The 128 most classic philosophical essays in the world

Chapter 17
[China] Liang Shiqiu

Everything in "Yashe" is nothing new, but the arrangement of everything is different from the usual.When people enter my room, they know it is my room.What Li Weng Xianqing occasionally sent is exactly what I want.

When I came to Sichuan, I felt that it was the most economical for people here to build houses.Fired bricks are often used to make pillars. Four brick pillars are built up alone, and a wooden frame is covered on top. It looks skinny and thin, but the roof is covered with tiles, and bamboo grate walls are woven around. The walls are covered with plaster, and no one can tell that it doesn't look like a house from a distance.The "Yashe" where I live now is just such a typical house.Needless to say, the house has brick columns, bamboo grate walls, and everything that one could expect.When it comes to housing, I have not little experience, such as "upper support and lower plucking", "front porch and rear building", "first floor and one bottom", "three upper and three lower", "pavilion room", "mao shed", etc. "Qinglou Yuyu" and "Skyscrapers", all kinds, I have tried them all.No matter where I live, as long as I live for a while, I will develop feelings for that house, and I am reluctant to move if I have to.When I first came to this "elegant house", I only hoped that it could shelter from the wind and rain, and I didn't dare to have extravagant hopes. Now that I have lived in it for more than two months, I feel good about it spontaneously.Although I have gradually felt that it can't keep out the wind and rain, because there are windows but no glass, the wind is like a gazebo; there are tiles but there are many gaps, and the rain seeps like a drip.Even if it cannot shelter from the wind and rain, "Yashe" still has its own personality.Cute with personality.

The location of "Yashe" is halfway up the mountain, with about seventy or eighty floors of earth steps down from the road.In front are the rice fields with spiral rice paddies.Looking further into the distance, there are a few verdant mountains in the distance, with sorghum fields, bamboo forests, pools, and cesspit beside them, and behind them are desolate hillsides that have not been cleared.If it is said that the place is desolate, there will often be guests on the night of the moon, or on the day of wind and rain. Most of the friends do not think the distance is far away, and the distance is the friendship.When guests come, they must first climb dozens of earth steps, and they still have to go uphill to enter the house, because the floor of the house is laid according to the mountain, one side is high and the other side is low, and the slope is very steep. It's uphill from the study to the dining room every day, and it's downhill when you bulge out after a meal, and I don't feel much inconvenience.

There are six "Yashe" in total, and I live in the second.The grate wall is not solid, and the doors and windows are not tight, so I and my neighbors can communicate with each other.Neighbors drinking and having fun, babbling poems, whispering, snoring, sneezing, sucking soup, tearing paper, and taking off leather shoes, all of which rippled from the gaps in the doors and windows at any time, breaking my silence.At night, the mouse looks at the lamp, and as soon as it closes its eyes, the mouse moves freely, or moves walnuts down the slope on the floor, or overturns the candlestick by sucking lamp oil, or climbs up the tent, or grinds its teeth on the door frame and table legs. Make people restless.But for the mouse, I am ashamed to admit that I "have no idea". The phrase "There is no way" is often quoted by foreigners, who think it best represents the attitude of Chinese people's laziness and forbearance.In fact, I am not lazy in dealing with mice.The window is pasted with paper, and the paper will be broken when you poke it; the door is tightly closed, and the rat has teeth, and a bite will make a hole.What else can I do?Isn't there "no way" for foreign devils to live in "elegant houses"?Even more annoying than rats are mosquitoes. The mosquito wind in "Yashe" is unprecedented for me. "Gathering mosquitoes into thunder" is really true!Every evening, the whole room is full of mosquitoes, which are black and big, and their bones seem to be hard.When the mosquitoes in other places have already been cleared away, they are extremely rampant in "Yashe". If visitors don't pay attention, the wounds on their legs will bulge like corn, but I'm still at ease.When winter comes, the mosquitoes will naturally disappear, and next summer—who knows that I will still live in "Yashe"!
"Yashe" is most suitable for moonlit nights - the higher the terrain, the earlier the moon.Watching the moon spit out from the top of the mountain, the red plate bursts out suddenly, and in a flash, the light shines everywhere, the sky is bright and clean, the fields are silent, and the dogs are barking slightly, and all the guests are quietly sitting there!There are two pear trees in front of the house. When the moon rises to the sky, the clear light filters down from the trees, and the underground shadows are colorful, especially at this time.Until the crowd dispersed and I went back to my room to go to bed, the moonlight still forced in through the window, making me miserable.When it is drizzling, "Yashe" is also interesting again.Open the window and look forward, just like Mi's method, like clouds and fog, diffuse.But if it rains heavily, I will feel anxious again. There are wet marks on the roof everywhere. At first, it is as big as a bowl, and then it expands like a basin. However, with a sound, muddy water bets, and the room is in a mess at this moment, and rescue is impossible.Such experiences are not uncommon.

The furnishings of "Yashe" can only be described as simple and simple, but sweeping and wiping will not leave any dust.I am not an important person, so pictures of my father and grand minister are not allowed to enter my room; I am not a dentist, so I don’t have a doctor’s degree to hang on the wall; I don’t do haircuts, so pictures of the ten scenes of the West Lake weaving with silk and movie stars are not allowed to take four pictures of me wall.I have a few chairs and a couch, sleep soundly, write and read, all of which I have, and I will not ask for it.But although the furnishings are simple, I like to refurbish them.Westerners often ridicule women for changing the positions of tables and chairs, thinking that this is a sign of women's changing nature.Regardless of whether it is false or not, I like change. Chinese old-style homes have the same furnishings. There is a table in the main hall, an Eight Immortals table in front, an armchair on one side, and two armchairs on both sides with a coffee table.I think that the furnishings should be sparse and uneven, and it is best to avoid pairing. Everything in "Yashe" is nothing new, but the arrangement of everything is different from the usual.When people enter my room, they know it is my room.What Li Weng Xianqing occasionally sent is exactly what I want.

"Yashe" is not owned by me, I am only one of the tenants.But thinking of "the heaven and the earth are the reverse journey of all things", life is like a post, I live in the "elegant house" for a day, and the "elegant house" is my own for a day.Even this day cannot be regarded as mine, at least this day, the bitterness, hotness, sourness and sweetness that "Yashe" can give, I will truly experience it for myself.Liu Kezhuang's words: "A guest house is like a home like a home." I live in "Yashe" at this moment, and "Yashe" is like my home.In fact, it looks like a home, and I can't tell the difference.

He has no slang for a long time, writes for himself, writes as he thinks, and does not stick to the chapters. The four characters of "Yashe Xiaopin" are used to show the place of writing and the cause and destiny of his writing.

Heart mark notes
Although it has the title of "Ya She", the reality of "Ya She" is not elegant. Its structure is simple, the grate wall is not solid, the doors and windows are not tight, the location is desolate, and rats and insects are rampant... Liang Shiqiu is almost writing about the "poor" of Ya She. , "ugly", "noisy".But between the lines, we don't feel the ugliness of Yashe, but feel that it is extremely cute, amiable, and individual. This is because "Yashe" projects the author's optimistic, positive, and life-loving attitude in difficult situations.Only by embracing this kind of mentality can we find the shining things in all the unsatisfactory life, and taste the sweetness and beauty in the hardships of life.

(End of this chapter)