1

The first time I took a train was in the winter of 2009. I was traveling with someone who would never let go of any opportunity in my lifetime to do something to my mind and body. Yang Yingzhan, who has ridiculed, attacked, exploited and other extremely vicious behaviors are too numerous to mention. Our trip that time was from Chongqing to Jinan, which spanned a long distance on the map. If we were in Europe, it would be equivalent to several cross-border trips.

Later, whenever someone brags in front of me about the cities they have been to, I will be very knowledgeable and list the cities that this train passes through, even those with names that are as unfamiliar as paradise. He didn't let go of the village streets until the other party was red-faced and resentful.

A few days ago, a friend who is a doctor told me that your sinusitis will affect your memory, but you are so old, it is okay to forget some things. I remained silent, vaguely feeling that he might have borrowed money from me before.

The most direct consequence of memory loss is that I completely forgot the reason for this long journey. I only remembered that my final destination was the coastal city of Qingdao, but why did I take the wrong medicine? As if following Yang Yingzhan and squeezing into this green train that even Nanjing bus drivers dare not drive? I definitely don’t believe that I am trying to save hundreds of dollars on air tickets. There must be a more noble reason than being short of money.

Maybe, I am here to experience life, it must be for this reason, it must be, when you are sitting on the rumble of the train, you may also find such a thing that you have to face. The right fact - in this life, you can only be on the road, always on the road...

2

I cannot say that I love trains without conscience. But I fell in love with that kind of state, that kind of state full of infinite possibilities. Maybe there is only one road, because there is no stop. For me, there are countless directions.

In this crowded train carriage, I passed by countless strangers one after another. I heard quarrels, singing, exchanges, temptations, laments and surprises in various tones. Walking and lingering among the crowd, looking around, hearing that the most extreme and extravagant prosperity in the world is the simplest and most essential desire between people.

When the train passed through Chengdu, a girl who worked for a mobile company came up. She may not be beautiful, but she is in her youth, when hormones are secreted. As soon as she got on the car, all the male compatriots in the sleeper car showed their wild nature and straightened their heads to chat with her. No matter he is sixty or sixteen years old, or whether he is wearing leather shoes or sneakers, there is no distinction between high and low in people's desires. Everyone is trapped in infinite possibilities and cannot extricate themselves.

I don’t remember the girl’s face because I didn’t get the ideal amount of attention in this competition that felt like mating season in the animal world. Now I really want to remember this girl I only met once, and I really want to know where she is now, who she is walking with, and who she is cooking for. Perhaps, there is a twists and turns and bizarre story hidden behind every ordinary face I pass by. It’s just that the natural barrier between people prevents us from hearing each other’s joys and sorrows, and we cannot appreciate or hate them.

3

The barriers between people make us stable.

This may be the reason why so many backpackers like to travel alone, because they know that cities and pedestrians that have nothing to do with them will not leave any traces in their lives. Come and go freely in it.

We are afraid of cities that are really entangled with us, such as Nanjing, Xi'an, and Chongqing. For many people I know, it is no longer a city, but a piece of history, a period of history. life.

On this train where pregnant women squeezed out abortions and virgins squeezed out pregnancy, Yang Yingzhan and I sat leisurely in the sleeper car and looked out the window at the Sichuan Basin and Loess Plateau.

At this time, I didn’t realize the significance of the space in which I could freely stretch my limbs. I blindly thought that some innate things were instincts given to us by God. Some time, until the dedicated conductor lifted my quilt and kicked us out of the sleeper car.

When we reluctantly left the sleeper car, I kept stealing glances at the girl who worked at the mobile company out of the corner of my eye. She looked at us as if she was frightened. My face turned red and I felt extremely sorry. I wanted to tell her several times that I could afford a full train ticket and that I came here just to experience life.

Later, I was very glad that I came to the hard-seat carriage, because here we saw the ultimate use of space by human beings. This is a unique scenery that cannot be seen on any bus in Nanjing. Yang Yingzhan and I were squeezed into the gap between the two carriages. The brothers and sisters around us were in their dreams, assuming all kinds of incredible postures that could only be seen in nightmares.

