Bam, darkness came. A large, dim, square moon appeared on the opposite wall. Yue Zhifeng's heart clenched and stretched. The car was shaking gently. People were gently swaying. What a sweet cradle of childhood! In the summer, put your clothes under the big willow tree, stripped naked little friends jumped into the hometown's cool creek in a single leap, a jolt out of a dozen meters, who knows who showed his head where? Who knows how many toads and tadpoles are contained in the mouthful of water he swallowed in a panic? Close your eyes and sleep on top of the ripples glistening with sunlight and tree shadows, isn't it also rocking gently, gently? Do the lost and un-lost childhoods and homelands blame me? Do they welcome me? My mother's grave and my father's grave!
The square moon moved, disappeared, and was born again. The only small square window let in a beam of light, was it the afterglow of the setting sun or the lamp of the station? Why were even the other three square windows covered up? It was dark, as if the afternoon was to be followed by night. The door slammed shut, cutting off the outside world. Was the sound of hail getting louder and louder? Was it a hammer on an anvil? In the countryside of the Loess Plateau, where iron is still made by men everywhere, how muscular are the arms of our motherland! Heh, of course, that's just the noise of wheels hitting the rails, coming from the gap between this rail and that. Isn't there a soft song in vogue at the moment, what's it called - "Spring Water Clanking". What if the train clanks and clanks too? Guangzhou people really know how to live, unlike on the northwest plateau, where a thick layer of yellow soil covers the faces of people and the windowpanes of houses. Guangzhou people's pergola below, hanging a lot of triangular ceramic plate, along with the wind, they issued a tinkling sound, pleasant to the soul. American abstract music, on the other hand, screams madness. I wonder how Kissinger felt when he listened to our Yang Zi Rong aria. Is there noise in the gongs and drums of a play, and is all noise unpleasant? Anyway, the sound of the wheels after the train has started gives encouragement and hope. At the next stop, or the next stop after the next stop, or the next stop after many, many next stops, the life you are looking for is there, with a mother or a child, a friend or a wife, a warm bath or a hearty meal waiting for you. It's all about coming home for Chinese New Year. The Chinese New Year, the best festival of our ancient nation, is now, thank goodness, a happy one for all the people of the country. No longer will the Spring Festival be canceled in the name of "revolutionization".
It's funny. After returning from a three-month study trip abroad and staying in a high-class hotel in Beijing for a while - summarizing, reporting, receiving and reporting ...... - Yue Zhifeng received a letter from his 80-year-old father, who had just removed his landlord's hat. He decided to make a trip back to his hometown, which he had been away from for more than twenty years. Was this a mistake? How could he not expect to have to sit in a stuffy car for two hours and forty seven minutes ah. Three hours earlier, he had been sitting in a spacious, comfortable seat on a Trident airliner traveling from Beijing to X City. Two months ago, he was on an Elbe River liner bound for Hamburg. Now he was crammed in with all those dusty, faceless travelers in the dark, like sardines in a tin box. He couldn't even tell which way the train was going. The only thing in front of him was the moon-like spot of light moving rapidly, and whether the train was traveling in the same direction as the spot of light or in the opposite direction? He, an engineering physicist, was stumped by this not-quite-geometric-optics question, which even an elementary school student could answer.
He hadn't been back to his hometown in more than 20 years. Who made him wrongly reincarnated? Landlords, landlords! He had been home once in 1956, and once was enough - home for four days, but reviewing for twenty-two years! And one sentence from a great man is enough for a hundred years of study and implementation. He was puzzled as to whether he had been born to make a review? Was he born in China to make a lifetime of review? Fortunately, all this is over. The assembly line of the Mercedes-Benz automobile factory in Stuttgart is constantly turning, and the workshop is clean and open without much noise. Siemens is a huge company with a history of 130 years. We're just getting started. Catch up, catch up! No matter how hard it is. So much for the stuffed car that was being driven fast. Not to mention the trident in the sky
The spicy odor from dry tobacco leaves appeared in the haze of dust and paper smoke, like needle burns to the trachea and lungs. The plum needles probably stuck in the lung lobes. The smell of sweat is much softer. The concentration of the dialect is between the dry tobacco and the sweat, both stimulating and friendly. And the scent of pumpkin! Who's eating pumpkins? I don't see any cooked pumpkins for sale in the square in front of the X-city train station. Other snacks and souvenirs are available. Peanuts, walnuts, sunflower seeds, persimmon cakes, drunken dates, mung bean cakes, yams, ferns ...... are all for sale. Just like a magic trick, hold up a piece of red cloth, point two fingers to the left, these things are all gone, even matches, batteries, soap are followed by shortages. Now, all at once, all changed again, perhaps reach out and grab two more grab, can grab more wealth. Persimmon cakes and dates are simple and unadorned, but they are sweet to the heart. Yue Zhifeng took a bite of the persimmon cake he bought before boarding the train, chewing on the sweet aroma of his childhood. The spicy flavor is always tasted at once, but the sweetness is buried deep and deep. It takes patience, goodwill, experience, and a keen sense of perception. Through the pungent tobacco and the hot, sweaty smell, Yue Zhifeng smelled the fragrance of green beans carried by the townspeople. The mung bean seedlings were lovely, as were the gray hares, but the gray hares often tried to destroy the mung beans. In order to chase the hare, he and Xiaozhuzi ran three miles in one breath, so much so that even the trees shook with the field attack. On a moonlit night in mid-autumn, he saw with his own eyes a silver-gray fox, walking silently, like an immortal, like a dream.
