On the Prose of Nianweier

In a blink of an eye, one twelfth of the year 20xx has passed, and we have ushered in the traditional festival of China Lunar New Year.

As the Spring Festival is approaching, every household is busy preparing the new year's goods needed for the Spring Festival, and delicious meat products such as chicken, duck, fish, cattle and sheep are stored in the freezer. Red lanterns are also hung high on balconies or kitchen windowsills; There is a big red blessing written upside down on the door. Needless to say, there must be red couplets on both sides of the door. Happy New Year. In a word, the warm family is full of the festive atmosphere of the New Year.

But, in my opinion, that's a thing of the past.

Why do you say that? It doesn't mean that in my generation, I feel mature, sophisticated and sophisticated, and I don't look forward to the New Year like I did when I was a child. It doesn't mean that in the next few years, we will all suffer from greetings from relatives and friends during the New Year and don't want to go home for the New Year, such as asking you, "Do you have a job?" Do you have a car, a house and a wife? What is the salary? "Questions like this. It means that although most families are still actively preparing for the Spring Festival and buying all kinds of new year's goods, the taste of that year no longer exists. I don't know what the rural customs are like, and I can't evaluate how the people in the village feel for the New Year. Anyway, I think Nian is getting farther and farther away from us in the city.

When I was a child, I was very excited about the New Year. I look forward to the Spring Festival every day, so I can have a holiday. You can go home to play with your cousin and meet your distant relatives. I remember a few days before New Year's Eve, I was always excited about the countdown, Spring Festival Evening, New Year's Eve, my first visit to my grandmother's house and so on. I really can't wait. In those years, there was a lot of gunfire in the city. I was scared, but I was curious. I always wanted to go to grandma's yard to play with other older children. At that time, I was puzzled because my cousin was deaf and dumb. When I was at my grandmother's house during the Spring Festival, I pulled my cousin and asked her to cover her ears for me to see. When I was a child, I was too timid to hear such loud guns, especially those that "kicked" and "rang in the sky" (all children in the north should know). My cousin is also happy to cover my ears and watch colorful fireworks in the sky with me. That's true.

I used to spend most of the Chinese New Year at my grandmother's house. At that time, my grandparents still lived in the old bungalow arranged by the factory, so think about it. Just like quadrangles and hutongs in Beijing. Every family is very close. In the Spring Festival, I will play with my brothers and sisters in the same alley, steal guns and buy a bunch of "black bosses", "guns" and "scud" and so on. It was wild then. Once my cousin and I rubbed a handful of "black boss" and threw it into the sewer. There was a loud bang and the smelly water below was blown out. I remember being beaten so badly that I almost lost my life, but I remember wrong.

I know all the families in grandma's alley. Hutongkou is an elderly couple. Grandma likes me very much. Every time I go back, she gives me a big cake that she is good at. At the end of the alley is an old woman who is my grandmother's best friend. Her wife left, and she sold candied haws. She often goes to grandma's house, and the old man sits and chats over tea when he has nothing to do. I will definitely visit her home when I go back for the Spring Festival, and she will also give me delicious Sugar-Coated Berry.

Grandma's house is three hutongs away from my cousin's house. I will definitely go to her house to play her game machine with my cousin during the Chinese New Year. He is a bully with a red and white machine, so my brother and I basically play a game every New Year. Tank battle, Street Fighter, Contra and The Legend of Ninja Dragon Sword are all our favorites! On the other hand, grandma's house is small, with a bungalow of 80 square meters, but it is antique and interesting, and everything is antique. What impressed me the most was that the two "Kowloon lanterns" hung by my grandmother's house during the New Year were certainly not as good as those given to Joe by Cixi, but the modern imitation was really lifelike and super beautiful. And that copper hot pot, which is bigger than when I was a child. After using it many times, the bronze has deepened, but I still want to eat hot pot with this thing. This is absolutely very exciting. That's the smell!

I said there were too many things at home in 2008. Let's talk about the taste of the year in the city at that time. It seems that it snows every New Year's Eve. It snows heavily. It's cold outside, warm outside and red outside. I will go downstairs around 23 o'clock and make a snowman with my mother. The guns in the sky are loud and beautiful. Think about it. Isn't it beautiful? That kind of feeling is really great, just like the Chinese New Year in the advertisement! It's just that people scatter artificial snow in the advertising shed, which is very fake. When I got up early in the morning, the outside world was already white, and firecrackers were spread on the "white carpet of the earth", red and white as strawberry sundaes, which was beautiful! Dad drove around the city, guns were everywhere, and the children were chasing and laughing. The car is as slow as a tortoise on the road, but the air conditioner in the car is super warm. I really liked this feeling when I was a child.

But what about now? There are no guns in the city, so we have no fun. There are so many relatives that we have to sit in the back room with my grandmother's cousins. Relatives come to visit us every year, which is annoying. The city is suddenly quiet, and I'm really not used to it. Grandma's family has already moved to a well-equipped community, and the neighborhood relationship has also changed. It's boring to go back. My cousin is married, and she doesn't come back on the first day, and there are even fewer grandmothers on the first day. In the street, no designated gun stalls can be seen, and supermarket shops are no longer decorated. They all closed down early and went back to their hometown for the New Year. There is no festive music in the street, and there is no sound of Song Zu Ying and Tan Jing. Compared with before, there are few people on the main roads, and lanterns are rarely hung on the balconies of every household. Last night, I was outside and didn't see anyone. It feels ordinary all the way, just like ordinary Saturday and Sunday. This city is not bright, quiet or lively at all! That's it. This place is like a dead city.

Maybe I didn't feel it until after the Spring Festival in the countryside.

It was the feeling of last night that finally made me want to throw up. Thank you for insisting on seeing here, seeing me and telling your past, but if you look carefully, you should feel the same way.

Maybe I'm too nostalgic. Maybe other post-90s people don't feel anything. On the contrary, I will joke that I am really grandpa Niu, but I think I am talking about true feelings and facts. Really, the Spring Festival is nothing, alas.