocked up by singer, a fascinating traveller who would have entertained different girls after you, especially from the countryside. You couldn’t really have a choice. Keeping your family name and staying with your family was the only way to keep yourself alive in the misogynistic society that was the provincial North Eastern Italian countryside at the time.
如果你被歌手怀孕了，你真的没有太多选择，歌手是一个迷人的旅行者，会招待你之后的不同女孩，特别是来自农村的女孩。 你真的别无选择。 保留你的姓氏和家人在一起是让自己在当时意大利东北部农村的厌恶女性的社会中生存的唯一方法。
So my super-duper granny who had guts raised a child by herself and against the whole world; a child who carried her and her brothers and sisters’ own family name. And that was her pride; to not share her child’s identity with anyone else.
因此，我的超级超级奶奶，她有胆量独自抚养一个孩子，反对整个世界；一个带着她和她的兄弟姐妹自己的姓氏的孩子。 这就是她的骄傲；不与任何人分享她孩子的身份。
I kept this in mind every time somebody needed to confirm that my surname was actually written with double “E” and double “T”.
每次有人需要确认我的姓氏实际上是用双“E”和双“T”书写的，我都会牢记这一点。
Then, at some point of my life, but still too early, there was this very famous Formula 1 driver, who unbelievably, carried MY unique surname. Or better, people thought we had the same surname. And of course, when you are thought to carry the same family name, the first question you are asked is:, “Are the two of you relatives?”. But no no no.
然後，在我生命中的某個時刻，但仍然太早了，有一位非常著名的一級方程式賽車手，令人難以置信的是，他帶著我獨特的姓氏。 或者更好的是，人们认为我们姓一样。 当然，当你被认为有相同的姓氏时，你被问到的第一个问题是：“你们俩是亲戚吗？”。 但是不不不。
This American, he maybe came from an Italian family, but, gosh, he only got a miserable lonely puny “E”. Just one. And you cannot compare my outstanding impossible to pronounce double “E” with a single one.
这个美国人，他可能来自一个意大利家庭，但是，天哪，他只有一个悲惨的孤独的“E”。 就一个。 你不能将我出色的无法发音的双“E”与单E进行比较。
That was my turning point; when I started to understand that my fear of this word, because at the end of the story it is still a word, was about to swallow my identity. And my identity, remember, my skin, well everything was in there, in that family name. Our whole story, the strength of my grandma, the fight of my father, everything was in there, in that awkward dissonant and unique double “E”. So, I had first to cope with that, accept it and then make it mine.
那是我的转折点；当我开始明白我对这个词的恐惧，因为在故事的结尾，它仍然是一个词，即将吞噬我的身份。 我的身份，记住，我的皮肤，嗯，一切都在那里，以那个姓氏。 我们的整个故事，我祖母的力量，我父亲的战斗，一切都在那里，在那个尴尬的不和谐和独特的双“E”中。 所以，我必须首先处理它，接受它，然后把它变成我的。
Alright, I actually needed to find a way to get it properly under control and proudly mine. If correctly pronouncing an Italian word wasn’t enough to stop people from staring at me with that dopey look, I found my own strategy. The “surname-with-double-’E’-and-double-’T’”. It goes together now, as if was a single word without space nor pause. You have to say it in one single breath. As if it was a prayer. Because if you show yourself reluctant in any of this passage, you will receive “the look” back. I can’t stand it anymore, come on.
好吧，我实际上需要找到一种方法来妥善控制它，并自豪地属于我。 如果正确發音的意大利語單詞不足以阻止人们用那種呆子的眼神盯着我，我找到了自己的策略。 “双’E’和双’T’的姓氏”。 它现在在一起，仿佛是一个没有空格和停顿的单词。 你必须一口气说出来。 仿佛这是在祈祷。 因为如果你在这段话中的任何一段中表现出不情愿，你会得到“表情”的回复。 我再也受不了了，来吧。
Eventually, I found the point when I’ve outgrown this too. There was once somebody that told me something very precious. When I told him my full name, he was so enthusiastic, and I mean genuinely enthusiastic, and exclaimed, “Wow, this is so director-style”. It sounded good.
最终，我找到了重点，我也长大了。 曾经有人告诉我一些非常珍贵的事情。 当我告诉他我的全名时，他非常热情，我是说真正的热情，并感叹道：“哇，这太有导演风格了”。 聽起來不錯。
I don’t really care about being famous, but I’d like to see my double “E” and “T” respected because they belong to me. I am not a single letter. I am an unusual combination of two vowels and two consonants that got together hand in hand, and walk straight and hard as armour.
我真的不在乎出名，但我希望看到我的双重“E”和“T”受到尊重，因为它们属于我。 我不是一封信。 我是两个元音和两个辅音的不寻常组合，手拉手走，像盔甲一样笔直而硬。
Take that, Formula 1 single “E” pilot.
拿着那个，一级方程式单“E”飞行员。
