單身愛獨居，享受自由和年輕

In her tinny flat, which she shares with two cats and a flock of porcelain owls, Chi Yingying describes her parents as wanting to be the controlling shareholders in her life. Even when she was in her early 20s, her mother raged at her for being unmarried. At 28 Ms Chi took “the most courageous decision of my life”and moved into her own home. Now 33, she relishes the privacy—at a price: her monthly rent of 4,000 yuan ($625) swallows nearly half her salary.
在她和她的兩隻貓以及一堆貓頭鷹瓷器共同居住的蝸居里，Chi Yingying將她的父母描繪成一直想要控制她生活的“大股東”。儘管早在她20歲的時候，她老母就爲她未婚一事大動肝火。但是chi小姐還是在28歲時做了“生命中最勇敢的決定”——搬出去自己住。現在她33歲了，可她任然享受隱私——當然這是要付出代價的——她每個月要拿出工資的一半將近4000元人民幣（625美元）來付房租。

In many countries leaving the family home well before marriage is a rite of passage. But in China choosing to live alone and unmarried as Ms Chi has done is eccentric verging on taboo. Chinese culture attaches a particularly high value to the idea that families should live together. Yet ever more people are living alone.
在許多國家，在結婚之前離開家庭自己住是一個必由之路。但是在中國，像chi小姐這樣不結婚卻選擇獨守空房的行爲卻是在禁忌中的古怪行爲。中國人將家人們住在一起視爲無上光榮。然而越來越多的人選擇單獨住。

In the decade to 2010 the number of single-person households doubled. Today over 58m Chinese live by themselves, according to census data, a bigger number of one-person homes than in America, Britain and France combined. Solo dwellers make up 14% of all households. That is still low compared with rates found in Japan or Taiwan (see chart), but the proportion will certainly increase.
在2010年之前的十年之中，單身狗窩的數量已經翻倍。根據人口普查資料，現在已有超過5800萬的中國人自己住，超過了美國，英國和法國的單身住戶的總和，佔總戶口本數的14%。當然與日本和臺灣相比還是偏低，但是這個比例還在增長。

The pattern of Chinese living alone is somewhat different from that in the West, because tens of millions of (mainly poor) migrant workers have moved away from home to find work in more prosperous regions of China; many in this group live alone, often in shoeboxes. Yet for the most part younger Chinese living alone are from among the better-off. “Freedom and new wealth”have broken China’s traditional family structures, says Jing Jun of Tsinghua University in Beijing.
中國的獨居模式與西方還是有不同之處，因爲數千萬（主要是貧困地區）“農民工”從家鄉到繁榮之地尋覓工作。這個羣體中很多人就住在一個小隔間裏。對於大多數年輕人來說他們可以說是黃金單身漢了。“自由和新貴”，已經破壞了中國傳統的家庭結構，北京清華大學的景軍說。

The better-educated under-30-year-olds are, and the more money they have, the more likely they are to live alone. Rich parts of China have more non-widowed single dwellers: in Beijing a fifth of homes house only one person. The marriage age is rising, particularly in big cities such as Shanghai and Guangzhou, where the average man marries after 30 and the average woman at 28, older than their American counterparts. Divorce rates are also increasing, though they are still much lower than in America. More than 3.5m Chinese couples split up each year, which adds to the number of single households.
在30歲以下的年輕人越是接受過良好的教育，賺的錢越多，他們越可能自己生活。中國富裕地區有更多的非喪偶單身住戶：在北京將近五分之一的家庭裏面只有一個人。結婚年齡在上升，尤其是在上海和廣州這樣的大城市，平均來說男人在30歲，女人在28歲以後結婚，都老過同樣在做這事的美國佬了。離婚率也在上升，但還是美國老大更高，可喜可賀。每年超過3.5m的中國夫婦勞燕分飛，這對於單身住戶的數量增長來說是極好的。

For some, living alone is a transitional stage on the way to marriage, remarriage or family reunification. But for a growing number of people it may be a permanent state. In cities, many educated, urban women stay single, often as a positive choice—a sign of rising status and better employment opportunities. Rural areas, by contrast, have a skewed sex ratio in which men outnumber women, a consequence of families preferring sons and aborting female fetuses or abandoning baby girls. The consequence is millions of reluctant bachelors.
對某些人來說，獨自生活是結婚、再婚以及重組家庭的必經之路。但對於不斷增長的單身人士來說，這可能是永久狀態。在城市中，很多吃過幾年讀書飯的女性公民們將保持單身視爲一個積極的選擇——可以獲得更高的地位以及更好的工作機會。然而相反的是，在鄉下，存在着嚴重的性別比例失衡——男性數量遠高於女性，這都是一些家庭重男輕女從而對女嬰流產的惡果。結果就是逼人爲狗。

In the past, adulthood in China used, almost without exception, to mean marriage and having children within supervised rural or urban structures. Now a growing number of Chinese live beyond prying eyes, able to pursue the social and sexual lives they choose.
在過去，中國成年人無一例外的在農村與城市二元結構的限制之下，結婚生子。現在更多的中國人逃離被掌控的生活，追求他們選擇的社會和性生活。

In the long run that poses a political challenge: the love of individual freedom is something that the Chinese state has long tried to quash. Living alone does not have to mean breaching social norms—phones and the internet make it easier than ever to keep in touch with relations, after all. Yet loosening family ties may open up space for new social networks, interest groups, even political aspirations of which the state may come to disapprove.
從長期來看這構成了政治威脅：對個人自由的稱讚是天朝長期想要宣佈無效的。雖然獨自生活並不意味着打破社會規範——畢竟手機和互聯網讓保持溝通更容易了，但是失去家庭聯繫或許可以爲新的社會網絡，興趣小組，甚至是天朝所不待見的政見團體創造空間。

For now those who live alone are often subject to mockery. Unmarried females are labelled “leftover women”; unmarried men, “bare branches”—for the family tree they will never grow. An online group called “women living alone” is stacked with complaints about being told to “get a boyfriend”.
目前“單身狗”們還是處於被鄙視的狀態。未婚少女被稱爲“剩女”，未婚男人被稱爲“光棍兒”——估摸着他們也沒指望長成樹了。一個被稱爲“獨自生活的娘們們”的網絡小組中充滿着被告知“找一個男朋友”的牢騷。

Even eating out can be a trial, since Chinese food culture is associated with groups of people sharing a whole range of dishes. After repeated criticism for dining alone, in 2014 Yanni Cai, a Shanghai journalist, wrote “Eating Alone”, a book on how singletons can adapt Chinese cuisine to make a single plate a meal in itself. According to tradition, even a frugal Chinese meal comprises “four dishes and one soup”. A single diner is likely to find that rather too much to stomach.
甚至下館子也成了一個問題，中國的飲食文化是與一羣人共享佳餚聯繫起來的。在無數次被批評一個人吃飯之後，在2014年一個上海的妓者Yanni Cai寫了一本名爲“吃獨食”的書。該本書旨在爲單身飯桶如何在中國的烹調下爲自己做上一餐盤可口的飯菜提供指導。根據中國傳統，最“共產黨員“的料理也應該有”四菜一湯“。但對於單身人士來說，吃這麼多菜他們有可能會消化不良。