(1)
Clean roads, orderly buildings, uniformly managed farmland plots, warning signs and slogans standing everywhere, a bright and spacious health service station, a village committee building with marble-clad exterior walls…
This is the new countryside.
Aside from the buildings still retaining a half-Western, half-local style, every aspect of the planning could fit seamlessly into a suburban street in the city.
Though it was just a village, the unified planning gave it the air of a small town.
The village had an easy-to-remember name: “Dinghai New Village.” It wasn’t far from the neighboring villages either—only about four or five hundred meters away.
On the way over, we’d passed Pinghai New Village, which housed residents from another island—they’d moved in earlier than the people in other new villages.
The villages were practically connected now, bringing people much closer than when they lived on the islands. Before, if people from different islands wanted to visit each other, they had to take a boat. Now they didn’t need to—just a few minutes’ walk would do, easily fitting into an after-dinner stroll.
All the uniformly built houses were painted with plain white paint, with basic plumbing and electrical wiring installed. If you wanted to live more comfortably, you had to renovate yourself.
Besides the ones being renovated, many houses were still empty, uninhabited.
Some families had their elderly parents taken directly into the city to live. Others had moved in but then the elderly passed away not long after—and there were quite a few such cases.
In just half a year, enough things could happen, enough familiar faces could be buried forever in this unfamiliar land.
The car stopped in front of a Western-style house that looked no different from its neighbors. A red flag was tied to a transplanted ginkgo tree by the door, fluttering in the evening breeze under the setting sun.
Zhu Ying rolled up her earphones and put them back in her pocket, gently shaking An Jing’s body. “Xiao Jing, Xiao Jing? Wake up, we’re here.”
“Huh… Huh?”
“The scenery along the way was pretty nice. There was even a stretch of coastal road, really beautiful.”
“Ah… I missed it.”
“It’s okay, there’ll be plenty of chances.”
“The sunset is almost gone…” An Jing looked out the window at the crimson setting sun and rubbed her eyes gently. “Yeah… getting out… you go first?”
“Are you okay? Legs not numb? Want me to help you?”
“Tch, my neck’s just a little stiff, not my legs, alright…” An Jing muttered, pouting, and staggered out of the car. “Ah—natural wind really is more comfortable.”
“Yeah, the AC was so cold it almost froze my face.” Zhu Ying covered her mouth and sneezed very quietly. “Achoo… the cicadas are so loud here.”
“It’s the countryside after all. Lots of trees, almost no other noise.”
“Grandpa, we’re here.” Yu Minghui greeted her grandfather, who was sitting outside enjoying the cool air, and carried the fruit into the living room.
“Mm, your grandma is still cooking, it’ll be ready soon.” Grandpa nodded. When he saw them, the wrinkles on his face seemed to soften. “Hehe… the car, how long did you drive?”
“Not too long, just over an hour.” Yu Mingfei yawned as she replied. “The last stretch was pretty nice, but the winding mountain road in the middle was a bit tricky.”
“Grandpa!” An Jing greeted warmly. “How have you been lately?”
“Pretty good, very good.”
“Still going fishing?”
“Of course, why wouldn’t I? The fish you’re eating tonight were caught by me today.”
“Are they saltwater fish?”
“Haha, you silly kid. How could you catch river fish in the sea? That would be strange.”
“What are you all talking about…? I can’t understand a single word.” Zhu Ying, who could catch at most one word per sentence, blinked and pouted angrily. “The signs at the village entrance are all promoting Mandarin!”
“Cough, when I’m at Grandma and Grandpa’s, I automatically speak dialect…” An Jing scratched her cheek apologetically. “I was just asking if he still goes fishing, and he said he caught saltwater fish today, so we’ll eat them tonight.”
“Oh~”
“Grandpa.” An Jing switched back to dialect. “No need for introductions, right… this is the one from last time—”
“Right, I’ve met her once.”
Zhu Ying hugged An Jing’s arm tightly and smiled sweetly at Grandpa. “Hello, Grandpa~ I’m Xiao Jing’s girlfriend.” Though a bit red-faced, An Jing nodded in agreement.
Grandpa patted An Jing’s head and said with a smile, “Good, since she’s your girlfriend, you need to take good responsibility for her from now on.”
“I definitely know that…”
“What about that other pretty girl from last time?” Though Grandpa pretended to be serious, An Jing could hear the teasing in his tone.
“She’s going abroad to study. She left the small city today.”
“Oh, people, everyone has their own choices.” Grandpa patted her shoulder cheerfully. “Go inside, it’s almost time to eat.”
“Xiao Ying, let’s go, time to eat.”
