Essays ⁽³⁴⁹⁾

During the May Day holiday, I returned to Beijing from school and got my fill of rural life. I repotted the houseplants and flowers that needed repotting, added soil where it was needed, fertilized where needed, and pruned branches where needed. On the shared balcony…

Wandering for three thousand years, at last he leaves his cloud-shoes on the westernmost peak. The door is shut; the beast-ring knocker gives scattered sounds. Who returns on the front steps? Who returns begging, star by star? Then an ancient, masculine voice rises in the…

Returned to Beijing for the weekend, I finished my work, did a bit of farm work in the vegetable plot, and then my wife accompanied me deep into the mountains of Mentougou. We went to Tan'chang Village near Shenquan Gorge; we came here last summer…

In the blink of an eye, a third of this semester has already passed. Time really flies; in just over two months, summer vacation will begin again. This semester's study and life at school have been a joy, body and mind. From Monday to Friday,…

I have always insisted that I am a country person, but I have overlooked the fact that I have lived in Beijing for nearly thirty years. Thirty years is long enough to change many things before one even notices. Beijing is China's capital, a city…

The new semester has been under way for three days. I arrived at school on the evening of the 13th day of the first lunar month, and it was snowing heavily when I came. After it snowed all that night, when I got up the…

The winter vacation is over, and a new semester is about to begin. This semester will officially start on March 1 and end on July 3. During this period, national statutory holidays (the Qingming Festival, Labor Day, the Mid-Autumn Festival, and weekends) will be observed…

Around 1:40 p.m. on the first day of the first lunar month, my 76-year-old third uncle passed away after illness failed to respond to treatment. In the days that followed, we busied ourselves arranging his funeral. According to our local custom, the body should be…

The great bell first strikes, the sacred verses resound on high, reaching up to the heavens and down to the underworld. Above, may all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas bless the world with their light; below, may all beings in the dharma realm together enter the One…

The lunar year 2025 is drawing to a close. This year has not been easy for me; the road has been full of various challenges, but precisely because of these challenges I grew rapidly once again in middle age. At the turn of the year,…