All his folks knew he was very much fond of playing Er hu. But nobody knew where he got the fi rst Er hu, how he learned to play it and why.
In fact, nobody cared.
About that, I never stopped wondering myself. I assumed, in father’s philosophy, life is not to get what you want or what you like; life is made for what you are; life is not of choice, but of life itself.
Although his job was tiring and immobile in that shabby and airless guardroom, he had enjoyed being seated on a recycled revolving imitation leather chair for the fi rst months. The truth was, he felt something glorious in his uniform, something unusual. It was as though a wondrous movie scene, that before could only be seen on the screen, now appeared as a part of his own life. This part was so remarkably real he imagined it to be unreal. In other words, it was a dream he had never dreamed before and that dream had now not only come true but become surrealistic. It was forceful, and he was unprepared as he seldom looked to the limit of the future.