A few days ago, the heat was unbearable. I made an appointment with the old man to chat, and the location was set at a Japanese restaurant.
The reason why I chose that store is that it is very close to the elderly’s home and very quiet. Unexpectedly, after sitting down, the old man looked up at the Japanese furnishings in the room and suddenly sighed. I only realized after the narrative began that the beginning of the story was closely related to Japan.
The old man lowered his head and drank barley tea . His silver hair fell down a small strand of it, hanging on his silent forehead.
I couldn't guess the complicated eyes behind those retro round lenses, so I had to stay silent and wait for him to speak.
The long story slowly opens in such an atmosphere. The old man's legendary ups and downs of the family past, one by one, spreading in the intermittent narrative, outlining the context bit by bit.
Back then, my great-grandfather's family moved from Hebei to Weifang, Shandong to make a living, but they were still so poor that they couldn't eat enough.
Great-grandfather and brothers are the eldest, and they must shoulder the burden of supporting the family. He took his two younger brothers to Qingdao , hoping to find a way out in the bustling city known as "Little Shanghai in the North". But after walking around, I couldn't even find a job in charge of food.
As the year approaches, the three brothers are discouraged. Could it be that I just went back empty-handed? How to face the withered face of parents? Three young men squatted dejectedly on the street, their stomachs getting thicker than a pool of mud.
Two younger brothers are waiting for the elder brother to make an idea. My great-grandfather stomped his feet hard on the curb and said to his two younger brothers, "Let's go home! There is no place for us to eat here." The two younger brothers lowered their heads blankly and said nothing.
The salty and wet sea breeze penetrated into the cracks of human bones. The hungry and cold brothers began to miss home very strongly, missing the thin stick porridge made by my old mother that could see the shadows.
The fate of a person is even more strange than imagined. A strange fragrance suddenly floated at that time, which changed the direction of our family.
The first person to smell the strange fragrance was my great-grandfather.
The rich, spell-like fragrance penetrated into his nostrils. He sniffed hard, his nostrils greedily opened and closed. Soon, the two brothers also noticed something strange. The six nostrils on the three high noses (the characteristics of our family) move together, neatly as if they are beaten.
They quickly recognized where the strange fragrance mixed with the smell of meat came from. Liu Ziji pulled his rag shoes, following the strong fragrance, and stopped at the door of a house.
The three of them leaned their heads and looked in. I saw an old man in the yard holding a red-hot iron hook and burning a fat pig's head. With a "sourcing", a stream of white smoke came out of the pig's head, and the fishy fragrance rushed out, "sucked" and drilled into the cold nose of the three homeless men outside the door, and then firmly entrenched on their respective hearts.
Great-grandfather looked at the two brothers' straight eyes and the Adam's apple that was constantly swallowing the air, and his eyes turned red. At that moment, he felt cruel in his heart: In the future, our family will have to eat a pig's head every year during the Chinese New Year!
For this "ambition", my great-grandfather stayed in Qingdao. He is the eldest son, and it is his life to take on this dilapidated family. He vowed to find a way out so that the whole family would no longer be hungry.
A few months later, he followed a fellow villager to the gate of the Japanese training center. It was a cold winter morning, with a large cloud of gloomy clouds pressing down on the sky.
If he knew how to die like his son and daughter-in-law would rather starve to death than step into that door.
The old man stopped.
The expression on his face was frozen into a dull fold under the orange lantern above his head. Two white eyebrows were lying tiredly on the high and wide forehead, like two rows of sparse green onion leaves in the dry land. A deep and long ravine hanging between the two rows of green onion leaves.
The following story seems to be getting more difficult. I renewed a cup of tea for him and waited silently for the hoarse voice to ring again.
Great-grandfather survived in Qingdao.
He learns Japanese and learns very quickly. Afterwards, he participated in a business training class at Waseda University in Japan and began to learn some business methods.
At that time, many Japanese businessmen came to Qingdao to do business. With his fluent Japanese and basic business knowledge, my great-grandfather worked as a Japanese translation work among Chinese and Japanese businessmen.
Great-grandfather stood up in Qingdao. The two younger brothers rushed to join them, and he helped them find a job to support their family. Just like that, the whole family moved to Qingdao and settled down.
My great-grandfather fulfilled the oath he made. Then every New Year's Eve from now on, the family would burn a pig's head. This tradition has become a kind of "family rules" and has continued to the end of my great-grandfather's life. Even after his death, it still lasted for a long time.
After moving the whole family to Qingdao, life gradually stabilized. The trees planted by great-grandfather in the yard were yellow and green. Time is like clouds chased by the sea breeze, changing shapes and disappearing in the farther horizon.
