MUJIB MASHAL, BINOD GHIMIRE2026年9月14日 Lam Yik Fei for The New York TimesTaking a break from the noisy work of leading a school of over 500 students, Madhav Lamichhane would ride his motorbike down to the riverside Betrawati Bazaar every week. The principal skipped the busy shops around the town’s clock tower, preferring a quiet moment by the Ram temple to take in the “very beautiful flow” of the Trishuli River.玛达夫·拉米查内校长每周都会抽出时间，从管理一所有500多名学生的学校的嘈杂工作中抽身，骑着摩托车前往河畔的贝特拉瓦蒂集市。他会避开镇上钟楼周围熙熙攘攘的商店，更喜欢在罗摩神庙旁边享受片刻的宁静，欣赏特里苏利河“非常美丽的流水”。But on Aug. 26, as he was in school preparing for the first morning bell, the river below suddenly became a violent torrent that obliterated much of the town of Betrawati, erasing its square from the map. It left no trace of the temple, the market or the concrete bridges, and only fragments of the hundreds of homes that dotted either side of the river.但在8月26日，当他在学校准备敲响第一声晨钟时，下方的河流突然变成了汹涌的洪流，摧毁了贝特拉瓦蒂镇的大部分地区，将其广场从地图上抹去。神庙、市场和混凝土桥梁都不复存在，点缀在河流两岸的数百栋房屋只剩下残骸。Mr. Lamichhane and the school, up on a hillside, escaped its wrath.拉米查内和位于半山腰的学校躲过了这场肆虐的灾祸。But about 200 students did not. The younger children, ages 5 to 11, had been waiting in the riverside town for a yellow school bus. The oldest, backpacks strapped on, had been slowly making their way uphill to the school when the deluge swallowed them.但大约200名学生未能幸免。五岁到11岁的年幼孩子们当时正在河边小镇等待一辆黄色的校车。年纪较大的学生背着书包，正缓慢地向上走向学校，就在这时，洪水吞噬了他们。“What can I say to the river?” Mr. Lamichhane sighed. He said that fewer than a third of the town’s families had scraped through without losing anyone, with many wiped out entirely.“我能对这条河说什么呢？”拉米查内叹息道。他说，镇上只有不到三分之一的家庭没有失去任何一名家庭成员，许多家庭则全员遇难。“It was very beautiful previously,” he said. “It is a cultural and historical place, too. But all that became the past.”“以前这里非常美丽，”他说。“这里也是一个充满文化和历史的地方。但一切都成为了过去。”特里苏利河化作一股狂暴的洪流，将贝特拉瓦蒂市集的大部分区域夷为平地。玛达夫·拉米查内是一所学校的校长，该校约有200名学生在洪灾中失踪或遇难，其中一些孩子当时正在等黄色校车。洪水过后，一个被遗落的书包。When part of a Himalayan glacier near Nepal’s border with Tibet collapsed late last month, the ferocious water and debris that barreled through the gorge wiped out almost everything in their path for tens of miles. Two weeks later, the death toll stands at over 1,300, with 5,000 others missing, many most likely buried beneath the mud.上月末，尼泊尔与西藏交界处附近的一座喜马拉雅冰川发生部分崩塌，汹涌的洪水和夹杂的碎石冲过峡谷，摧毁了沿途几十公里内几乎所有的东西。两周后，死亡人数已超过1300人，另有5000人失踪，其中许多人极有可能被埋在泥浆下。In the days after the floods, reporters from The New York Times traveled along the path of destruction, trying to reach areas cut off in a poor country with difficult terrain. What we found was towns and villages wiped off the map. Small reminders of life before remained in the sludge: a buried roof jutting out from the mud, a student’s backpack, an empty reading glasses case.洪水过后，《纽约时报》记者沿着被破坏的路线行进，试图抵达这个地形崎岖的贫困国家里那些被切断联系的地区。我们发现了那些从地图上被抹去的城镇和村庄。淤泥中还残留着一些昔日生活的痕迹：泥浆中露出的被掩埋的屋顶、一个学生的背包、一个空的的老花眼镜盒。 The New York TimesThe dozens of bridges and the tens of miles of destroyed roads will surely be rebuilt. Technical assessments are already underway for a financing plan. The expected billions in costs will add to the debt of a small country still paying back loans it took to rebuild after a catastrophic earthquake just over a decade ago.被毁坏的几十座桥梁和几十公里的道路肯定会重建。为制定融资计划，技术评估已经展开。预计高达数十亿的成本将增加这个小国的债务负担，它目前仍在偿还十多年前一场灾难性地震后为重建而申请的贷款。But helping to count the number of dead and telling the stories of wiped out communities is left to loved ones who were away at the time or who climbed to higher ground as the water closed in — now unsure whether to consider themselves lucky to have survived, or cursed to bear the crushing grief and loneliness.