Translated…
The music came from the guitar, and Yin-Xia’s crisp, clean voice sang out, “Suddenly, it was, only for an instant, allowing us to sit together, to sing our songs………”
With our hair trimmed too short, with that black hairclip on, white top, black skirt, black dress shoes, those, were the days of our youth, other than the hair length requirements, there were also, an assortment of other rules and regulations, the discipline official at the school would grill us when we failed to put that vest inside, everything about us, we are, a flock of quiet sheep, just, grazing, and if those big bad wolf boys passed in front of us, we can only call out like the sheep, without turning our gazes toward them.
The era without the singles mixers, only the programs set up by the national saviors clubs, my best friend and I worked really hard, to sign up for the hiking trips, as the summer came, we’d hauled our backpacks up, with that heart of joy, hopped, on that northbound train.
The guys and girls from different schools were separated into the first, second, third, fourth, and so on teams, and thus, we’d started, this tightly-knitted connected interaction over the next couple of days. With our separate backpacks we’re carrying, with the construction workers’ hats, we’d followed along that winding pass into the mountains, and from afar, we looked like, worker ants that are working hard away.
The female students who were very slim and tender, their backpacks had already been hauled out by the stronger guys already, and, that freshness of first-time meeting was, melted away and replaced by the you haul, I’ll carry in-synchness. In the common shower rooms of the estate, the very first time we’d all stripped nude, took our quick and swift showers, because the hot water would only be provided for just the first ten minutes, and, we’re all too worried that we hadn’t cleaned off the shampoo in our hair, without the time to feel bashful about it, just take off all our clothes.
And, at night, it was, the collective harvest of ALL the blisters we’d received on our feet during the daytime, there were, a wide variety of appearances, a strand of hair, or a sewing thread, the puss came out, and all us girls would cover our faces in pain.
not my picture…
As our affinity grew, it was, the end of the activities already, on the bonfire of our last night, the stars shone and made our tears twinkle, we’d held tight to those pieces of papers, with one another’s contact information, trying to figure out, how it was, that we’d just spent seven days, and had become, totally inseparable, or maybe, we’d all come to know, that after this parting ways, there would never be another same seven days we would come to share now, the sixteen, seventeen adolescent guys and girls had, for the first time, handed all our hearts in, and we were starting to taste, that bitter fruit of goodbye.
After we’d grown, we’d endured through an assortments of goodbyes, and yet, it’d become a way of our lives now, and, it’d become hard, to feel as deeply about parting as we had when we were just teens. Those days of walking on those hiking trails, the rainbow days of our black-and-white youths, became even more colorful and lively inside that kaleidoscope of our memories.
here we are, at one of the campout sites…
And so, this, is thinking back to that very first time you’d gone off on your own, how exciting it was, how shy you all were, and, it was, a very good memory for you, and, all the experiences of interacting with people your age had not been as imprinting, impressing as this very first experience you’d had.
Life, the Obstacle Course 