When flying to the US for our summer holiday each year, my family has a foolproof method of locating our check-in queue at Shanghai’s Pudong airport: look for the passengers with the greatest girth. The largest people fly to America.

每年坐飞机回美国度暑假，在上海浦东机场寻找值机柜台时，我家人有招万无一失的办法——寻找腰围最大的旅客。哪队旅客腰身最粗，哪队就是飞往美国的。

But according to last week’s Chinese newspapers, we may soon have to find a new strategy (something radical¹ like looking for our flight number on the departures board). Xinhua, the state news agency, reported that China now has a higher percentage of overweight and obese² people than the west.

可是根据上周的中国报纸，我们可能很快得想个新招了（比如在起飞时刻表上找我们的航班号这样的“创新”方法）。据中国官方通讯社新华社(Xinhua)报道，目前中国的超重和肥胖人群比例已经超过西方。

Even more interestingly, Xinhua further asserted that the reason that China has supposedly overtaken the US as the world’s obesity³ superpower is not the one most of us would imagine. Relax KFC: apparently⁴ it’s not your fault for once.

更有意思的是，新华社进一步断言，中国可能已经超越美国，成为世界头号肥胖大国，但原因并非我们大多数人可能会想到的那个。放心吧，肯德基(KFC)，至少这次看上去不是你的错。

Yum Brands, which owns the popular Southern fried chicken chain, may be the undisputed market leader in Chinese fast food — but that’s not what’s making the country fat. It’s more likely to be hotpot. Even vegetables, it seems, make Chinese people plump these days: growing affluence⁵ means people can add more oil to their meals, and that’s the real culprit, apparently: oil and salt-heavy foods, such as hotpot and grilled⁶ meat. The Communist party mouthpiece, Global Times, says it’s all doublethink anyway: “Eating meat products is mistaken for [living] the lifestyle of the rich,” the paper quotes an expert saying.

百胜餐饮集团(Yum Brands)可能是中国快餐食品市场无可争议的领导者，倍受欢迎的美国南部风味炸鸡连锁店肯德基就为该集团所有。但让中国人变胖的并不是百胜，火锅可能才是元凶。在当下的中国，貌似就连吃蔬菜都会让人们长肉：日益富裕的生活意味着人们可以在饭菜里加入更多食用油，看上去，重油重盐的食物才是真正的罪魁祸首，比如火锅和烤肉。中共党报旗下的《环球时报》(Global Times)表示这不过都是双重思想在作祟，并引用一位专家的话，称食用肉类被误解为是富人的生活方式。

Xinhua didn’t produce any statistics to support the claim that China is now fatter than the west. It based its story on a study by the National Health and Family Planning Commission, which found that 30 per cent of the country’s adults were overweight in 2012 — and that the rate had swollen⁷ by almost a third since a decade earlier. Nearly 10 per cent of children aged six to 17 were overweight, double the rate in 2002, the report said. No definitions, or comparative statistics for other countries, were given.

新华社称，目前中国居民超重肥胖增长幅度都已高于西方，但没有给出任何统计数据来支持这一观点，其报道依据是中国国家卫计委发布的一份报告。报告发现，2012年中国18岁及以上成人超重率为30.1%，这一比率比十年前上升了近三分之一。该报告还显示，6至17岁儿童青少年超重率接近10%，是2002年的两倍。但报告中并没给出超重的定义，也没有提供与其他国家对比的统计数据。

But even if China hasn’t yet trounced the world on this measure, it will do soon. The most recently published international study of the issue had China already at number two behind the US, and rising rapidly.

但就算中国尚未在这一指标上称霸全球，这一天的到来也不会太久。关于该问题公布的最新国际研究表明，中国已成为世界第二大肥胖国，排名仅次于美国，而且与后者的差距还在迅速缩小。

And that’s where all those fattening⁸ vegetables come into it. One 2011 study found that Chinese youths who ate more vegetables and less fast food, and came from richer households, were fatter than those who didn’t. “Overweight-related correlates seem to play different roles in the Chinese culture than in western cultures,” the study’s authors conclude. Translation: fat is cultural; and fat fads⁹ are even more so.