但是，统计死亡人数和讲述被摧毁社区故事的责任留给了当时不在现场或在洪水逼近时爬向高处的亲人们，如今他们不知该庆幸自己得以生还，还是该哀叹自己要承受巨大的悲痛和孤独。The only lifeline connecting the remains of those settlements is a narrow dirt track that skirts the hills. The drive between some of the towns, which would have taken 15 minutes before the floods, took us seven to eight hours — the path was jammed with traffic and frequently blocked by mudslides caused by the last of the monsoon rains.连接这些定居点遗迹的唯一生命线是一条沿着山丘边缘的狭窄土路。在洪水来袭前，行驶在某些城镇之间的路程只需15分钟，如今却耗费了我们七八个小时——这条路上挤满了车辆，而且经常被季风季末期降雨引起的泥石流所阻断。几名男子正试图把陷在泥里的汽车拖出来。一架直升机正飞越河流运送救援设备。The Chilime hydropower tunnel, 10 miles from the border with China, was as far as we could get before the road collapsed into a dirt track along the river that was not safe to trek. Helicopters frequently flew through the narrow gorge on search and rescue operations to several tunnels in the area, where workers are feared trapped.距离中国边境约16公里的奇利梅水电站隧道是我们能抵达的最远地方，再往前，道路塌陷，成了一条沿河的土路，无法安全通行。直升机频繁穿梭于狭窄的峡谷，前往该地区的几条隧道进行搜救，人们担心有工人被困在那些地方。Officials who had flown into Syrabrubesi and Timure — the stretch beyond what was accessible by road — and survivors who were airlifted out said that hundreds of buildings had vanished, with nearly 1,000 people missing.飞抵西亚布鲁贝西和蒂穆雷（公路可达范围之外的区域）的官员以及被空运出来的幸存者表示，那里数百栋建筑消失了，近1000人失踪。“The area is deserted now,” said Dolma Thangjen Sherpa, an elected member of the ward where Syabrubesi is, who was sheltering in a monastery in Kathmandu.“那个地区现在已经没有人烟了，”西亚布鲁贝西所在选区的民选委员多尔玛·唐詹·夏尔巴说，她当时正在加德满都的一座寺庙里避难。In the urban pockets along our journey — from Kathmandu to an army base and to a city nearly 100 miles downstream from where the floods originated that saw over 350 bodies wash up on its riverbanks — people flipped through lists of the dead, which ran multiple pages, and searched for clues in the lines of mangled bodies.我们此行沿线的城市区域——从加德满都到一个军事基地，再到洪水发源地下游约160公里的一座城市（那里有超过350具遗体被冲上河岸），人们翻阅着长达数页的死者名单，在一排排支离破碎的遗体中寻找线索。Most left in disappointment. Kami Delma Sherpa stared at a photograph of a woman with a golden tooth posted on the wall outside a hospital in Kathmandu, thinking she had finally found her sister, who worked at the border crossing. But when she went inside and looked at the body, it was not her.大多数人都失望地离开了。卡米·德尔玛·夏尔巴盯着贴在加德满都一家医院外墙上的一张镶有金牙的女子的照片，以为终于找到了在边境口岸工作的姐妹。但当她走进去看到尸体时，发现那并不是她。Miracles in the Mud泥浆中的奇迹As we traveled along the floods’ path of destruction, there were still small miracles to celebrate.我们沿着洪水的毁灭路径行进时，仍有一些小小的奇迹值得庆幸。 The New York TimesA green house in Dhunge Bazaar remained standing, saving its residents, who had watched from their balcony as a whirlpool of mud and debris threatened to close in on them. A principal evacuated all of his students to safety, before his school was washed away. Three of the hundreds of workers trapped in hydropower project tunnels were pulled out alive more than a week after the floods.丹格市集里的一栋绿色房子矗立不倒，拯救了里面的居民，他们曾在阳台上看着泥浆和碎石形成的漩涡步步逼近。一位校长在学校被冲走前将所有的学生疏散到了安全地带。洪水发生一个多星期后，被困在水电项目隧道里的数百名工人中有三人被活着救出。Another unlikely escape was hiding in plain sight. We watched night fall over Betrawati last Friday, staring at a three-story house buried so deep in the sludge that only its roof and a sliver of its upper windows were visible. The search and rescue teams had moved on, the disposal of a decaying cow their last act that afternoon.另一个不可思议的生还奇迹就隐藏在我们眼前。上周五，我们看着夜幕降临贝特拉瓦蒂，盯着一栋掩埋在污泥中的三层楼房，它只有屋顶和楼上窗户的一点缝隙露在外面。