The sound of cars was small, the sound of cars was quiet. The sound of people grew louder, the sound of people boiled over. Bam - giggle, the iron door opens, the female conductor - a tall, big-boned girl is spilling out in her native dialect to direct the passengers who get off and get on the train. "There's no room, there's no room. Go to another car," was the ineffectual, and selfish, appeal of those who had already secured their places on the train. The passengers on board are crowding up, bustling. Everywhere you go, there is hustle and bustle. Compared to our Wangfujing, the streets of Hamburg are invisible, and the population of the city is still decreasing. Yue Zhifeng from the airport to the X city train station was startled - black pressure of people, oppression of the snow is not white, holly is not green. Could something have happened? In the student movement of 1946, people gathered in the station square, ready to stop the train to petition Nanjing, and there weren't so many people! Yue Zhifeng went to college in Beiping, once he went to visit the National Palace Museum, just four o'clock in the afternoon on the invisible, eerie halls make his back cold. He jogged away from the Forbidden City, on a crowded tram to feel a little more at ease. If he ran too slowly, Princess Zhen would probably come out of the well and pull him down!
But now there were long lines of people buying admission tickets in front of the south and north gates of the Forbidden City. And it's not Sunday.The crowds in front of the train station in City X are dizzying. It's as if half of all China is taking the train on the eve of the Chinese New Year. Everywhere there are reunions, meetings, reunion dumplings, reunion lanterns, the search for old friendships, for farewells, for the joy of family, for hometowns and childhood. The white cotton mattresses that cover the buns are covered with grease. Sellers of biscuits, helmets, doughnuts and cakes. Sells boxes of snacks, bread and cookies. Station X and the X City Food Service Company sold everything they had in the open air in front of the station. You have to work up a sweat just to buy two biscuits. How much did Yue Zhifeng sweat! After he had filled his stomach, "the rapid change in environment and material conditions had made him unable to distinguish between hunger and satiety," he bought a ticket for a short bus ride to his hometown. When he was looking for the money, he was stunned. It was written as $1.20, but why did he only receive 60 cents? Could it be that he didn't tell the name of the station clearly? He wanted to ask again, but the people behind him had already occupied the favorable position in front of the ticket window, and he could not squeeze back.
He looked at the ticket in his hand with dismay. Printed in bold letters on the ticket was 1?20 yuan, but then outlined in double dashed lines were two large words that filled the face of the ticket: Luk Kok. It puzzled him, almost like a biological code. "What's going on here? Why did she give me a 60-cent ticket when I bought a dollar and 20-cent ticket?" He muttered to himself. He asked others. No one answered him. Most of the people waiting to get on the bus were egotists who were forgivably busy.
A variety of information crashed through his mind. The blackened crowd. The greasy quilts that covered the steaming meat buns. Notices in large letters posted in the waiting room: about new trains being added during the Chinese New Year, and the schedules of the new trains that had been temporarily added. Long lines of people waiting to urinate in front of the men's and women's restroom doors. The double-hooked dotted line at the corner of the land. Big bundles and little bundles, big baskets and little baskets, big carrying pockets and little carrying pockets ...... He came to the conclusion that this last leg of the trip was going to be tough. He was mentally prepared. Finally, he heard the word "bog train" in the gossip of the travelers, and it dawned on him. The human brain was, after all, much smarter than a computer.
When he got on the train, he was a little downhearted. As the first Spring Festival of the 1980s approached, the people who were dreaming of the four modernizations had to ride in the stuffy cars of Watt and Stevenson's time! Facts. Facts are like the universe, like the earth, Huashan and the Yellow River, water and earth, hydrogen and oxygen, titanium and uranium. Neither as gentle nor as cold as one might imagine. Isn't it true that the stuffed car is full of people, and one by one, two by two, ten by twenty, they are still nestling into the gaps between people, molecule by molecule, atom by atom. Miraculously and inconceivably, so many more people were added to the already full car. No one screamed in agony.