“Your dialect is so hard to understand…”
“I think the weirdest thing is that you grew up in a small city and can’t understand dialect at all.”
“Nobody around me speaks dialect! I grew up in an environment where everyone spoke Mandarin!”
“But your Mandarin isn’t that standard either. Last time you couldn’t tell the difference between retroflex and non-retroflex sounds, and you spent forever trying to type that character.”
“This is authentic Southern Mandarin! Don’t you get it!”
“Is there even such a thing…?”
(2)
Six people sat around the rosewood table, which still looked somewhat empty—after all, it was a big table that could seat twelve.
The living room was so spacious it even echoed. Having just this many people eating felt like a waste of such a large space.
Unlike other houses where the first floor was partitioned into several rooms, Grandpa’s first floor was directly made into a bright, open living room. When all the descendants gathered together, they could still fill this large space.
For Zhu Ying, who hardly ever visited relatives, this was an unimaginable kind of liveliness.
Yu Minghui was chatting with Grandma and Grandpa about recent social news, warning them not to buy things that claimed to cure all ailments. Yu Mingfei occasionally chimed in with a comment or two.
Grandma occasionally pointed at the dishes on the table and said something in a dialect so earthy that even An Jing sometimes had trouble understanding—but even without understanding, you knew she was telling them to help themselves.
After all, the kind smile on her face was much easier to read than the dialect.
An Jing lowered her voice. “My grandma wants you to eat more of that spinach. It’s good for your skin.”
“I can’t eat any more. At most, I’ll have some fruit.”
“Grandma, Xiao Ying can’t eat anymore.” An Jing immediately relayed the message.
“Oh dear, the young lady is still growing. How can she eat so little?”
“Girls these days don’t eat much. She normally eats about this much.”
“Alright, I’ll cut her some fruit. Does she eat papaya?”
“Xiao Ying, my grandma asks if you eat papaya…”
“Papaya?”
“She says, she says it makes your skin fair.”
“Then, then I’ll have some…” Zhu Ying shyly covered her chest and waited until Grandma left before fiercely pinching An Jing’s arm.
“What was that for…”
“Your grandma wasn’t talking about skin being fair just now, was she?”
“Cough… you caught that?”
“I saw where she was looking! Geez… Does it look that flat?”
“…Well, there’s not much curve.”
“It’s actually not small at all, you know! If you don’t believe me, feel it yourself!”
“Eek!”
(3)
After dinner, the sunset had completely vanished. Night had enveloped the entire small city. A crescent moon hung high in the sky, surrounded by a dense cluster of stars.
Grandpa had poured himself half a glass of cola and was sipping it leisurely at the door.
He loved the stuff, but Grandma usually kept him from drinking too much, saying it had too much sugar and was bad for his health.
So every day he could only pour half a glass, like wine, and enjoy it slowly in the evening breeze.
Though it looked a bit pathetic, he himself seemed to enjoy that sense of “preciousness.”
Even though it was a new countryside, it wasn’t the city. There were no rows of streetlights close together. Only at each intersection or corner did a dim yellow lamp cast its glow.
“Grandpa, where’s the flashlight?”
“What, going out to explore in the dark?”
“Just walking on the road. It’s such a nice road, it’d be a waste not to take a stroll. Almost no cars, and it’s really wide.”
“Next to the shrine, there’s an old silver flashlight. I just changed the batteries yesterday, should be enough for you.”
“Great~!”
An Jing dashed into the living room and found the unusually heavy silver flashlight beside the shrine holding the statue of the Anhai Deity. She’d even used this thing when they lived on the island. Picking it up brought back quite a few memories.
The most vivid memory was that it didn’t use AA or AAA batteries, but the kind of No. 1 batteries used in gas stoves, and it needed two at a time.
Of course, the light was also exceptionally bright, and the battery life was very long. If you only used it for a short while each night walking in the dark, you wouldn’t need to change the batteries for two or three months.
An Jing weighed the silver flashlight—which could double as a small baton to hit someone—and clicked the switch.
A white beam of light immediately shone. Even in the lit living room, you could see the bright circle it cast on the wall.
“What are you doing, playing with the flashlight?”
“Xiao Ying and I want to take a walk around the village.”
“It’s so dark, what’s there to see?”
“Just wandering around. It’s all big roads with almost no cars. How fun is that?”
“Still a kid, always wanting to explore.” Yu Mingfei shook her head in exasperation. “Don’t go too far. Don’t go up the mountain. There are plenty of snakes in summer.”
“I know, I’ll be starting high school after summer vacation. Stop worrying so much—Xiao Ying! Let’s go explore the village at night!”
“Found the flashlight?”
“Right here!”
“Wow, it’s so bright!”