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quotidians) wrote2025-12-18 09:03 pm
quotidians) wrote2025-12-18 09:03 pm
swear it happened just like this
Now that we're only two weeks out from 2026, I'd like to reflect on my favourite memories of the year. Nostalgia, for me, is firmly bound to physical places; the locale is just as important as the time. My dad and I spent most of my childhood annually returning to the motherland like migratory birds, but we hadn't gone without reason since the pandemic. Spring break of tenth grade was no different: my eighty-something maternal grandmother had broken a bone, and the monsoon made our house's roof leak like crazy in the years we were gone. In short, we mainly returned for the sake of filial piety and household upkeep. Have you ever heard anything more Chinese? But as it turned out, my mother had some business in the south as well, so my dad and I enthusiastically tagged along like the bai chi* we are.
*a homophone that could mean "moron" or "eating for free" depending on the second character. I thought both meanings were fitting.
With that, I'd like to share some photos I took during the few late March nights I spent in Guangzhou, accompanied by a few comments I'd jotted down while I was there. That way you get the gist of the experience straight from the horse's mouth without all the tricks of time and whatnot. My notes from that time are greatly focused on the lives of ordinary people: petty vendors, mahjong players, the chubby kid whom I passed a birdie to in a dark alleyway. I hope you'll feel a semblance of the lust for life I was reeling from as I jotted these down. Either that or you'll be bored to death.
- Uncles getting their hair cut in the streets, smoking on platforms attached to bikes, lounging on leather chairs facing electric fans in their shops. In an alleyway shop a barefoot old man lounging on a plastic chair with his overweight cat sold me the best peanuts I'd ever eaten
- Electric bikes everywhere, young guys absentmindedly scrolling douyin or xiaohongshu on them (parked). I watched a delivery driver scroll, open mouthed, past girl after girl after girl without looking up once and ruminated on how cooked he was.
- Watching a pretty girl in a white slip speed off on her motorbike. Ruminating on how cooked I am.
- Street shops selling traditional medicine. You smell them before you see them.
- A particularly rotund cat in every other shop
- Entire street specialized in selling refrigeration appliances (shops located in garages, apartments up top)
- Kids playing badminton in dark alleyways
- Restaurants that have been open since 1958 where the most expensive menu item is $5
We walked to a square full of Buddhist temples, where I saw a woman pray by holding sticks of lit incense in her hands and bowing in four directions. "People in the south seem more religious than they are in the north" I said offhandedly to my dad, who reminded me that we weren't walking around Buddhist temples back in Beijing.
China obviously isn't really Communist these days. Now they just sell shot glasses and framed portraits featuring kitschy Chairman iconography. Mao is rolling in his crystal coffin. The streets were lit up from restaurants with open doors, advertising $3 beef noodles and $5 barbecue pork. I'd already had a meal of pork innards (it's an acquired taste but the texture's great) and beer that I'd bummed from my dad, but I sure was tempted.
We returned to the Buddhist square at night once the rituals started. Each temple had its own processions — in the centre one rang the men's voices; monks in orange habits chanted and sang. To the left, I heard noticeably higher voices, perhaps that of women and/or children, though there was a mix in attendance. I don’t remember if the right temple sounded any different — perhaps a true mix of the other two. Whenever you walked further from one temple you would hear the chanting from another mix in, and the scent of incense followed you everywhere in the square and into the street. I remember being entranced at the harmonious chanting and the coming and going of people, who prayed with shaking hands. I was sweating lots. There was a cat there as well with the most barn owllike face I’ve ever seen. That’s why they’re called 猫头鹰, I guess.
*a homophone that could mean "moron" or "eating for free" depending on the second character. I thought both meanings were fitting.
With that, I'd like to share some photos I took during the few late March nights I spent in Guangzhou, accompanied by a few comments I'd jotted down while I was there. That way you get the gist of the experience straight from the horse's mouth without all the tricks of time and whatnot. My notes from that time are greatly focused on the lives of ordinary people: petty vendors, mahjong players, the chubby kid whom I passed a birdie to in a dark alleyway. I hope you'll feel a semblance of the lust for life I was reeling from as I jotted these down. Either that or you'll be bored to death.
- Uncles getting their hair cut in the streets, smoking on platforms attached to bikes, lounging on leather chairs facing electric fans in their shops. In an alleyway shop a barefoot old man lounging on a plastic chair with his overweight cat sold me the best peanuts I'd ever eaten
- Electric bikes everywhere, young guys absentmindedly scrolling douyin or xiaohongshu on them (parked). I watched a delivery driver scroll, open mouthed, past girl after girl after girl without looking up once and ruminated on how cooked he was.
- Watching a pretty girl in a white slip speed off on her motorbike. Ruminating on how cooked I am.
- Street shops selling traditional medicine. You smell them before you see them.
- A particularly rotund cat in every other shop
- Entire street specialized in selling refrigeration appliances (shops located in garages, apartments up top)
- Kids playing badminton in dark alleyways
- Restaurants that have been open since 1958 where the most expensive menu item is $5
We walked to a square full of Buddhist temples, where I saw a woman pray by holding sticks of lit incense in her hands and bowing in four directions. "People in the south seem more religious than they are in the north" I said offhandedly to my dad, who reminded me that we weren't walking around Buddhist temples back in Beijing.
China obviously isn't really Communist these days. Now they just sell shot glasses and framed portraits featuring kitschy Chairman iconography. Mao is rolling in his crystal coffin. The streets were lit up from restaurants with open doors, advertising $3 beef noodles and $5 barbecue pork. I'd already had a meal of pork innards (it's an acquired taste but the texture's great) and beer that I'd bummed from my dad, but I sure was tempted.
We returned to the Buddhist square at night once the rituals started. Each temple had its own processions — in the centre one rang the men's voices; monks in orange habits chanted and sang. To the left, I heard noticeably higher voices, perhaps that of women and/or children, though there was a mix in attendance. I don’t remember if the right temple sounded any different — perhaps a true mix of the other two. Whenever you walked further from one temple you would hear the chanting from another mix in, and the scent of incense followed you everywhere in the square and into the street. I remember being entranced at the harmonious chanting and the coming and going of people, who prayed with shaking hands. I was sweating lots. There was a cat there as well with the most barn owllike face I’ve ever seen. That’s why they’re called 猫头鹰, I guess.
