It is better to act than to act, and it is never too late to fulfill your wishes

Professor and doctoral supervisor of the German Department of Beijing University of Foreign Chinese

Writer, Published Multi-Faculty Literary Works

Associate Professor of the Department of Russian Language and Master Tutor of the School of Foreign Chinese, Peking University

"Every spring when the spring is in full bloom and the vitality is at its peak, we come to think about death and deepen our understanding of life in the review of death."

Editor's Note

It's another year of Qingming.

To set the festival of remembrance of life in a season of revival of all things must have the unspeakable wisdom of the ancestors.

This spring of this year, mankind not only continues to fight with the epidemic, but also witnesses the smoke of war and the loss of life.

So, how to face life and death? How to cherish life? In the unprecedented great changes and unpredictability, how to weave their own "web of meaning"? This will be a topic that everyone cannot avoid.

This clarity, let's talk frankly together, or fall into deep thought.

The customs of the Qingming Festival are different in different places and in different homes, and the ceremonial atmosphere is also different, or sad, or peaceful, or solemn, or lively... What is the way you personally agree with the commemoration?

Xie Yingying: The Qingming Festival is a ritual of sweeping the tomb to worship the ancestors, and it is also a kind of ritual. The whole family went to the countryside to repair the graves of the ancestors, and after the worship, burned paper money, and then it was equivalent to an outing. I don't think there is any need to mourn at this time, there is no need to be solemn, to worship naturally, to move naturally, and when children should jump, to run, to laugh.

Zhao Yun: Very lucky, I was born on the Qingming Festival. On April 5, 1945, Chongqing Shaci Hospital added a baby girl with big eyes and named it Cai (formerly known as homophone archaic characters). I remember that every day, my father would plant wicker for me, but I don't remember a birthday cake blowing candles. At that time, there was no Qingming public holiday, just a cheerful atmosphere for the spring. After having the concept of worshipping ancestors, my family has a tradition of the deceased not leaving ashes and not building tombstones. After the farewell ceremony of the body was held in the morgue of Beijing Fuwai Hospital in 1992, the 92-year-old thin grandmother was sent to Babaoshan by an important member of the prearranged family, and only my sister Zhao Wei in my generation had this qualification.

A few years later, my father died of illness, leaving only a poem "My Will" "Embrace me with a flame..." In the same year, when Aunt Naidi left, there was no ceremony, or several female colleagues of the Foreign Language Bureau spontaneously sent her. In 2009, Xian Yi's uncle left, the old cadres of the unit insisted on keeping the ashes, and then cousin Yang Chi planted two trees that could bloom in the yard, and we buried her father's ashes under the tree together. The great aunt Luo Peilin and Aunt Yang Minru have passed away one after another, and there is no tombstone, leaving behind our remembrance. The aftermath of his cousin Yang Yezhi's meteorite was even more minimal, and only his name and birth and death were recorded in a cemetery memorial book on the outskirts of London.

My ideal way to commemorate is to remember relatives and friends and confidants together, there is music, there are testimonials, solemn, simple, love expressions, and even some interesting passages before the death. I once visited a death museum in Germany, and the funeral supplies were all available, even the brooch worn by the lady was very elaborate, and in their opinion death should be beautiful.

Liu Hongbo: Qingming is both a festival and a festival. Qingming, as the name suggests, clean and clear, green willows are yellow, flowers and grass are shallow, it is the time of the year. I think that the ancients chose the festival of mourning for the dead in the Qingming festival, which in itself contains a profound concept of life: life has a beginning and an end, and when all things are born, they miss their ancestors and relatives and friends, and the grief of losing their love is comforted in the new Qingming of nature. Therefore, I personally agree that the way to commemorate is to be close to nature and spring with my living relatives, to remember and miss the deceased in the spring tour, to thank them for being with us, to love and warm us, and to pray that the heavens and the earth will always be in the same place.

Tell us about the experience of sending off your life the most?

Xie Yingying: At noon on March 3, 2019, Chen Jianai, the husband who had been in love with each other for 60 years, passed away peacefully at the age of 82. My daughter and I were by his side. I asked him an hour ago if he was uncomfortable, and he shook his head. He was running out of oil, so there was no pain and walked gently. I sent a message in the circle of friends: "The hunter has returned home, the sailor has returned, and the noble and lovely soul of the father-in-law has soared to heaven!" "When young friends saw the news, many people went to the memorial service, and later heard from friends that they had never seen such a warm memorial service, which was unique. I also know that he didn't really leave. He remains in my heart forever.

Zhao Yun: Reading this question, there is no doubt that I will recreate the scene of bidding farewell to Xian Yi's uncle in Babaoshan 13 years ago. I stood in the ranks of my family, and when a few Scottish folk songs that the old man loved before he died sounded, my heart ached like a tear, and the tears flowed uncontrollably, and it was difficult to suppress the almost fainting. When the family made a final farewell, my uncle was lying in the flowers in an old brown suit, as kind and calm as usual, and I mourned that I did not want him to be pulled away...