搜救队伍已经离开，那天下午他们最后的行动是处理一头腐烂的牛。一栋深埋在淤泥中的三层楼房。钱迪卡·什雷斯塔在洪水发生10天后从这栋房子里获救。一名男子正在为洪水中失踪的亲人举行最后的丧葬仪式。As we began our drive out of the ghost town late at night, we could hear only crickets and the roar of water. No one knew that a woman, Chandika Shrestha, was still clinging to life inside the house. Her family was among hundreds who had resigned themselves to their loss and had begun final ceremonial rites by cremating effigies of their loved ones.深夜，当我们驱车驶出这座鬼城时，我们只能听到蟋蟀的叫声和水的轰鸣。没有人知道，一位名叫钱迪卡·什雷斯塔的女子仍然在这栋房子里顽强求生。她的家人和数百个听天由命的家庭一样已经接受了失去亲人的事实，并开始通过火化亲人的人偶来举行最后的仪式。The next day, locals heard a faint cry. Rescuers scrambled to dig her out.第二天，当地人听到了一声微弱的哭喊。救援人员迅速行动，把她挖了出来。But those kinds of miracles were few.但这类奇迹少之又少。在这场洪灾中，百年古镇贝特拉瓦蒂受灾惨重。贝特拉瓦蒂一栋满是泥浆的房屋。帕维特拉·拉米查内坐在她家的原址——房子已被洪水冲走。Haunting Phone Calls难以释怀的电话The school where Mr. Lamichhane is principal had become the town’s relief hub, with trucks offloading aid material and social workers trying to console and entertain children uprooted from their homes.拉米查内担任校长的学校已经成为镇上的救灾中心，卡车在这里卸下援助物资，社工们则试图安抚、逗乐那些失去家园的孩子们。On the morning of the floods, as Mr. Lamichhane was preparing for the day in his office, he got a call from the school bus driver saying he had heard of flooding upstream.发生洪水的当天早上，拉米查内正在办公室里为新的一天做准备时，接到了校车司机的电话，说他听说上游发洪水了。The driver had delivered two busloads of students to the school and was on his way to the town square for his final run.这名司机已经把两车学生送到学校，正前往镇广场跑最后一趟。“I scrolled on my mobile but did not see any news of the flood,” the principal said. He phoned a friend upriver, who told him the market had collapsed. “The flood is coming,” the friend exclaimed.“我查看手机，但没看到任何有关洪水的消息，”校长说。他打电话给上游的一位朋友，朋友告诉他市场已经塌了。“洪水来了，”朋友大喊道。Mr. Lamichhane told staff to evacuate the 250 students already at the school to the forested areas above, while he and others rushed down toward the river to see what they could do.拉米查内告诉教职员工，将已经到校的250名学生疏散到上方有树林的区域，同时他和其他人冲向河边，看看他们能做些什么。贝特拉瓦蒂那所失去了约200名学生的学校已成为幸存家庭的救援物资集散点。工人在贝特拉瓦蒂抢修电缆。贝特拉瓦蒂一处避难所里的受灾民众。He called anyone and everyone he could reach along the river: his staff who had not arrived at school yet, the parents of students.他给河边所有能联系上的人打电话：还没到校的教职工，还有学生的家长。Two phone calls, in particular, haunt him.有两通电话让他尤其难以放下。The first was to his elementary schoolteacher, whose riverside house he had often visited for a cup of tea. She had told him, “We are escaping! We are escaping!”第一通是打给他的小学老师的，他以前经常去她河边的房子里喝茶。她告诉他：“我们在逃！我们在逃！”“The connection was lost,” he said. “She is among the missing.”“电话断了，”他说。“她在失踪人员名单中。”He remembers the second call, to another colleague, Ajay Kumar Yadav, with anger.第二通电话是打给同事阿贾伊·库马尔·亚达夫的，现在想来他还感到生气。“I told him to come out. But he did not believe that the river could come up to there,” he said. “And he lost his life.”“我叫他出来。但他不相信河水能涨到那儿，”他说。“然后他丢了命。”As the principal spoke, he took his cap off to show his head, which he had shaved in a ritual performed to mourn dead relatives. (He lost two cousins who had been truck drivers along the border.)校长说着，摘下帽子，露出光头——他在悼念已故亲属的仪式上剃去了头发。（他失去了两个在边境当卡车司机的表亲。）Attendance had not yet been taken when the floods came, making identifying the missing students a challenge.洪水来时还没来得及点名，这使得确认失踪学生变得困难。When we asked if he had to rely on families reporting their children as missing, he said, “There is no family to report,” adding, “The families are gone.”当我们问他是否必须依靠家人来报告孩子失踪时，他说，“没有家人可以来报告了，那些家庭都没了。”摄影：林亦非(Lam Yik Fei)地图由Pablo Robles绘制。Mujib Mashal是时报南亚分社社长，领导对印度及其周边地区（包括孟加拉国、斯里兰卡、尼泊尔和不丹）的报道。翻译：杜然点击查看本文英文版。