They slept so peacefully, completely ignoring the cold wind howling outside the car window and the stench of various bodily fluids filling the air. What I admire the most is the conductor who sells boxed lunches and snacks on the train. He pushes such a large sales cart on the tangled arms, thighs, leather shoes, and toes as fast as flying and as smooth as walking on the ground. His skills are so superb that he can do it without any doubt. Won the annual talent show championship.

When the wheels of the sales truck ran over my toes for the third time, I began to miss the good times I spent in the sleeper car. The corridor there was spacious enough for a hundred-meter hurdles, but I only saw The dust raised outside the car window.

It’s just that, only in my nostalgia, the memory that stays there is beautiful. In our lifetime, there are countless places we have never been to, and there are countless places we have experienced indifferently. For the first half, we deliberately avoided it because we were unable to predict it in advance. For the second half, because we were silent, we forgot the original troubles. So we often get stuck in the past we have experienced, unable to extricate ourselves, but forget that all the past was once the present.

Why can’t we get stuck in the present?

4

The present is too short and the memories are too long.

In every moment of my life, the present continues to become my history. This is the inevitable result of the passage of time. We can't stop it, we can only feel sad. So many times, when faced with memories, I am always unable to be relaxed and active, no matter whether those things that entangle us are beautiful or sad.

I can’t remember how long that journey lasted. What can remind me is the strange scenery outside the window that seems to never end. Checking the train schedule, it was only a day and night journey, but I remember falling asleep and waking up countless times, and in the end I couldn't tell where I was or where I was going.

In a short period of time, Yang Yingzhan beside me was able to have cordial and enthusiastic conversations with the strangers around me, covering topics such as astronomy, geography, and big breasts and buttocks. There are no accidents, this is his natural ability. In my understanding, Yang has always been the kind of person who desperately needs love. At any time, he cannot be a hermit who retreats to the mountains and forests to see through the world. He needs to be proven, noticed, surrounded, and admired. However, I also know that he is proud, indifferent, lazy, and enthusiastic. He carefully controls the distance between himself and the crowd, is ambiguous and entangled, and is decisive and cold. He needs friends, but many times, we wonder who his real friends are. He constantly strives to control this balance, and often appears hesitant until he is exhausted.

5

The scariest experience on this train was walking through the crowds to get to the restroom at the end of the aisle. In this distance that Bolt can complete in 3 seconds, I spent half an hour experiencing the unique feelings brought by the buttocks and breasts of different genders, ages, and body types. When I finally arrived at my destination like squeezing out toothpaste, my admiration for the train salesperson immediately burst out from my heart uncontrollably.

Of course, these are not the most terrifying things. The most terrifying thing is that I discovered a fact in the bathroom that was enough to change my world view, outlook on life and values. I discovered this fact the moment I pressed the toilet flush switch. For a long time, I repeatedly operated the flush switch in disbelief, and finally slumped against the door in despair. There were shouts outside the door, and someone started banging on the door because they couldn't bear the physical limit. Little do they know that behind the door, there is a world that is being overturned.

I opened the door in despair, passed through a bunch of men and women who were waiting at the door and were suffering from physical pain, desperately caressed the buttocks and breasts of indistinguishable gender, and returned to Yang's in despair. around. After Yang chatted happily and cordially with those real and fake friends of both men and women for a long time, he realized the sadness that I had no one to love. I looked at him sadly and almost burst into tears. The kind of heartbreaking grief was like a child who hangs his socks religiously by the bedside every year and suddenly finds Santa Claus's hat in the attic one day. All his faith collapses. .

6

My faith is the hope of getting out that was established in junior high school.

When I was in junior high school, the train drove into my hometown for the first time. From then on, in countless unforgettable evenings and mornings, I walked and ran alone on the train tracks that came from nowhere and went to nowhere. I ran into the wind, cheered and sang loudly. I have no reason to believe that one day, I will reach the end of this road and see clearly what the future looks like.

Many times, I fell head-on on the rails because I was running so selflessly. My lips touched the cold rails, and a salty taste of rust poured into my mouth. I became obsessed with this taste because I firmly believe that this is the ideal taste, the taste of the future, and the taste of the dream that I have to work for and persist in this life.

