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This is him out in Saudi. Running ahead of everyone in the desert. It's quite a poignant picture for me actually. He' running out there, ahead of everyone, on his own. What made him great, but also what got him into trouble in the end. My memories of my dad growing up are just building staff together. Birdhouse. Sandpits. And this is the barbecue he built, and all of us jostling to be the one to light the flames. Dad was a construction engineer. And he was used to building hospital, bridges, waterparks. My nephew Seth is obsessed with train building, so I think the engineer talent might have skipped a generation. You know he had pretty regular contact, it was before so the WhatsApp. So we used to sit down and write him a letter once a fortnight. And he'd write back and then he'd visit as often as he could. He called me up one day saying he'd had the worst year of his life. He had been diagnosed with some kind of heart condition. And then he said, 'there's other stuff as well...' But he was...said, 'I'll tell you about it when I get back. I want to move back to the UK. I've had enough out here'. I mean that's about as much as he'd normally open up. Found out he'd been misdiagnosed and actually he had lung cancer. And it was, it was quite late stage and it spread. We had no idea really you know what he'd been doing with his time or money or anything like that. 参考译文 这是他在沙特阿拉伯那边。他在沙漠里，跑在每一个人的前面。这张照片对我来说其实很心酸。他在那里跑，领先了每一个人，独自一个人。让他出色的东西，最后也让他陷入了麻烦。我长大后对爸爸的记忆只是他把东西搭在一起。他做了鸟笼。做了沙坑。这是他做的烧烤架，我们所有人都争先恐后地想成为点火的人。爸爸是一名建筑工程师。他建造了医院、桥梁，还有水上乐园。我的侄子赛斯对组装火车玩具很痴迷，所以我想爸爸的建筑才华可能遗传给了下一代。我爸爸和我们保持着非常固定的联系，这是他在玩WhatsApp之前（译者注：WhatsApp是一个即时通讯应用程序）。我们过去每隔两周就坐下给他写一封信。他会给我们回信，也会尽可能多地回来看我们。有一天，他给我打了个电话说他现在是人生中最倒霉的一年。他被诊断出患有某种心脏病。然后他说：“还有其他一些事情......”但是他说：“等我回去以后再告诉你。我想搬回英国去。我在这里已经受够了”。这是他通常能吐露的最多的内容了。后来我们发现他被误诊了，其实他患的是肺癌。等发现时已经到晚期了，而且癌细胞已经扩散了。我们完全不清楚他用他的时间、他的钱或者其他什么东西都在做什么。 |
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