Chapter 2 Section 1: An Urban Village Full of Dreams

I have been living in a village in the city for a year and have made many friends.A year later, when I became a reporter for that metropolis newspaper, my friends in the village in the city became my informants, and they provided me with many clues, all of which were precious. My department in the Metropolitan Daily had no branch and no source of clues. It was my friends in the village in the city who allowed me to fight my way out and stand out in an extremely competitive environment. Until now, when I am not busy with work, I often come to the village in the city to see where I started, and to see the dark and damp house where I could only fit a single bed.The people who live in this house are often changed, but they are all poor people like me at the beginning, with disheveled faces, sluggish expressions, and melancholy.But I know that everyone has dreams.

The urban village is a maze. The roads of the villages in the city extend in all directions and are dense like cobwebs; the roads of the villages in the city are very narrow and twisty.Almost every gold digger who just came to the city from the countryside will choose to live in a village in the city.Because the rent in urban villages is very cheap. An urban village is a small society. There are all kinds of people from the bottom of the society living here, and they have various occupations or no occupations.The roads in the village in the city are extremely narrow. A bicycle staggers over with its bell ringing and dragging a gas tank, and the pedestrians on the opposite side are about to hide on the steps on both sides.The two children were chasing and running in the alley, and pedestrians in the entire alley had to stop and give way.There are shops on both sides of the road in the village in the city, and these shops also bear the brand of the village in the city: sewing shop, barber shop, grocery store, pirated disc shop, second-hand book shop, mahjong stand, pornographic hair salon...these shops are all dark and small, Business is light, and there are few birds.On the streets where the sun can shine, there will be no such low-cost, low-income shops.

Everyone who comes to a village in the city is equally poor and destitute, and those who come out of the village in the city include rich men with a lot of money, elite white-collar workers in office buildings, and of course fugitives who murder and rob goods, and some are still penniless and really can't get along. Go down and have to go home to the peasants. There are countless small rooms in the urban village, and each room has an unknown secret.Those screenwriters who work behind closed doors can't think of their exquisite stories.People living in urban villages are a group of neglected people whose lives are unknown.

At that time, I lived with me in a rented house on the first floor. There were two dumb knife sellers; A prostitute who often brings back different men at night; a white-collar worker in a company who has not yet signed a contract and whose salary is low; An unknown painter dreaming of being a painter, shutting himself in his room to paint all day long; a young couple put their children in their rural home, fantasizing about buying a house and a car here, bringing their children here, and reuniting the family; there is another A girl dreams of being a singer. Two mutes, I don't know what their relationship is, one is in his thirties and the other in his twenties.Every morning, they finished their breakfast, ate half of it, kept half, and left the half to eat when they came back in the evening.After breakfast, they went out, each with a big woven bag on his shoulder.When they came to the intersection, they sat on the ground and took out a chopping board, a kitchen knife, and a piece of wire from the woven bag.They knocked the chopping board loudly with the back of their knives, attracting the attention of passers-by.Then, they put the wire on the chopping board, held a kitchen knife in their hands, and with one cut, the wire was shortened;They yelled excitedly and waved their kitchen knives like a flag of victory.

Although the kitchen knives are sharp, their business is not easy.If the business is not good, their food is very poor, and it is rare to have meat dishes.One morning, as soon as I got up, they knocked on my door, dragged me to their room, served a bowl of carrots and boiled meat, and insisted on me eating.They can't speak, but their hearts are as clear as a mirror, knowing who treats them well, they will repay them double. And I was kind to them, although I only walked into their room occasionally and gave them a cigarette each. The couple who didn't find a job slept in the room all day, and it was rare to see them coming out, and it was rare to see them cooking.They drink water throughout the day and rely on water for sustenance.It was quiet in their room, and they didn't know what they were doing in it.They were all sallow, emaciated, and taciturn.Later, the girl left first, and she didn't know where she went. Soon, the boy also left, and he sold everything in the room.One day, I walked into the empty room where they lived, and saw a few lines written in a ballpoint pen on the newspaper pasted on the wall: "I can't go on like this. I will continue to look for a job tomorrow." Xiaoli is gone, what is the meaning of living alone." "I am a loser, I want to end my life." It turned out that in those days, in this quiet rented room, there was a sad scene. Absolute love story.

Those little girls are the happiest people in the household on this floor. They go to work very early and come back very late.As soon as they came back, their laughter was rippling on the floor.They will hum the songs that have just started to become popular.They especially like Korean dramas, and they often sit around the door of the small shop downstairs, watching a small TV placed in the corner, until late at night.They imagined that they would have an adventure like the heroine in Korean dramas, meeting a prince riding a white horse, looting them into the palace, and then living a fairy-tale life with no worries about food and clothing and swarms of slaves.Their educational level is generally low. They all graduated from junior high school and work in a black factory in an urban village. This black factory hidden in the basement produces fake brand-name T-shirts and shorts.

