I have a friend, a small-town youth, "North Drift", 28 years old, who has been in Beijing for 5 years, "advertising dog", often working overtime and staying up late, and the schedule is reversed.
Half a year ago, during the chat, I felt that he was not quite right, his mood was particularly negative, and he had a tendency to be depressed. It turned out that he was experiencing the darkest moments of his life.
The first is that the body can't stay up, stay up late for many years, eat and sleep irregularly, accumulate day by day, and have stomach problems.
It just so happened that the project was not easy to do, lost the customer, and the project team was facing dissolution. Then, the college girlfriend who had been in love for many years dumped him, and the love lost to reality.
A series of unsatisfactory disappointments made him depressed.
One day at 3 a.m., he posted a message in the circle of friends: "The ultimate three questions in life - what is love?" What is the reality? Why is it to be alive? ”
I messaged him and said, "Are you okay?" After a long time, he replied: "It's okay, I just want to jump off the building." ”
After that, he disappeared from the circle of friends for half a year, and he rarely replied to messages to him, and I was worried that he would not be able to reach this hurdle. Two weeks ago, I suddenly saw him posting a few photos of food in the circle of friends, with the text: "Smelling the aroma of food, I feel that I have finally come back to life." ”
It turned out that he had been depressed for half a year, and even really thought about committing suicide, until one day he passed the market and went in for a walk.
Listening to the clear shouts of vendors, the lively bargaining sound, looking at the colorful, fresh fruits and vegetables, live fish, shrimp and seafood, friends suddenly feel warm and bright in their hearts.
Along the way, he couldn't resist the vendor's shouting, he bought a fish, a variety of fresh vegetables and fruits, and came home to make a simple meal.
When the hot meal is put on the table, the room that originally felt cold seems to have a little more life. Take a bite of your own meal, and a warm current will rush from your mouth into your heart.
"At that moment, I felt like I was alive, and I felt that no matter what happened, I could go on my own." Friends said.
Since then, he has fallen in love with visiting the vegetable market, which has become the most healing place in the vast city of Beijing.
Image source: Panorama Vision
I remembered a sentence that Gu Long had said: "If a person is desperate and wants to find short-sightedness with a narrow heart, let him go to the wet market." ”
This is an exaggeration, but it is true. There is no place like a wet market.
As the old saying goes, men and women eat, and people have great desires. Diet is always the most primitive and strongest desire of people, and a person who can still eat will not give up on himself.
The wet market is a place that can arouse the desire for food and make people re-sprout their love for life.
I myself have had the experience of being healed by a wet market.
That year I lost love, wanted to use travel to heal my wounds, in Dali, Yunnan, blew through the Shangguan wind, watched the Xiaguan Moon, basked in the bright sunshine of the plateau, still feel that the bottom of my heart is cold.
One morning, I was wandering around the ancient city when I suddenly broke into the bustling wet market. The bamboo baskets on the ground are filled with various kinds of mushrooms, bamboo shoots and other rural mountain goods, and the aroma of ham and bacon can be smelled from afar, and there are flaunting camellias everywhere.
I bought a bamboo shoot and a piece of ham and went back to the inn kitchen to make a bowl of ham bamboo shoot soup. It was that warm soup that suppressed the sadness and wandering feeling in my heart at that moment.
Since then, during my travels, the wet market has become a must-visit place for me.
Mr. Wang Zengqi has a similar view, saying:
"When I go to a new place, some people love to visit department stores, some people love to visit bookstores, and I'd rather go to the vegetable market." Looking at raw chickens, live ducks, fresh watery melon vegetables, and red peppers, it is lively and crowded, making people feel a kind of fun of life. ”
I always feel that people who love to visit the wet market will not collapse, and they will draw the energy from this lively market place to let themselves go down.
The wet market is the most down-to-earth and humane place in the city.
There is no wind and snow in the vegetable market, no coffee, no black tea, no poetry and far away, some are just down-to-earth and a vegetable and a meal, and the kindness and humanity between people who do not know the roots, but are willing to release.
I have a friend, a mom of a 3-year-old baby, who says the most free time of the day is bathing, going to the toilet and visiting the wet market. Only these moments can she detach herself from the identity given to her by society and be pure herself.
We worry too much because we ask for too much. Go to the market more, you will find that your most basic needs are actually not much, simple and ordinary, let people meet.
If you are in love, I suggest you visit the wet market, which will heal your wounds more than coffee, alcohol, and talk to someone; if you feel sad, you can also go to the wet market, where there are meals that warm the cold of your heart; if you are bored, I still recommend you to visit the wet market, where the lively atmosphere of the market and the hard work of ordinary people will let you see what is real life.
Author: Ge Gewu. Source: Reader Magazine, No. 14, 2018, original titled "Go to the Wet Market".