In my beautiful and innocent boyhood, I never thought about where the excrement from those dream chasers on the train went. When I started to realize this problem one day, I believed that the train In addition to checking tickets, selling goods, and rolling their eyes at a passenger who humbly asked where the boiling water was, the conductors on board also had a noble job, which was to clean up the excrement of people on the train. I once imagined with great emotion what a huge amount of work it would be, but now I know that they didn't do that at all.

They are the ones who have tarnished my faith.

7

I came to Jinan with a broken world in mind.

My first impression of this city was that of a secluded rural town, with its ancient and simple folk customs. There were not many pedestrians or vehicles on the road, which was spacious enough for a military parade. The taxi drivers, regardless of gender, were all strong and strong. Looking in from the window, they looked like the uncle who lived next door and often went downstairs to buy groceries shirtless.

There was no sign of fatigue from the journey on Yang's face. He was extremely excited when he heard the long-lost local accent. He and the driver's uncle checked each other's household registrations along the way.

Yang and I parted ways at Jinan Long-distance Bus Station. He went back to his hometown and I went to Qingdao. My mood also improved after I broke up with Yang. The reason was the clean and comfortable environment on the long-distance bus and the train attendants who all dressed up like they were going to fly to the moon. Especially the latter, it really made me amazed and excited. Along the way, the waiters poured water and handed snacks. Their attentive service made me think that I had mistakenly boarded the train to heaven. You know, in our remote hometown, which is known as one of the top 100 counties in the country, the conductors on the bus are like aunties who have just pulled themselves into the car from the roadside fields and haven't had time to change their clothes. Their gestures are full of strong local flavor. Compared with Jinan Passenger Transport, the passenger transport service in our hometown seems quite amateurish. The only thing that wasn't amateurish was the way the conductors quarreled with passengers. They were all eloquent and eloquent, as if they had been professionally trained.

In the more than 2 hours of journey from Jinan to Qingdao, this was the first time that I did not fall asleep on the long-distance bus.

As a foreign tourist, I made a 360-degree all-round observation and analysis of the services of Jinan Passenger Transport very dedicatedly, so that I can sit here today and analyze the third-party services in Jiangsu and Shandong from the perspective of economics and sociology. Make an objective and fair evaluation of the quantitative and qualitative gaps in the industry.

It can be seen that although we did not predict many things - I never thought that one day I would sit here and write this - their occurrence has its own value and significance. This kind of value and meaning does not necessarily appear immediately. Sometimes it needs to be accumulated over time and filtered by memory. Sometimes, we must wait until our own texture changes before we can look back and look at the original views again. Real meaning behind meaningless things.

This is why we must always be on the road.

8

In the past few days, a friend who plays music around me is always trying to recommend some good songs to me that are within the scope of his taste and knowledge. I was very resistant at first, because he would always recommend some angry youth rock music like the Hugo Gang, which is not my style. Most of the time, I am a quiet and peaceful person who is unconcerned with the world. However, that day he was very persistent in recommending a song to me, just as persistently as when he recommended "Oldboy" to me.

It was an a cappella version of "In That Faraway Place" by a bunch of old men. My friend told me with emotion that I have fallen in love with old songs recently. For some reason, I always feel that old songs are more It's getting more flavorful. A bunch of old men singing "In that far away place, there is a good girl" at the top of their voices may be a hooliganism in the eyes of some people, but this time, I unexpectedly reached a mutual understanding with my friend. . Or rather, I feel the same way, because this song also makes me shiver. Of course it's not because of the "good girl" in the song, but because of its unique interpretation of the words "on the road". Beautiful things are always far away. As long as we still have expectations in our hearts, we must keep chasing them like Kuafu chasing the sun until our life is exhausted.

A few days ago, my friend and I prepared a Centrino laptop, a second-hand printer, and a SLR, and we quickly sorted out a warehouse and prepared it as a studio. My brother asked me several times, what do you plan to do, has the trademark been registered, when will the website be launched, and do you want me to help you attract investment and promote it. I was touched by his enthusiasm, but now he still can't understand my state of mind and situation. Just like when friends formed the band "Red Radio" a few years ago, for us now, the direction is not important. What is important is that we are always on the road.