Zhou Lang Gu Qu
In October 2020, I finally made up my mind to leave Beijing and start writing freely.
Although he also told his mother that he worked in Beijing, in fact, he was in Shanghai, renting 706 (a youth public space, providing members with salons, parties, short-term accommodation and other services) a small single room of 1800 yuan in a living laboratory in Shanghai. It is the cheapest storage room renovation, the sound insulation effect is not good, but for me who has slept in the floor, bunk beds, and lived in a shared house for a long time in Beijing, such a room has been much better.
▌ Epidemic
Compared with Beijing, Shanghai is less affected by the epidemic. In the spring in Beijing, because the 706 headquarters was closed, I moved to a friend's house, and all those who returned to Beijing for the first time from other places were quarantined for 14 days, and they had to report in the group every day, there was a temperature gun at the entrance of the community, the neighborhood committee did registration, and a pass was required to enter the community. During the quarantine period, in the WeChat group to report their own online shopping orders, takeaway riders can only be delivered at the door of the community, by the security guard or neighborhood committee staff to send home.
After the end of the isolation, go out to breathe, after the Shichahai, it is the season of thawing, there are not many pedestrians on the road, walking on the street, the surrounding is quiet, there are occasional bicycles and nagging sounds, thin blue floating in the night sky, colored light particles are flickering. The girl in front of her slipped her hand into her boyfriend's pants pocket. Passing by a small shop, I bought stinky tofu and duck intestines.
The owner said that the storefront was rented at the beginning of the year, with a monthly rent of more than 100,000 yuan, and did not want to catch up with the epidemic, and the business was suddenly deserted. A netizen told me that he met a stall owner of the Temple of Earth Temple a while ago, spent a lot of money to buy entertainment equipment, and prepared to make a profit at the temple fair in the New Year, but in April, the machine was still rusting.
By June, affected by the xinfadi epidemic, Beijing had entered a wartime state, with ball games, dinners, and large-scale events canceled, and hospitals could see medical staff wearing protective clothing and tightly wrapped from head to toe, sometimes rushing to get on ambulances. This wartime state is intermittent, and you may not be told to queue up for nucleic acid testing one day.
The flow of the epidemic in Beijing also reflects the difficulty of beating workers. Some people live in Shunyi, Yanjiao, early in the morning to take the subway to work, commute back and forth for up to two or three hours, go at 7 o'clock in the morning, the last bus in the evening to come back, live far away, but also have to reverse the bus. The subway station is full of people, such as Youth Road, Xi'erqi and other popular stations, you go in, immediately overwhelmed by a large army of migrant workers. From above, the black overhead is densely packed, breathless.
After arriving in Shanghai, although people still go out to wear masks, Pudong airport has also spread rumors of the recurrence of the epidemic, but the cinema has been full of people, a popular hot pot restaurant has to queue for two bells, to Sinan Road, Tianzifang, Nanjing West Road, Jing'an Temple and other popular places, the streets and alleys are flowing crowds.
▲ The glow of the Dinghai Road. © The author shoots
▌ Work
I usually call home a few days a month, and over my phone, I pretend to work in Beijing. Fortunately, my mother did not look at Douban and my public name, otherwise the matter would have been revealed long ago. She was the one who most wanted me to leave Beijing and return to Guangdong to work, but when she caught up with the epidemic, she was frightened by the wave of unemployment, so she told me to work hard and not to think about quitting.
Once, she called: "Little brother, how have you been doing lately?" ”
I pretended to be calm: "Old man, what about you?" Is Dad's health better? ”
"Your dad is all right. Are you working well now? ”
"Smooth, the leader is good to me. Mom, I also recently took a bonus. ”
"What bonus?"
"Just an essay contest."
"How much is the bonus?"
"Not much, two thousand."
"It's all right."
"Mom, what do you think I do when I write full-time one day?"
"It's only stable to have a job, and how old are you to think about writing!"
"People Mo Yan and Yu Hua are not also writing full-time."
"Are you Mo Yan?"
"Mom, a lot of people are the same age as me, and they work well as full-time writers."
"Concentrate on your work first. You have a job without affecting your writing. Little brother, are you still hanging on to the company's social security? ”
The mother continued: "The people from the Social Security Bureau here came to ask, saying that if you have the company's social security and medical insurance, we don't have to pay this side of the money, which is equivalent to saving an overlapping cost." ”
"Then you tell them I have social security."
"You need a certificate from your unit."
Broken, my mom isn't going to test me, is she? I pondered in my heart, my palms sweated, my mind went through ten thousand methods, and the thought of finding a former leader to make a false certificate came out.
"How much is this cost in my hometown?"
"More than two hundred, we have been helping you before."
"Only two hundred?" Let's pay for another year! Writing certificates and sending them to the past is still troublesome. ”
I once again perfunctorily put this matter in the past, but my heart was bottomless, and finally I found a friend, hanging up social security on behalf of my, thinking that the next time my mother asked, it would be good to perfunctory.