Liu Hongbo: Since about the beginning of the founding of the people, this kind of thing has happened from time to time in my life. To say that the biggest influence on me was to say goodbye to my father.

It was learned that my father had liver cancer, which was advanced, on a Day of April 2008. When I rushed back to my hometown, my father was sallow and obviously aged a lot. I lied that because the students were going to volunteer for the Olympics, the school was on holiday early, and my father was very happy. As we chatted, I massaged him and noticed that his legs and feet were swollen badly. Within a few days, my father's condition deteriorated to the point where he couldn't eat any more, and then his eyes couldn't see. My father wanted to be strong, and I watched him grope his hands before he found that he was blind, and his heart ached to the point of suffocation.

Father walked very fast, not more than half a month ago. After bidding farewell to his father and returning to Beijing, the May sun was particularly harsh. For a long time I was in a trance state, blind to everything around me, without sorrow or joy, without desire or desire, but I would unconsciously burst into tears. The strong thought is that it takes a long time before it seems to break through the ice and the water is gushing out. I don't want to be separated forever! Every day I look forward to my father to give me a dream...

If you have a life around you that you can't let go of for a long time, how do you heal yourself?

Xie Yingying: I don't feel particularly sad that my husband is gone, because the two of us have loved each other and supported each other for 60 years, and when we were alive, we achieved perfection and no regrets. He was gone, and I often saw him in my dreams. Whenever I miss him, I rejoice whenever I read the books and poems he wrote, the poems he translates, and the ability to discover a new humor that can be mocked and self-deprecating.

We also have many wonderful experiences to remember... Even if he was sick and sick in his later years, he was hospitalized with a fall, and the scene where we lived in the hospital together was enough to warm my heart when I recall it.

Zhao Yun: The sudden death of my father in 1999 made me slow down for several years. I would wake up crying in the morning with tears streaming down my face. I fantasize that one day I can put together the ashes that my father scattered in the Oujiang River, buried under the lilac tree on the Campus of Nanda University, and under the pomegranate tree in the courtyard of the family, how good it would be to restore a father! I remember the last long letter that my father wrote to me before I died, "You are a child who can write, can write, dare to write..." After my father left, I did not quit writing, the more I wrote, the more open, the more mature. Writing has become my life and a great spiritual comfort. If Dad had known from heaven, he would have been pleased.

Liu Hongbo: Rationally, I can't let go of my father's departure, probably for two reasons: one is that my father is in too much of a hurry, and I am not mentally prepared; the other is that I have not been able to bear the guilt of falling on my knees. Time, memory, responsibility, these three medicines should be the main bar, time will consume pain, memory can comfort the heart, and responsibility forces you to face reality.

My personal self-healing also benefited from the dream of being with my father, who was probably reluctant to let his daughter suffer from missing, and finally appeared in my thousands of calls, with a funny and a little helpless look, like any father who spoiled his daughter and was wayward.

If you were to confront your child, how would you answer "What is death?" "Such a question?

Yingying Xie: When my child was five years old, the father of her kindergarten child died suddenly. I told the child that the father of the little friend was gone, that he was going to heaven. In the future, your little friend will not have a father, and without a father to love him and hold him, their family's life will become worse.

Zhao Yun: I will tell my children that death is an irresistible natural phenomenon that everyone must go through, and it is life from birth to the end. Death is not terrible, just a permanent goodbye to family, friends and classmates. Death is going to another world. Life is long and short, so we who are alive should cherish life extraordinarily, live happily and meaningfully, and be a person with love in our hearts.

Liu Hongbo: Death is a long, long dream, like Sleeping Beauty.

Wu about life and death, please recommend a book or film and television work that most inspires you, why?

Xie Yingying: I recommend Kafka's Metamorphosis. Gregory disliked his job as a salesman so much that he was depressed to a certain extent and deformed. The family began to work on their own, the family life continued, and the attitude towards him went from the initial concern to the final indifference, so much so that they wanted him to die.

Social and family oppression can kill people. One should find oneself, do what one loves, and lose oneself without having to think about one's family in everything.

Zhao: I would like to recommend the Soviet novel "Doctor Zhivago" and the German film "No War on the Western Front". Both works have the shocking power of life and death, dr. Zhivago and nurse Lala are in love with each other, and lovers who have gone through hardships have been reunited for a long time but have passed by, and they have become eternal tips. At the end of the film, on the front line of World War I, on this rare day without war, a young and handsome German soldier Paul stood up from the trench to paint, and was killed by a cold shot from the enemy. The return to silence in the battlefield adds to the tragic color. When I read these scenes, I think that there is also love in the cruel fate, and the desire for a better life. This is also a belief that I must stick to.

Liu Hongbo: Regarding life and death, I recommend the 2007 American film "Bucket List", starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. What struck me about this movie was that it was better to act than to act, and it was never too late to fulfill my wish.

Sooner or later, everyone will face disease, aging, disability, and the end, in your opinion, what is the way and way to face the "fear of death"?

