Arriving in the Capital With Her Parents in 1973: Gossip Fills the Courtyard

Reborn in Northeast China in the 1960s, Qiao Xin has a loving grandfather, grandmother, and maternal grandmother, parents who favor her, and an older brother who indulges her. She thinks she has gone from a little orphaned girl from the south to a Northeast girl adored by her family.

Then, with a crash, her grandfather, parents, and maternal grandmother all move to the capital for work, and just like that, she becomes a city girl in Beijing. They move into a courtyard house, and she can only say: This place is wonderful. A courtyard home inside the Second Ring Road, with spacious rooms, a private kitchen and bathroom, and a little yard.

There’s no end of gossip to enjoy: stories about the neighbors in her courtyard, and in the surrounding compounds. It’s every bit as entertaining as surfing the internet in a later age.

But there’s one downside. It’s 1973, an era when education isn’t valued, so why is everyone insisting she study hard? That’s too much! She may be a little girl now, but she was a college student in her previous life. So why can’t she outdo the locals? It’s infuriating, absolutely infuriating.