A prostitute works in a massage parlor in a village in the city. Sometimes she comes back, sometimes she doesn't come back. When she comes back, she will definitely bring a man with a different face.The prostitute's room is the most beautiful room in the rental house on this floor, and it looks very cozy.Foam puzzles with cartoon drawings of various animals cover the floor.Mirrors adorn the walls, making the space look much bigger.The bed that has slept countless men is very wide and firm, making everyone who sees it dreamy.The prostitutes' cries were loud and persistent, often covering entire buildings in the middle of the night and making everyone who heard them blush.

And in this building, there are also some teenage children living here with their migrant parents, and they fall asleep listening to such calls every day. Next door to the prostitute lived a young white-collar worker.This small white-collar worker in the company has just graduated from university and is full of longing and longing for a happy life.The company he works for is in a tall office building near the village in the city, and there are often BMWs and Mercedes-Benz parked in front of the office building.What the white-collar workers like to talk about most is that their boss owns a BMW, the latest model, and there are not many such expensive cars in the whole city.Little white-collar workers also like to say that they all use computers at work, one for each person, and there is no paper in the office. Press the button on the wall, and the buttocks will be rinsed and then dried.” The working environment of small white-collar workers has made us envious for a long time, but we are still skeptical.Later, when I also worked in the office building, I realized that the young white-collar workers were bragging. I am afraid that Mrs. Clinton would also use toilet paper after going to the toilet. Where would there be such a "butt dryer"?

The little white-collar worker finally achieved success. After a long half-year trial period, he finally signed a contract with the company and moved out of the village in the city.On the evening before he left, he called me, and the painter—probably the only "cultural person" in the building—we had a meal together in a decent restaurant.The little white-collar worker said that his ideal is to open a multinational company, go to work by plane, be in Europe in the morning, come to China in the afternoon, and direct the global business.The little white-collar is in high spirits, pointing out the country, which makes me, who has been through vicissitudes, infinitely envious.

The painter is my best friend in the village in the city. He graduated from an art academy in a nearby provincial capital city. He is tall and thin, like clothes on a bamboo pole. When he walks, his clothes are rickety. He is really "personable" ".The painter wears a shawl and long hair, drinks alcohol and smokes, and is full of profound theories. After listening to it, people feel as if they are in the fog, but they feel awe. I often go into the painter's room, and his room must be the most chaotic room I have ever seen in my life. On the floor, on the bed, on the dining table...wherever things can be placed, there are all kinds of oil paintings prints and books.Da Vinci, Titian, and Raphael squeezed in the corner, Xu Beihong, Luo Zhongli, and Chen Danqing slept side by side on the bed, Repin and Levitan faced each other with zero distance, and Michelangelo sat on the bed. Tilting his neck behind the door, he looked at all this coldly...

When the painter returns to the room, he will put on a blue coat, which is covered with spots of paint.It is winter, and a beam of unusually precious sunlight shines in from the gap of the "Handshake Building". The painter sits in the sunshine, holds a brush, and his face is full of intoxication and happiness.And in summer, the painter would take off his clothes, only wearing a pair of trousers, and paint in the rented house.Painting is the only daily content of the artist's life. Various art exhibitions are often held in this city. At first, the artist's oil paintings were hung on the walls of the rural exhibition rooms in the outskirts, and few people paid attention to them; later, his oil paintings entered the artist's gallery in the city center. Into the eyes of those artists.The price of the artist's oil paintings is getting higher and higher. Now, one of his oil paintings can be exchanged for a car. We've been in touch all these years.The painter's life is still wild and uninhibited, and he is still single.The painter said that he often wandered around the village in the city where he lived at the beginning. Whenever he came to the village in the city, there were thousands of words in his heart, turbulent and turbulent, but he couldn't express it. Among the others, the one who left a deep impression on me was the girl who dreamed of becoming a singer.She secretly came here from a small city in the north before finishing high school, dreaming of meeting a Bole like Wang Kun.When Wang Kun discovered Li Guyi and Wei Wei, the girl believed that there would not be only one Wang Kun in this world.The girl's voice is very similar to Tian Zhen's, hoarse and vicissitudes. At that time, there were no imitation shows like now, and it is not like now that they can compete on TV.No matter how much a girl looks like Tian Zhen, she will never become Tian Zhen. Tian Zhen sings on the stage illuminated by neon lights, and girls can only sing in their hearts. At that time, girls often traveled to and from opera houses, university campuses, and various performance groups, imagining that someone would discover her and someone would recommend her.The girl is very thin, but her eyes are shining, full of fanaticism and dedication to art.Afterwards, where the girl went and whether she was on the stage, I never knew.