Someone screamed in agony: "This box can't be pressed." A woman holding a child wrapped in a hijab tried to see if she could sit on one of the crates. "You come over here, you come over here." Yue Zhifeng hurriedly stood up and gave up his place against the side. Sitting at the side, one could lean on the wall of the car, which was the most superior "elegant seat". The woman was a little embarrassed. But she finally moved over with her small child in her arms. It took a lot of effort for her not to step on others. "Thank you!" The woman said in fluent Beijing dialect. She raised her head. Yue Zhifeng seemed to see a charcoal sketch. The title should be called Smile.
The bell jingled and the iron door banged shut again, a deeper blackness. The twilight outside the car was thickening too. The big-boned conductress lit a white wax candle and put it in a square glass enclosure. Why don't you light an oil lamp? Probably afraid of kerosene shake out. The large compartment, rely on this one candle to light up. A little light, the passengers into a shadow after a shadow. The car body shook again, the square spot of light on the opposite wall is rapidly moving again. Closer to home again. With his hat off and his son in sight again, the father should be able to rest in peace, shouldn't he? Whether it was his sin or his penitence, whether it was his tears or his gratitude, whether it was his hideous ugliness or his honest goodness, it was all about to cloud over with his disappearance. One by one, the Old Ones were making their way to the other side of the river. Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump... are they crossing the bridge? A bridge linking the past and the future, China and foreign countries, the city and the countryside, this bank and the other bank!
The wax lamps close by imprinted black-and-white light and shadows on the conductor's face. The female conductor resembled a full-body idol. "Comrades travelers, during the Spring Festival, passenger traffic is crowded, and our ticket cars (Ticket cars: railroad personnel generally refer to passenger cars as ticket cars.) Go to support the long distance ...... vigilance ...... "She said quite energetic, every spit out a word like tightening a nut. She had a confident, commanding presence, leading a carload of rabble by the light of a candle at a young age. But her voice was also drowned in the roar, the buzz, the rumble, the clamor of not only seven mouths but seventy mouths and eighty tongues.
Free market. Department store. Hong Kong electronic quartz watch. Yu opera movie "Reeling in. Mutton dumplings. Mash and egg flower. Three-jointed leather shoes. Three pieces of tile hat. Packet Production to Group. Acquisition of green onions. Chinese medicine for cancer. Differential Election. Wedding Feast ...... In the midst of all this warm gossip, Yue Zhifeng took turns transferring his weight from his left leg to his right leg and then from his right leg to his left leg. Fortunately, people have two legs, otherwise, standing unsupported amidst the density of people and things, it is not good. Standing in the middle of a cone, Yue Zhifeng now had a graphic understanding of this idiom. Could it be that there were such crowded, unseated and unlighted traveling vehicles in ancient times? But he gave up his "seat" to a lesbian. No, there was no seat, only a place. I can not imagine that she speaks a mouthful of Beijing dialect. This made Yue Zhifeng seem a little more excited. "Thank you", "sorry", in foreign countries are full of such polite words. Although a sack containing hard iron was squeezing the calf's stomach of his right leg. And another seated on the ground has his spine simply resting against his aching, tingling left leg.
It was simply magical. Not only while watching a performance in a theater in Munich; but also in Beijing, in institutes, ministries and hotels, in twenty-three-square-meter houses and one? Three and Three-Three-Two buses; he could not have imagined that people would have to ride in stuffed cars. Wasn't this the car that carried goods and livestock? Bad luck! But what's bad luck? It is easiest to curse. It is easier to curse a boring car than to build a new, beautiful, comfortable passenger train, which is both less laborious and more impressive. The spit of the idle and resentful is drowning the labors of those who endure and bury their heads in the sand. People are now and then shocking and replacing the work of those who work tenaciously, piece after piece, day after day, year after year, with a high profile and a low profile.
"It's a shame to give this kind of car a ride!"
"You make do. In the past, there was no railroad!"
"Troops are transported in stuffy tank cars, otherwise, they would be exposed."
"If you catch diarrhea, you'll be in trouble, there are no toilets on this kind of car."
"And no one pooped in their pants."
"What can be done? Every Spring Festival, more than 100 million people have to take the train ......"
