Why has wedding of Japan's Princess Mako still not gone ahead?
日本真子公主的婚禮為什麼還沒有舉行?
They have been together since university, their emotional bond apparently stronger than ever despite being separated by an ocean and a continent. And they have the blessing of a likely future emperor.
他們從大學開始就在一起，儘管二人相隔一個大洋和大陸的距離，但他們的感情顯然比以往任何時候都要牢固。並且他們得到了日本天皇繼承人的祝福。But for Japan’s Princess Mako – the eldest daughter of the first in line to the Chrysanthemum throne – and her boyfriend, Kei Komuro, the sound of wedding bells has grown more distant in the three years since they made their relationship public.
但對日本天皇第一順位繼承人的長女真子公主，和她的男友小室圭來說，自他們公開戀情的三年以來，結婚的鐘聲已經變得越來越遙遠。
The couple are no closer to exchanging vows after their plans to marry two years ago were derailed by revelations that the would-be groom’s mother was embroiled in a financial dispute. The saga has not only fuelled unusually intrusive media and public interest in the private lives of Japan’s royals; it has also brought the country’s succession crisis into sharp relief.
兩年前，準新郎的母親被曝捲入一場經濟糾紛，這打亂了他們結婚的計劃，現在這對新人離交換結婚誓言還距離很遠。這一長串事件引起的媒體和公眾對日本皇室私生活的興趣，讓皇室備受幹擾，而且它還使該國的繼承危機凸顯了出來。
Japan celebrated when, in May 2017, Mako and Komuro, a contemporary at International Christian University in Tokyo who does not come from a royal background, said they planned to get engaged later in the year and marry in November 2018. But in February 2018, the imperial household agency said the wedding had been put off for two years following reports that Komuro’s mother owed money, including education fees for her son, to an ex-fiance. A date for the wedding has yet to be set.
在2017年5月，真子公主和她的一名沒有皇室背景的，東京國際基督教大學的同學小室圭表示，他們計劃在當年晚些時候訂婚，並於2018年11月結婚，日本當時慶祝了此事。但在2018年2月，宮內廳表示，婚禮被推遲了兩年，因為有報導稱小室的母親欠前未婚夫的錢，這筆錢包括他兒子小室圭的學費。現在婚禮的日期還沒有確定。
This week, Mako’s father, Crown Prince Akishino, gave the marriage his blessing but suggested that the couple, who are both 29, had yet to win over a sceptical Japanese public, who will foot the bill for a lump sum Mako will receive when she marries and leaves the imperial household.
本周，真子的父親文仁親王，祝福了這樁婚事，但表示這對29歲的夫婦，尚未贏得持懷疑態度的日本民眾的支持，真子公主和小室圭結婚時將一次性收到一筆錢，而日本民眾要為此買單。
「I approve of them getting married,」 he said in comments to journalists ahead of his 55th birthday on Monday. 「The constitution says that marriage shall be based only on the mutual consent of both sexes. I believe I, as a parent, should respect their intentions if marriage is what they truly want.」
「我贊成他們結婚，」文仁親王在他周一的55歲生日之前對記者說。「憲法規定婚姻只能建立在兩性相互同意的基礎上。我認為，作為父母，如果他們真的想要結婚，我應該尊重他們的意圖。」
But, he added, Komuro’s family needed to make a 「visible」 response to his mother’s financial troubles, which, according to Japanese media, have not been resolved two years after they were revealed by a weekly magazine.
但他補充說，小室圭的家人，需要對小室圭母親的財務問題做出「明顯的」回應。據日本媒體報導，小室圭母親的財務問題被一家周刊雜誌披露後，問題兩年以來一直沒有得到解決。
Akishino, who became crown prince after his elder brother, Naruhito, ascended the throne last year, was quoted by the Kyodo news agency as saying: 「From my point of view, I don’t think they are in a situation in which many people are convinced and pleased [about their proposed marriage]」 – adding that Mako was aware that the public was not fully behind the union.
去年，在哥哥德仁登基後，文仁成為了日本的王儲。日本共同社援引文仁的話說:「從我的角度來看，我認為他們現在的處境是，他們的婚姻不會讓很多人感到信服和高興。」他還補充說，真子知道公眾並不是完全支持她和小室圭的結合。
When Mako marries, she will immediately lose her royal status and, like the previous emperor’s daughter, Sayako Kuroda, live a comparatively 「ordinary」 life with her commoner husband beyond the walls of the imperial palace in Tokyo.
真子公主在結婚後，將立即失去她的皇室身份，並會像前任天皇的女兒黑田清子一樣，與她的平民丈夫在東京皇宮牆外，過著相對「普通」的生活。
The family she leaves behind will shrink again. As the Asahi Shimbun newspaper has pointed out, only seven members of the imperial family are below 40, and all but one of them are women. Under Japan’s succession laws, no female member of the imperial family – not even the emperor’s 19-year-old daughter, Aiko – can become a reigning monarch.
她離開的日本皇室將再次縮小。正如《朝日新聞》所指出的，皇室成員中只有7人年齡在40歲以下，而且這其中除了一人之外，其餘都是女性。根據日本的繼承法，皇室的女性成員，包括天皇19歲的女兒愛子公主在內，都不能成為在位君主。
No Japanese administration has shown an appetite for revising the 1947 succession law since the maverick conservative, Junichiro Koizumi, saw his reform plans fizzle out after the 2006 birth of Prince Hisahito, Mako’s younger brother and the first male to be born into the imperial family for 40 years.
在真子公主的弟弟，日本皇室四十年來出生的首位男性繼承人悠仁，於2006年出生後，特立獨行的保守派人士，小泉純一郎的改革計劃就此告吹，自此以後，日本政府一直沒有表現出修改1947年繼承法的意願。
While the birth of Hisahito, who is second in line to the throne, gave the family a one-generation reprieve, if he does not go on to have a son an imperial line some believe stretches back 2,500 years will come to an end.
日本皇位第二順位繼承人悠仁的出生，給了這個家族一代人的喘息時間，但悠仁如果不能繼續生下一個兒子，這個可以追溯到2500年前的皇室血統將會終結。
A potential constitutional crisis will be furthest from the thoughts of Mako and Komuro, who is studying for a law degree at Fordham University in New York, as they consider their next move, including a suggestion by her father that they offer the public an explanation once they have agreed on a wedding date.
真子和小室圭正在紐約福特漢姆大學，攻讀法學學位。當他們在考慮下一步的行動時，包括考慮她父親的建議，即一旦他們就結婚日期達成一致，就得向公眾提供一個解釋，他們最不可能考慮的就是一場潛在的憲法危機。
The two consider each other 「irreplaceable」, the princess said recently, adding that they thought of each other as 「someone to rely on, during both happy times and unhappy times」.
真子公主最近表示，他們兩人都認為對方是「不可替代的」，並補充說，他們認為對方是「無論在幸福還是不幸福的時候，都可以依靠的人」。
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