【英语国际】鸠山由纪夫缘何被日本人称作“外星人”？

Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama's resignation announcement Wednesday was long (about 20 minutes), emotional (he was in tears and his voice cracked at times), and apologetic (he said sorry to the people of Okinawa for his handling of the U.S. Marines base issue).

It was also, at one point, self-deprecatingly humorous: he acknowledged his unusual nickname - 'ET'.The name has been around for years and is so widely known that one entrepreneur last fall cranked out a special edition box of candies featuring Mr Hatoyama and crew surrounded by flying saucers and little green men. Most think it refers to Mr. Hatoyama's slightly eccentric demeanor and piercing gaze. Not so, he claimed Wednesday.

'People say that I'm a space alien. My own selfish interpretation of this is that I talked about what Japan should be like five, 10 and 20 years from now, and the Japanese didn't understand me. Japan's politics are fundamentally changing. In five, 10 years, people will understand what I was talking about.'

It remains to be seen whether future Japanese will remember Mr. Hatoyama as a political game-changer, as he hopes, or as a historical footnote with a funny nickname and a First Lady in Miyuki Hatoyama who claims to have traveled to Venus in a UFO.

日本首相鸠山由纪夫(Yukio Hatoyama)周三宣布辞职时，用时20分钟之久，其间激动地流下了眼泪，并数度失声。他还为自己对美军基地问题的处理而向冲绳人民致歉。

Associated Press“外星人”夫妇，照片拍摄日期不详。他也曾一度自我解嘲，承认自己有个古怪的绰号叫“外星人”。这个绰号已经流传多年，由于知名度太高，一位企业家在去年秋天还推出了一款特别版盒装糖果，上面画着鸠山及其机组人员，周围是飞翔的飞碟和小绿人。多数人认为这个绰号指向的是鸠山略显古怪的举止和盯着人不放的目光。他本人在周三声辩说，不是这样的。

他说，人们都说我是外星人，我对此做一个自私的解释，那是因为我谈到过日本在今后五年、10年和20年会是怎样，而日本人并不理解我；日本的政治正在发生根本性的变化，五年、10年过后，人们会理解我说的是什么意思。

鸠山会像他所希望的那样，作为一个政治变革者而留存在日本人记忆中吗？亦或人们只觉得他是一个历史注脚，有一个搞笑的绰号，还有一个名叫鸠山幸(Miyuki Hatoyama)、自称坐UFO去过金星的第一夫人？这就要拭目以待了。