Born in 1979, at the dawn of reform and opening up, I grew up during China's forty years of rapid development, making the journey from a small village in the western mountains to the great city of Shanghai in the east.
I have tried to portray these extraordinary forty years in Chinese history from my own perspective.
Development over these forty years has been so rapid that every day brings something new, so rapid that we have no time to think, so rapid that our souls have not kept pace with material progress.
Over these forty years, the Chinese people have gained a great deal, but also lost a great deal. Our lives and material conditions have improved, yet at the same time, we have lost our happiness, the carefree joy that comes from deep within.
What do people live for? When we lacked material comforts, we thought that having them would mean having everything. But forty years have passed, and we no longer lack food or clothing. Yet we have grown distant from our families, have no true friends, and feel lost in the world. Anxiety and unease slowly hollow out our bodies, leaving our souls with nowhere to rest. The spirit that sustains our inner world seems to be crumbling, as we spend our days consumed by the fear of death.
As the years pass ruthlessly, the childhood in my memory becomes increasingly blurred, so I have always been eager to record the various aspects of my childhood. It can be said that this book is a precious memoir of my childhood. When I was writing, I pursued documentary wholeheartedly, so entertainment and storytelling were lacking, but a sense of reality filled the lines. When writing this book, I never thought about how to attract readers' attention. I just wrote down the fragmented fragments in my memory truthfully. I wrote wherever I thought, without any attempt to exaggerate the various storylines. I was born in the west and grew up at the foot of the Qinling Mountains. Every plant and tree there will always be the deepest concern in my heart. Even when I am old and dying, I firmly believe that some fragments of my childhood will still linger in my mind. For those of us born in the 1970s and 1980s, childhood is both beautiful and full of hardships. Only people of our generation can deeply understand the hardship of extreme material scarcity. While I was writing, I sometimes smiled and then burst into tears. It fully reveals the life of that era, including moments of joy and unbearable hard times. This book has neither a grand historical vision nor an attempt to expound a profound social philosophy. It is merely an observation and narrative from my perspective. Maybe I have some biases or short-sightedness, but this is indeed the truest thought in my heart, and it is my look back and remember those heavy years.