这时蔬菜让人发胖的论点就登场了。2011年的一份研究发现，一些来自较富裕家庭，吃蔬菜较多、吃快餐较少的中国青少年，要比其他青少年更胖。这份报告的作者得出结论：“超重相关因素在中国文化里起到的作用似乎与西方文化不同。”换言之，肥胖与文化相关，肥胖风潮更是如此。

For example, it’s obvious that the Chinese middle class can afford to eat more steak these days; what’s not so obvious is why they think it’s such a good idea. Yu Peidi is one of this new generation of gung-ho meat-eaters — and like many of his compatriots, he believes it’s actually the healthier option. We had lunch with Yu, nicknamed Little Fish, on his 30th birthday: but he’s not planning a big change in his eating habits (despite a recent health check-up that showed cause for concern in the liver region).

举个例子，很明显，中国的中产阶层现在更消费得起得起牛排了，至于吃牛排为什么是个好的选择，原因就不那么明显了。于培弟是新一代肉食爱好者中的一员，像许多同胞一样，他认为吃肉实际上是更健康的选择。于培弟绰号小鱼，在他30岁生日时，我们跟他一起吃了顿午餐。小鱼在最近一次体检中发现肝部有些状况，但他说自己不打算对饮食习惯做太大改变。

“I think beef is good, it’s high in protein?.?.?.?if it’s fattening, it has much more nutritional¹⁰ value than pork,” he said, while tucking into a teriyaki portion of the stuff in a Shanghai hostelry. Was he aware that many westerners think beef is bad for the heart, I asked. He was astounded¹¹. Did he know lots of non-Chinese think shrimp¹² is bad for cholesterol¹³? He hadn’t heard that one either.

在上海一家酒店里，于培弟说：“我觉得牛肉是好东西，它是高蛋白食物……就算吃牛肉会变胖，至少牛肉的营养价值远大于猪肉。”小鱼一边说着，一边吃下一大块红烧牛肉。我问他知不知道，许多西方人认为吃牛肉对心脏不好。他大吃一惊。我又问他知不知道许多外国人认为吃虾不好，因为虾胆固醇含量过高？他表示同样没听说过。

I’ve got no idea which of us is right: the point is that our two cultures’ beliefs about food are so different. I think Chinese food is, on balance, healthier than western food; and he, on balance, thinks the opposite. My Chinese colleague piped up to say she forces herself to eat an avocado a day to lose weight; I mentioned I hadn’t touched one in decades, for exactly the same reason. Veins¹⁴ and arteries¹⁵ must be cultural too.

我不知道我们俩谁才是正确的，关键在于，我们分属的两种文化对食物的观念如此不同。我认为中国食物总体来说，比西方食物更健康，而小鱼则认为总的来说恰好相反。我的中国同事突然开口说，为了减肥，她每天硬逼着自己吃一个鳄梨，我说自己几十年都没碰过鳄梨了，原因同样是为了减肥。看来我们的血管也有文化差异。

Luckily we all agree we should go to the gym more often (or, in Little Fish’s case, at all). His parents rode bikes and walked everywhere so they didn’t need to work out; but his generation of middle-class professionals knows they have no choice. Health clubs are booming in every Chinese city, and Little Fish plans to join up soon. There’s doubtless one opening in that shopping mall near him — right next to all the new steak restaurants.

好在大家都同意我们应该增加去健身房的次数（对小鱼而言则是至少我们得去）。小鱼的父母去任何地方都是骑车或走路，所以没有去健身房的必要，但小鱼这代中产阶级专业人士心里清楚他们别无选择。健身房正在中国所有城市蓬勃发展，小鱼也计划不久后就去。其实他附近的商场里就开有一家健身房——紧挨着那些新开业的牛排餐厅。