"The situation in Syria is terrible - so terrible that I think it stops kids from dreaming. But it's their dreams that one day will make Syria good again," says Obada Kassoumah.
“叙利亚的情况非常糟糕，糟糕到那里的孩子已经没有梦想。但是，只有他们有梦想，叙利亚未来才会再次好起来，”奥巴达•凯瑟马说。
"I wish I could just give them a little bit of hope and make them believe that yes, they can have dreams."
“我希望我能带给他们一丝希望，让他们相信，他们可以拥有梦想。”
Obada is a Syrian student in Tokyo who, by a mixture of chance and determination, has become the translator of Japanese manga comics into Arabic.
奥巴达是在东京留学的叙利亚学生，运气和决心让他成为一名日本漫画的阿拉伯语翻译。
And by another twist of fate, many of these Arab editions of football saga Captain Tsubasa have been donated to aid agencies and are being handed out to Syrian refugee children across Europe and the Middle East.
在命运的安排下，他翻译的众多阿拉伯文版《足球小将》漫画被捐赠给救助机构，并送到欧洲和中东的叙利亚难民儿童手中。
For Obada, the project started as an unexpected translation job but has become something very personal and important.
对于奥巴达来说，这项公益活动起源于一份意外的翻译工作，但却对他个人具有重大意义。
A narrow escape
死里逃生
As a student of Japanese at university in the Syrian capital, Damascus, Obada received a scholarship to go to Japan for an exchange programme. That was in 2012, and the unrest in the country had already started.
2012年，奥巴达在叙利亚首都大马士革的大学学习日语时拿到了一个日本交换项目的奖学金。那一年，这个国家已经爆发动荡。
The situation got worse and worse and often he would be stopped by the police in the street suspecting that as a young man he might be a rebel fighter.
叙利亚的情况越来越糟糕，作为一名年轻男性，他经常在街上被怀疑他是叛军的警察拦住。
When the situation got too dangerous, his parents decided to send him to live with his aunt in Jordan until he could leave for Tokyo.
当情况实在太危险时，奥巴达的父母决定在奥巴达前往东京前，将他送到约旦和阿姨一起生活。
It was almost already too late - it was only through personal connections that he managed to cross the border.
但那时已经太晚了，他只能动用一些人脉关系才成功出国。
When his scholarship ended a year later, he was able to stay in Japan by enrolling as a regular student, and picked up a part-time job translating Captain Tsubasa.
一年后，奥巴达的奖学金结束了，他被录取为普通学生，得以留在日本，并接下了翻译《足球小将》的兼职工作。
"I myself watched Captain Tsubasa as a kid on TV and I loved it," says 26-year old Obada.
26岁的奥巴达说：“小时候，我很喜欢在电视上看《足球小将》，我很喜欢这个漫画。”
"It's a story about a kid having a dream to become a professional football player and working hard to make that dream come true."
“它讲述的是一个小孩儿梦想成为职业足球运动员，并为实现梦想而努力的故事。”
"And that's something beautiful, that's something you should make these kids see."
“这个故事很美好，应该让叙利亚的孩子们看到。”
Initially, adapting the books for the Arab market was a mere business decision by a Japanese publisher.
最初，将《足球小将》翻译成阿拉伯文版只是一家日本出版商的商业决策。
But they were then approached by Prof Masanori Naito, a Middle East specialist at Doshisha University in Kyoto.
但随后，京都同志社大学的中东问题专家内藤正则教授联系到他们。
Prof Naito had spent several years in Damascus as a doctoral student in the 1980s and was looking for ways to help people affected by the conflict.
上世纪80年代，内藤教授在读博期间曾在大马士革待过几年，他正在寻找帮助难民的方法。
He suggested the publisher could donate some of the manga books to refugee kids.
他建议出版商可以向难民儿童捐赠一些漫画书。
"The tragedy of Syria," he says, "is a very serious concern to me. Back then I worked in villages that are now held by the rebel forces."
他说：“我非常关心叙利亚发生的悲剧。当年我工作的村庄现在已经被反政府武装控制。”
The original copyright holders in Japan, Shueisha publishers, were immediately ready to fund the donations, he said.
