The Ups and Downs of the Wujiang River

When the river fog cleared, some people came ashore and some sank to the bottom. In 1988, Chen Wangjiang, the eighteen-year-old son of a dockworker in Wujiang, made a living by carrying sacks by the river. He didn't want to take refuge with his uncle who was a gangster, but he accidentally learned abacus, literacy and account books from the accountant. He thought that if he learned to settle accounts, he would be able to live a prosperous life, but he didn't know that the accounts in this world could never be settled by an abacus. In the 1990s, the tide of market economy swept across Wujiang. The restructuring of state-owned enterprises, the wave of layoffs, the real estate boom, collusion between government and businessmen... The underworld has evolved from the "classical gangster" era of street fighting into a new species wearing suits and ties. Chen Wangjiang walked from the dock to the rivers and lakes, from a coolie carrying sacks to "Mr. Chen" who controlled half of the Wujiang River. He helped laid-off workers collect wages, went out of his way to help demolished households, and personally sent his brothers to prison, watching helplessly as those who once stood beside him fell one by one. In 2008, the storm of crackdowns on organized crime and evil struck. Standing by the river, Chen Wangjiang remembered his mother's words when he was eighteen years old: "If you want to live, live until the light comes." But where is the bright spot? When the river fog cleared, he saw the lights on the other side and the abyss beneath his feet. This is the bloody youth of a generation and the twenty years of changes in a city. Some people exchange their lives for money, some people exchange their money for their lives, and some people lose themselves in this ups and downs.