Some of these conversations were heard in the darkness. Yue Zhifeng's heart calmed down. Yes, there was once no railroad here, no highway, not even a road for bicycles to walk on. The rich man rode a donkey, and the poor man relied on two feet. Peasants picked fifteen hundred eggs and set out from dawn in the morning, crossing countless hills and river valleys, only to arrive at X City at dusk. My dear beautiful but barren land! It's about time you became rich, isn't it? The memories of the past have faded like smoke and fog, but they will never be completely forgotten, will they? History, history; reality, reality; ideal, ideal; moo-moo-moo-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam ...... karang karang karang... ...highway along the Rhine. Grapes on the hillside. Dark green rivers. Spinning at speed.
Isn't that the children of Frankfurt? Boys and girls, yellow and blue eyes, chasing, running, jumping, cheering. The ones feeding the birds, the ones holding flowers, the ones blowing brass horns, the ones raising flags. That joyous sound of life. That moving cry of friendship. The red, pink and white roses. The violets and the blue of forget-me-nots.
No. That's not Frankfurt. That was the home of the Northwest Highlands. A giant white lilac put its flowers on the gray tiles of the roof. Like snow, like jade, like splashing waves. Pick a turquoise willow leaf, roll it into a small tube, look up at the blue sky and white clouds, and blow a shrill whistle. Startled two tiny orioles fly up. Put on a small basket, follow the big sister, go picking gray ash greens. To throw stones, to chase hares, to gather the speckled colored eggs of quail. Even every puppy, every kitten, every calf and donkey foal is playing. Even every little blade of grass was dancing.
No, that wasn't the Northwest Plateau. That was pre-liberation Beiping. The school committee under the North China Bureau's Urban Works Department (its minister was Comrade Liu Ren) organized a big reunion of Pingjin students. A campfire party. "The sun goes down and the morning still climbs up ...... my youth like a bird does not come back", "Who is it that opens the barren land on the mountain? Who planted the flowers on the ground?" Song after song stirred the hearts of the young people. In the end, everyone raised a strong voice that emboldened the Kuomintang agents: "Unity is strength ...... Let all undemocratic systems die!" Faith and happiness can never be separated.
No, that's not the departed, distant Beiping. That was the liberated, capital city flying the five-star red flag. That was the first love of his youth, the warm wind that first blew his heart. The Spring Festival had just passed, and suddenly, he realized that the wind was no longer so cold and harsh. The February wind then brought the hope of warmth and the news of early spring. He ran to the North Sea, the ice has not yet melted miles. There were no swimmers yet. He took off his hat, he unbuttoned the first button under the collar of his jacket. Is it still winter? Of course, it's still winter. But it is winter that has been linked to spring, a bridge between winter and spring. The wind is no longer cold, as evidenced by the wind! The wind will become warmer and warmer, such as drunkenness, such as crispy ...... he welcomed to bear the others still feel the cold, but he has been for the "spring" wind, whispering the name of the girl he quietly loved.
What, then, ...... is that? The first thing you need to do is to get your hands dirty. Is it water chestnuts and strawberries? Is it the rutabaga chickens that hatch eggs? It is the mountain spring, elm money, returned to the green wheat seedlings and pairs of swallows? He settled down. It was spring, it was life, it was youth. In our lives, in the chambers of each of our hearts, in the constellations of Orion and Cassiopeia, in every atomic nucleus, every proton, neutron, meson, does it not contain the power of spring, the sound of spring?
He settled back and rubbed his eyes. It was clearly the children of Frankfurt singing, in German, of course. A tenacious, muffled female voice accompanied the cheerful chorus of children's voices.
He settled down again, rubbed his eyes again, and it was clear that he was in a stuffy car traveling from X city to N place. In the midst of the dimness and noise, he heard a chorus of children's voices in German, and a low, unskilled, and rather strained female vocal accompaniment.
What? A tape recorder. Listening to a recording in this place. One song followed by another, then an adult one. Three songs played. It was the sound of bla bla bla snapping buttons, and then the three songs started over. The tenacious, muffled, unskilled female voice also restarted. The sound overpowered all the noise.
The train's long whistle. The moving square patches of light on the opposite wall slowed and increased in brightness. The passengers, who had become shadows in the dimness, gradually revealed three-dimensional shapes and silhouettes. There was a big jolt, and another, and presumably the train passed the turnoff. It's at the station again. Bam - giggle, the iron door opened, the strong light of the station's spotlight shone into the carriage. Yue Zhifeng saw clearly that the tape recorder was on the lap of the woman holding the child. Beginning the underman and the overman. The tape recorder accepted the instructions of the hostess, "bla", stopped singing.
"What brand is this ......?" Yue Zhifeng asked.
"The Sanyo brand. People here jokingly call it 'Little Goat'." The woman lifted her head and answered generously. Yue Zhifeng seemed to see her weathered, yet still young and clean face.