Xie Yingying: I have been paraplegic for 33 years, and I have suffered from pain for decades. Now I am in a state of old, sick, disabled and semi-disabled, close to the end, but I have no fear of death. As long as we can do something, whether it is reading and writing or listening to the voice of the heart, doing what we can, helping others, benefiting ourselves, treating all things with love and compassion, and observing the world with curiosity, when Angel comes, we can calmly follow him.

Zhao Yun: First of all, face up to the fate of the god of death, sooner or later. Secondly, before life, be charitable and charitable, as far as possible to complete their life wishes, make a difference, and realize their self-worth. When I went to see the world, my heart became open, and I understood that the earth is round and should not be complacent. There are also those who have loved or been loved in this life, and by doing all this, when death comes, looking back on this life, they will be much more calm, more beautiful than regret, and calmly overshadow fear.

Liu Hongbo: Disease, aging, disability, the end, these are indeed the things that everyone has to face sooner or later, whether there is a "fear of death" or not. Qingming Festival is actually the embodiment of the wisdom of the ancients, and I understand it as a drill to face death. Every spring when the flowers are warm and the vitality is at its peak, we come to think about death and deepen our understanding of life in the review of death. Because there is life, there is expectation; because there is death, there is cherishing. From birth to death, in the past hundred years, I have struggled, worked hard to become a better self, loved, warmed, helped, and protected others, and I have saved wealth in my life. Old, can't walk, there are memories, there are still people worried, should not be afraid. For the things we can't decide, let it be.

If you were the screenwriter of your own life's story, how would you design the end of this story?

Xie Yingying: I naturally like to hold the hand of my lover and ascend to heaven in the finale, regardless of whether I am sick or not.

Zhao Yun: I hope that I will remain in the state of writing until the last moment, or stop at the painting scene. I hope I look good, I should have the appearance, the white hair is not messy, and the clothes are well-dressed and elegant. I hope that before I die, the person who loves me will be with me. All the grievances that were once written off.

Liu Hongbo: Make up stories, this is good! I imagine: Teacher Liu's life after retirement is uneventful, one day he woke up from a nap, and suddenly found himself on a flying machine, below which was a blue earth, oceans, islands... The aircraft is not large, only herself, and there is no joystick, dashboard or the like. After the initial panic, Teacher Liu was appointed to relax and relax, and it turned out that the flying machine could do whatever he wanted, more powerful than Sun Wukong's golden hoop stick. Teacher Liu was overjoyed and went to soar freely in the universe...

Which of the three things do you think you are most proud of and "worthy of this life"? For the rest of your life, what are your personal dreams that reflect the value of your life?

Xie Yingying: I am most worthy of the three things in this life: 1. I have always loved the person I believeD I want to love, until he is gone, the love is still continuing; 2. I am wholeheartedly devoted to the work of teaching and educating people, I dare not slacken off, I love students like children, they love me like a mother or grandmother; 3. I have always lived in the world with my conscience, do what should be done, try to do things that can be beneficial to others, never do things against my heart, and never say things against my heart. For the rest of my life, I will still look at the life with compassion and do what should be done with my conscience. With a pure and soft heart to get along with people, the ultimate goal I pursue is to live out the shadow of the Son of Man.

Zhao Yun: "Worthy of this life": 1. Fortunately, the innate character is enthusiastic and not indifferent, is lenient and does not care, is independent and fearless and has perseverance; 2. Very early on, he chose the literature and art he liked as his lifelong career and obtained a sense of happiness; 3. As a woman, he had an unforgettable love.

For the rest of my life: I hope to write one or two literary works that can be passed down in my lifetime, such as Lot's "Job", Xiao Hong's "Hulan River", and Pasternak's "Doctor Zhivago"; publish one or two self-illustrated poems; hold a retrospective exhibition and publish a picture book; record too much in this life, whether words and paintings, I hope that they will have a cherished home.

I look forward to seeing world peace in my lifetime. If I can't wait for this day, I pray that my descendants will have this blessing!

Liu Hongbo: "If you are born here now", I have really thought about this question. In the past two years, I have been surrounded by people who have traveled far and wide, including my middle school and university teachers and the students I have taught. Some of them are in their nineties, and some are only in their thirties, which is exactly the sentence "There are no old or young people on Huangquan Road". Therefore, I can't help but think, if I am born here now, how will I stay? After a few days of entanglement, I found that my answer was: no, what to do and what to do.

Is this a shame to feel worthy of this life? In a sense, there is no denial of the first half of life, no feeling that it should be changed, forget it. But it is still a little difficult to cite the three most proud things, because I have always felt that I am still a small writer, still on the road, and have not yet done anything.

If I am worthy of this life, then I can probably say that I have never slackened my efforts to be a good mother, a good teacher, and try to maintain an independent self. But if you don't do it, to what extent you have done it, I am afraid it is not easy to talk to yourself.

After the rest of my life, I don't know how long the rest of my life will be. I hope to live as healthy as possible first, and under this premise, I will write down the books I have read in the first half of my life, the roads I have traveled, and the problems I have thought. If there is more balance, translate several contemporary Russian novels.