他说，该漫画的原著版权持有者日本集英社立刻准备资助捐赠活动。
Through co-operation with a number of international NGOs and Unicef, the books are now being distributed to young Syrian children in camps across Europe, Turkey and the Middle East who have escaped the terror and trauma of the civil war ravaging their home country.
在多个国际非政府组织和联合国儿童基金会的帮助下，这些漫画书被分发给欧洲、土耳其以及中东难民营里的叙利亚儿童。他们为摆脱内战带来的恐惧和创伤背井离乡。
"It is very far from the reality they know," Prof Naito explains. "But for kids it is very important to be able to escape from reality for a while. And these books can also give them some hope for their own future."
内藤教授说：“书中的描写和他们所知道的现实差距很大，但是对于孩子们来说，能够从现实中逃离一段时间是非常重要的。而这些书籍也能给他们的未来带去一些希望。”
Manga he says, could even be "a tool of soft power against despair and radicalisation".
他说，漫画甚至可以成为“对抗绝望和激进行为的软实力工具”。
A surprise from Japan
来自日本的惊喜
One of the places where Captain Tsubasa now provides a small escape from reality is a refugee home in Berlin where just last week, the copies were handed out by German-Turkish NGO Wefa to around 60 refugees.
《足球小子》为柏林的难民之家提供了一处逃避现实的小小港湾。上周，德国和土耳其共同建立的非政府组织Wefa将这些漫画书分发给约60名难民。
"It was really something quite unique and we got a completely different reaction from normal," Ismet Misirlioglu of Wefa told the BBC from Berlin.
来自Wefa的伊斯梅特在柏林接受了BBC采访，他说：“这些漫画书非常独特，孩子们的反应和平时完全不同。”
"What the children usually get are of course clothes and food and so they were really surprised when we suddenly had Japanese manga books - in their own language," he says, laughing.
他笑着说：“通常孩子们得到的是衣服和食物，所以当阿拉伯语的日本漫画书出现时，他们感到非常惊喜。”
"And you really could tell that from their eyes!"
“你从他们的眼神中就能看出来！”
Wefa in Berlin is planning to give out more of the books in the coming weeks.
柏林Wefa组织打算在未来几周发放更多的漫画书。
A duty to help
帮助他们是我的义务
Back in Tokyo, Obada Kassoumah is still at work putting ever more adventures of Captain Tsubada into Arabic. He is currently translating volume seven out of 37.
在东京，奥巴达•凯瑟马仍在努力把更多《足球小将》的冒险故事翻译成阿拉伯语。目前，他已经翻译了37卷中的7卷。
For him, going back to Syria is not an option.
对于奥巴达而言，他无法回到叙利亚。
Instead, he will stay in Japan for now and finish his degree - he knows Syria will need his skills in the future and he hopes he can have a bigger impact if he works building links between the two countries.
目前，他将留在日本完成学业。他知道，将来叙利亚将需要他的技能，而他希望通过自己的努力发挥更大的影响，在两国之间架起一座桥梁。
"I have friends who are fighting with the government and other friends who are fighting with the rebels," he says with a heavy voice.
奥巴达语气沉重地说：“我有朋友在和政府战斗，也有朋友在和叛军战斗。”
"We are all one family - and now they wish death to each other, trying to kill each other."
“我们都是一家人，而现在他们却希望对方去死，他们试图杀死对方。”
But he hopes his translations will put a smile on the face of a Syrian child somewhere, trying to forget the terror of the past.
奥巴达希望，他翻译的漫画能给某个试图忘记恐怖过去的叙利亚儿童带去一丝笑容。
"As a Syrian it's like my duty to help - and through this thing I can help.
“作为一名叙利亚人，我有义务帮助他们，而我能通过这件事帮到他们。”
"This way the children can - at least for a bit - forget all the bad memories they have from the war."
“这样可以让孩子们忘记战争留下的糟糕记忆，就算不是全部，至少可以有一点帮助。”
Source: 董静 & yaning from language.chinadaily.com.cn