"Did you buy it from Beijing?" Yue Zhifeng asked again, somehow so interested. Originally, he was not a rakish person.
"No, just from here."
Here? I don't know if that meant City X or one of the smaller counties and towns the train was heading towards. He stared at the "Sanyo" logo.
"Are you learning foreign songs?" Yue Zhifeng asked again.
The woman smiled shyly, "No, I'm learning a foreign language." Her smile was both humble and noble.
"German?"
"Oh, yes. I haven't learned it yet."
"What kind of songs are these?" A youth sitting at Yue Zhifeng's feet asked. Yue Zhifeng's continuous questions attracted more people.
"They are ...... 'Little Bird, You're Back,' 'May Rotation Dance,' and 'The First Tobacco Flower,'" said the lesbian, "Hinmeyer - the -Sky, Fogel - Bird, Brummie - Flower ......" she whispered to herself.
Their words did not continue. The compartment was filled with the usual "Don't crowd!" Don't sit on this box!" "Don't step on the baby!" "There's no room on this side!" ...... and other shouts.
"Attention everyone!" A person in civilian police clothing got on the car, holding a semiconductor loudspeaker in his hand, and while gasping for breath, announced, "Just now, the previous car went up two bad guys, mixing up the water, hooligans pickpocketing. There are a handful of bad ruffians who specialize in stealing things from the stuffed tank cars. Those two bad guys we have caught. I hope that all travelers to raise vigilance, close cooperation, to the criminal elements to fight resolutely. Do you all hear me clearly?"
"Hear me clearly!" The passengers on the bus answered in unison like schoolchildren.
Satisfied, the police officer hurriedly jumped down, carrying a megaphone, and probably went to another compartment to make propaganda.
Yue Zhifeng couldn't help but feel the two travel bags he was carrying, the four pockets of his jacket and the three pockets of his pants. Everything was in order.
The car drove off. After a brief moment of confusion, people had taken their places again. Everyone was gossiping, everyone was dozing, everyone was getting high, everyone was smoking. "The Little Goat" was playing again, still "Birdie, You're Back," "May Rotation Dance" and "The First Tobacco Flower. She was still learning German, still whispering Hinmeyer - the sky, Fogel - the birds, and Brummie - the flowers.
Who is she? Was she young? Is that her child in her arms? Where does she work? Is she in science and technology? Is she a new student at a night college? Is she a graduate of the "Old Three"? Why is she studying German so hard? Is she catching up on lost time? Is she a graduate of the "Third Class"? Why is she studying German so hard? Is she catching up on lost time? Is she making it to the point where she won't lose a minute? Does she have a chance to meet German friends or go to Germany or has she already been there? Is she a Pekingese or a local? Does she often take the train? There are so many questions I want to ask.
"You listen to music." She said. As if to him. Yes, three songs later, she didn't press the button. After "The First Tobacco Flower" came Johann Strauss's "Waltz of the Voices of Spring," and the stuffy tank car was swaying gently, smoldering and swooning, curling forward to this springtime melody.
The car arrived at Yue Zhifeng's hometown. Small station, stop for a minute. Rang through the arrival bell, and immediately rang the departure bell. Yue Zhifeng carrying two travel bags off the car. The small station has no platform, the boring tank car and no steps. Each carriage put an ordinary wooden ladder, temporary support. Yue Zhifeng from this simple wooden ladder finally came down to the ground, he took a long breath. He said goodbye to the female comrade. The lesbian also answered his goodbye. He was a bit reluctant to leave. He had just gotten off the train, and before he could wait for his ticket to be checked out of the station, the train started. He saw the tattered and shabby appearance of the stuffy tank car: the paint had fallen off in places, and it looked white and flowery in the light. However, after getting off the train, he noticed that the locomotive was quite good, the locomotive was a new, clean, lightweight internal combustion locomotive. The internal combustion locomotive was green and blue; after all, there were no internal combustion locomotives in Watt's time. The internal combustion locomotive was dragging a long line of bored tank cars forward. The moon rose in the sky. The station was surrounded by a thin layer of snow. Both the sky and the snow were glowing with a continuous greenish light. You could see the dark, never-growing pines on the cemetery in the distance. There was a little wind. He walked on the pothole-ridden land of his hometown. He turned his head to take one more look at the stuffy, temporary substitute wagon loaded with birds, May, tobacco blossoms, and the divine spring sounds of John Strauss. It seemed as if he had never yet heard such a moving song. He felt that life was taking a turn for the worse in every corner these days, all interesting, hopeful and never to be forgotten. The melody of spring, the code of life, it was very precious.
(From the May 1980 issue of People's Literature)