The most direct reason for coming to Shanghai is to end the long-distance relationship with his girlfriend, and there is another reason, which is that the feeling of burnout in Beijing has reached an extreme. The COVID-19 pandemic, the closure of the 706 headquarters, the scattering of friends, repeated relocations, the poor housing environment, the exhaustion of being squeezed by heavy tasks, each one is not fatal, but one by one, it will create the feeling of being held down by something: you can still breathe, but you are blocked, you crave anger, but you face a fog. Densely packed people passed on the sidewalk, everyone tensed their faces, everyone seemed unhappy, as if they were living in a nine-to-nine company, just wanting to catch their breath and sleep after work.
Dusty people poured out of the subway station. In the movie "Parasite", class is divided by smell, while in Beijing, the working class is based on bitterness and wandering as a mutual identity. When you sit on the subway, you will smell a similar smell that has been mixed with dust, compartments and holding the rails of the subway for too long.
▌ Life
After arriving in Shanghai, I still lived in a shared house, sharing the living room, kitchen, balcony and bathroom. Open the window to see the Suzhou Creek, not far away is the bustling shadow of Jing'an Temple. The pale blue Suzhou Creek flows quietly through the vast and narrow Shanghai. Spread out the map, it is the metropolis of the East, the economic center of China. But if you do live in, you will find that the difference between the co-tenants and the rich is only a few subway stops, and the silent wall secretly indicates the price.
Most of my friends in Beijing don't consider themselves To be Beijingers, and the friends I meet in Shanghai aren't "Allah" or "Old Keler." Neither Beijing nor Shanghai is our home. The provincials living in the metropolis develop a subtle empathy for each other, empathy for the wandering, and let us see each other as friends.
I remember talking to a friend in Beijing that I wouldn't call the city "my home." For the shared house where I am located, I will say "place of residence", but if I say "go home", I can't help but feel awkward, because it is not like home, and home will not drive you away the next day. Fortunately, when you are with a group of roommates who are also drifters, you will still occasionally feel at home, as if your spiritual home has always been on the road, in those souls that resonate with you.
In the autumn and winter, the epidemic rebounded. At the beginning of November, there were asymptomatic infected people in Pudong, and it was rumored that all employees of Pudong Airport would do nucleic acid testing, which was later cancelled. That night, Yingqian Village, Zhuqiao Town, Pudong New Area, was listed as a medium-risk area, and whether Pudong Airport will become a medium- and high-risk area has become the focus of our attention. At that time, because I received a small prize, I was ready to go to Guilin, the day before the trip, the epidemic in Pudong caused panic, I was worried about being isolated on the spot after getting off the plane, and the cost of isolation exceeded the bonus I received, so I had to apologize to the organizer and refund the ticket.
At the end of the year, the cold wave came, and the new crown was like a wound that could erupt at any time, bothering people who were ready to return home. The girlfriend was informed that the school was closed during the holidays and had to go home early. I also learned from the high school football team that returning to Zhanjiang at the beginning of the year would be advised to stay at home for two weeks, and for safety reasons, I also advanced the date of returning home.
▲ Deciduous Christmas tree. © The author shoots
▌ Friends
I said goodbye to a friend in January 2021 and only met her three months ago. I'm afraid of getting emotionally invested in new people who will soon be gone, but in shared housing in Beijing and Shanghai, I'm used to the experience. At 706, I had met a large number of friends, and then the 706 headquarters closed, and they dispersed.
Moved to Shanghai in October 2020, I met a group of friends again, but unfortunately asked about the lease period, some friends will leave the next year, we said that there will be a period later, we all know in our hearts, it is difficult to see each other again several times in this life.
It reminds me of my college roommate, who was actually very calm on graduation day, took a lot of photos, walked a lot of places, and had a casual meal. Some people stayed in Tianjin to teach, some people returned to their hometowns, and some roommates went to Beijing like me. A year and a half passed, and I never saw any other roommate except my friends in Beijing. They update the circle of friends and Weibo less, I also see less, sometimes late at night, I think of them, quietly to see, what dynamics have been posted recently, but in the end do not know what to say, just silently watch.
▲ Housemates. © The author shoots
Friend Ada invited a group of friends that day, including 706, the University of Leeds, Fellow Guangdong, and other friends. Roommate Aaron huddled in a small corner, I was also in the corner, people in the circle sat together, people tended to be closer to acquaintances, there was a sense of security, and before long, several other roommates also sat down. That day I met K again, a friend who is often misunderstood as a literary and artistic young woman, but does not like to write, who has read "The Biography of Zhen Huan" dozens of times, and the writer I like is Chekhov. She asked me how I was doing lately, and I said, "I'm writing a novel, what about you?" She said, as usual, there are too few friends in Shanghai. She took a picture with Ada and said to the photo, don't you think I'm older? She said it always felt empty. I asked why, aren't you more comfortable living than you are in Beijing? She said that she was very flustered in Beijing, but she was ready to study abroad at that time and had a hope. Now living in Shanghai, I live more stable, but there is no hope in life. It felt like nothing was going on.
On that day, we dispersed in a lively and lively way, and the Suzhou River was empty and silent in the middle of the night, and the golden river quietly poured into the boundless night. As we walked, we saw the blackbirds parked on the railing by the river, and they stood there motionless, thinking at first that they were sculptures, because they were very neat, and when we looked closer, the blackbirds spread their wings and flew away, and they knew that they were living creatures. It was a cold wave, the piers were empty, and the people who slept under the bridge were gone that day.