On August 26, 2004, at 23:12, I penned a reflection of a day’s journey that took me through the vibrant streets of Shanghai, specifically along Huaihai Road. It was a day filled with anticipation and nostalgia, as I had received an intriguing message from a friend in Beijing. He was heading to Shanghai for a Ferrari promotional event and wondered if we could meet up. The prospect of a convertible Ferrari ride was enticing, but it was more than just the allure of luxury that brought me to the airport lounge on Friday afternoon with a small backpack in tow. I was also eager to reconnect with friends I had made during my time in Shanghai, including the Mosuo woman Yan and the Hangzhou woman Xiaolu.
Xiaolu and I had first crossed paths in Hangzhou a year prior, amidst the enchanting scenery of ‘Nine Creeks and Eighteen Gullies’. The Jiangsu and Zhejiang mountains were a sight to behold, with their lush greenery, blossoming flowers, and the melodic songs of birds. Fields of rapeseed flowers, tea gardens with diligent pickers, and tall fir trees lining the paths created a picturesque backdrop for artists sketching in the tranquility of the forest. It was there, in the midst of this idyllic setting, that I encountered Xiaolu, a woman with an ethereal presence, her long hair draped over a white dress as she sketched in a tea garden.
Our chance meeting blossomed into a friendship. Xiaolu, a native of Hangzhou, had a fair complexion, a tall and slender figure, and a voice as sweet and mellow as the tea from the nearby hills. Her blue contact lenses and soft, light chestnut-colored hair gave her a distinctive, cat-like charm. We shared a taxi back to the city, exchanging stories and contact details, and the following day, she invited me to explore the ‘Yunqi Bamboo Path’. The mountain was a sea of green, with bamboo shoots pushing through the earth, and we spent a delightful afternoon sipping tea and chatting at an open-air stall.
Xiaolu’s life took an unexpected turn when she left her stable teaching job in Hangzhou to marry her boyfriend, a manager at a large eyewear chain store in Shanghai. Despite her family’s disapproval, she embraced a new life in the city, opening an outdoor supply store. I had the pleasure of visiting her during a trip to see the stage play ‘CATS’ and later joined her on a hiking trip along the Ancient Huizhou-Hangzhou Path, a journey that took us from Anhui to Zhejiang before dropping me off in Hangzhou.
In Shanghai tonight, no one sleeps. The city pulses with energy, and as I reminisce about my past adventures and the friends I’ve made along the way, I can’t help but feel a sense of excitement for the weekend ahead. The Ferrari event is just the beginning; the real treasure lies in the connections and memories that will be made.In the silent forest, the brook is gurgling. There are tall fir trees on both sides of the path, and groups of art academy students are doing sketches. A woman in white with long hair draped over her shoulders is sitting alone in the tea garden on the slope, also doing sketches. Half an hour later, with the sweet fragrance overflowing between my lips and teeth, I walked out of Longjing Village. From afar, I saw a white figure and a large army green drawing folder standing under the station. While waiting for the bus, she came over and said to me, “Just now when I was painting, I saw a girl with a large camera on her back walking alone from down the mountain. Why don’t we share a taxi back to the urban area?” I smiled and said, “That’s exactly what I had in mind.” In fact, I also noticed her in the mountains just now. “Nice to meet you,” I added. She is Xiao Lu, an authentic Hangzhou woman with fair and transparent skin, a tall and slightly slender figure, and a soft Mandarin with a sweet and mellow tone. What’s special is that she wears blue contact lenses and has soft long hair dyed light chestnut, making her whole person resemble a lazy cat.
On the way back to the urban area, we had a great conversation and exchanged phone numbers and QQ numbers. Unexpectedly, the next day I received her text message: “The sun is very bright today. Do you want to take a walk in the mountains?” I remember that day we went to ‘Yunqi Bamboo Path’, where there were lush green bamboos and spring bamboo shoots breaking through the ground. In the afternoon, we had tea and chatted at an open-air tea house on the mountainside. This time she changed to amber contact lenses. It’s not that I don’t find it strange; after all, there are very few women who change the color of their eyes like changing new clothes.
It was later revealed that her boyfriend was the manager of a large Shanghai-based eyewear chain store stationed at the Hangzhou branch, whom she met while getting her lenses fitted. Xiao Lu showed me his photo; tall and handsome Shanghai men are not common. Later on, she resigned from her stable and comfortable teaching position in Hangzhou, disregarding her family’s objections, and married him, moving to Shanghai to settle down and opening her own outdoor equipment store.
Once, I made a special trip from Hangzhou to Shanghai to see the stage play ‘CATS’ and stayed at Xiao Lu’s place. The next day, she organized a hiking trip to the Hui-Hang Ancient Path, and I joined them, walking from Anhui to Zhejiang, and then was dropped off in Hangzhou by the chartered vehicle that passed through the city. Among the group of about ten people, I remember a man named BOB who was particularly kind to Xiao Lu, always eager to help her carry her backpack and do miscellaneous tasks.