Great-grandfather marrys his sons and has children, and they have reproduced and reproduced from generation to generation. My grandfather is the eldest son of my great-grandfather, and my father is the eldest grandson of my great-grandfather. The elderly, especially the elderly in the north, are the greatest happiness in their lives.
And my great-grandfather is a wandering person in his heart.
When all the family thought they would spend their whole life in Qingdao, their great-grandfather carried a suitcase and brought his eldest grandson, who had just turned 18, who was my father. Regardless of the family's dissuasion, he boarded the train to the outside of the pass.
My father, smart and gentle. In front of his strong great-grandfather, he dared not disobey him, and could only follow my great-grandfather honestly and sail towards an unknown fate.
The strange journey of several days and nights made my father both excited and panicked.
He stared at the changing scenery outside the car window, feeling his mother's warm and rough hands quickly thrown away. He didn't know when he would be allowed to go home, and he didn't know what kind of life would be waiting for him.
He didn't know that in the strange and cold Harbin, there was a beautiful girl who was being pulled by a red thread in the dark, approaching him little by little. She will marry him and give birth to a son with some quirks, and that will be their eldest son, me.
My mother was a rich daughter who was fond of being raised by a rich family at that time. Her parents' wings blocked the storm outside for her, and she had never seen the sorrow and danger of life.
At that time, there was a bustling street called Daoli . There are traffic on the street and shops are lined up. More than half of the shops belong to my mother's home.
My mother grew up to be a gentle and beautiful girl in such a wealthy family. She had a simple imagination of the future and did not notice the fate at all. The giant beast had secretly stretched out her cruel giant hand in the shadows around.
The avalanche-like decline of the family began when my grandfather met a Japanese ronin that night.
(To be continued)
The expression on his face was frozen into a dull fold under the orange lantern above his head. Two white eyebrows were lying tiredly on the high and wide forehead, like two rows of sparse green onion leaves in the dry land. A deep and long ravine hanging between the two rows of green onion leaves.
The following story seems to be getting more difficult. I renewed a cup of tea for him and waited silently for the hoarse voice to ring again.
Great-grandfather survived in Qingdao.
He learns Japanese and learns very quickly. Afterwards, he participated in a business training class at Waseda University in Japan and began to learn some business methods.
At that time, many Japanese businessmen came to Qingdao to do business. With his fluent Japanese and basic business knowledge, my great-grandfather worked as a Japanese translation work among Chinese and Japanese businessmen.
Great-grandfather stood up in Qingdao. The two younger brothers rushed to join them, and he helped them find a job to support their family. Just like that, the whole family moved to Qingdao and settled down.
My great-grandfather fulfilled the oath he made. Then every New Year's Eve from now on, the family would burn a pig's head. This tradition has become a kind of "family rules" and has continued to the end of my great-grandfather's life. Even after his death, it still lasted for a long time.
After moving the whole family to Qingdao, life gradually stabilized. The trees planted by great-grandfather in the yard were yellow and green. Time is like clouds chased by the sea breeze, changing shapes and disappearing in the farther horizon.
Great-grandfather marrys his sons and has children, and they have reproduced and reproduced from generation to generation. My grandfather is the eldest son of my great-grandfather, and my father is the eldest grandson of my great-grandfather. The elderly, especially the elderly in the north, are the greatest happiness in their lives.
And my great-grandfather is a wandering person in his heart.
When all the family thought they would spend their whole life in Qingdao, their great-grandfather carried a suitcase and brought his eldest grandson, who had just turned 18, who was my father. Regardless of the family's dissuasion, he boarded the train to the outside of the pass.
My father, smart and gentle. In front of his strong great-grandfather, he dared not disobey him, and could only follow my great-grandfather honestly and sail towards an unknown fate.
The strange journey of several days and nights made my father both excited and panicked.
He stared at the changing scenery outside the car window, feeling his mother's warm and rough hands quickly thrown away. He didn't know when he would be allowed to go home, and he didn't know what kind of life would be waiting for him.
He didn't know that in the strange and cold Harbin, there was a beautiful girl who was being pulled by a red thread in the dark, approaching him little by little. She will marry him and give birth to a son with some quirks, and that will be their eldest son, me.
My mother was a rich daughter who was fond of being raised by a rich family at that time. Her parents' wings blocked the storm outside for her, and she had never seen the sorrow and danger of life.
At that time, there was a bustling street called Daoli . There are traffic on the street and shops are lined up. More than half of the shops belong to my mother's home.
My mother grew up to be a gentle and beautiful girl in such a wealthy family. She had a simple imagination of the future and did not notice the fate at all. The giant beast had secretly stretched out her cruel giant hand in the shadows around.
The avalanche-like decline of the family began when my grandfather met a Japanese ronin that night.
(To be continued)
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