The two-hour journey passed quickly in the memories as the plane landed at Pudong Airport in the evening. Walking through the Lujiazui Financial Center and Century Avenue, one cannot help but marvel at the grand planning and the cosmopolitan flair of Shanghai. At night, at the Pudong Shangri-La Hotel, sitting on a 20th-floor windowsill overlooking the surroundings, the dazzling lights give an illusion of being in space, unsure of the present moment.
Three days later, the Beijingers returned, and I contacted Xiao Lu, meeting at the True Pot Café on Huaihai Road on an early summer afternoon. After not seeing each other for a year, I still recognized her among the fashionable men and women and the pervasive smoke, distinct from the aggressive refinement and petty bourgeois pretentiousness of Shanghai women. Xiao Lu exuded a natural and gentle charm, albeit looking a bit haggard.
It is said that men make friends through alcohol, sports, and politics, while the friendships among women inevitably involve gossip and emotional matters. Xiao Lu told me that within half a year of coming to Shanghai, she discovered her husband’s affair. Over these six months, they went through all the typical emotional entanglements: crying, pleading, forgiving, and reconciliation, followed by another betrayal. The continuous entanglement and betrayal left them in a state of chaos. In the end, her husband even suggested she should be more open-minded, asking what era it is now! Hearing this, I felt a surge of anger and couldn’t help but curse: “Damn it! What a jerk, is he even a man?” Still not satisfied, I kicked the table leg in anger. The handsome men and beautiful women at the neighboring tables looked at us in surprise, probably never having seen such a rude woman in such a place. “Why keep such a man, just kick him away, you are still so young and beautiful.” I forgot to mention, Xiao Lu is only 23 years old. “I’ve thought about it, but I just can’t do it.”
Unimaginable is life without him. He was well aware of this, that she could not live without him. The sadness filled the blue eyes of the fawn. I rolled my eyes and made a fainting expression: “Heaven, don’t be so traditional, it’s the 21st century now, who can’t live without whom?” Only to hear the low voice of the fawn: “I’m pregnant, two months.”Speechless silence. At night, I made an appointment with several netizens, acquaintances from our last hike to ‘Qiangui’, to indulge. BOB was also there. It seemed as if everyone carried a burden, willingly succumbing to indulgence under the spell of alcohol. We danced wildly in the dim, enigmatic light of the private room, to the pulse of the music. I watched BOB and the fawn, their bodies intimately close, swaying to the melody. BOB’s right hand roamed the fawn’s waist, while she, seemingly intoxicated, weakly rested her head on BOB’s chest.
At two in the morning, ‘Qiangui’ closed its doors, but our spirits were still high, eager for late-night snacks. In the back seat of BOB’s car, the fawn closed her eyes and leaned her head on my shoulder. Just as I thought she had dozed off, she murmured softly in my ear, “BOB likes me. Am I being too much to him like this?” I pondered, then sighed, “Love has no reason, no right or wrong. Perhaps when the weather turns cold, we all long for someone to hold, for warmth.”
BOB rolled down all the windows and opened the sunroof, filling the car with ‘Bao Jia Street 43’ music. Wang Feng’s voice, cold and hoarse, accompanied by the powerful drumming, carried us through the quiet streets of Shanghai late at night.
“Disintegration”
Performer: Bao Jia Street 43
Composer: Wang Feng
Lyricist: Wang Feng
Passing through this wholesale production city,
Passing through Jianguomen, millions of neon lights,
Passing through ATMs, stock terminals,
Passing by the angelic girls on Chengdong Road,
Passing through the frozen electricity and the split moonlight,
Passing by the luxury cars that pass gas loudly,
Passing through the crowd like thousands of troops,
Passing through the end of the twentieth century where we will be thrown into the money mixer,
Passing through supermarkets, amusement parks, and squares,
Passing through the machine network composed of computer chips and rumors,
Passing through the sky reflected by the landscape of desire,
Passing through the crazy emptiness of nothingness,
Passing through the self-abandonment that has been frozen to the bottom of the foot,
Passing through deception, gain, loss, and oblivion,
Passing through the inexplicable sadness after countless climaxes,
Passing through the empty dance of the soul on Saturday night,
Passing through the soft sobs in the perfect machine dream,
Passing through the discounted freedom with golden edges and shining light,
Passing through the weightless feeling that can never land again after jumping up and flying,
Passing through newspapers, telephone signs, and overpasses,
Passing through cigarettes, screens, networks, and storms,
Passing through streets, mountains, seas, and eternity,
Passing through love and life, passing through many years and many illusions.
The dreams and souls we bought with our youth,
The cruel changes have washed the brain completely,
The expensive nothingness, the tears day after day,
Fill the best hearts in the world.
Dear Confucius, where is your hand pointing now?
I lie on the soft bed meditating on the space without time.
Outside the window is the exhausted future.
All of this means that maybe my life will be a joke.
