Ke Ling (1909-2000) is a famous Guangzhou-born film theorist, critic and playwright in China. His multi-dimensional artistic creations are featured with many styles, with a plethora of masterpieces often seen in the fields of proses, fairytales, dramas and films. He started his prose composition during the Second Sino-Japanese War when he was greatly inspired by the critically temporal situation and the illusionary prosperity of the ‘Isolated Island’ (referring to the time when Shanghai’s former foreign concessions were besieged but not invaded).

Walking in the Night

At night when everything becomes quiet and lights are dimly lit. I will come out from a hilarious place and into the street alone, often with a subtle feeling of joy.

The deserted street looks empty and vast, like a lonely river in the fall with only one canoe floating there. Occasionally a car will speed by, having you in mind those skittering gulls. At the far corner of the street, the traffic light is signaling a point of scarlet, like a maple leaf drifting down from the sky, or a piece of amaranthus solitarily blooming on the river bank.

In Shanghai's daylight, torrents surge in our struggle for life, yet the flower of sin will usually open at night. Though everything is shrouded by the night's mysterious curtain, we may still see all sorts of countenances on this earthly paradise by our imaginative eyes. It must be the most exciting moment in the dancing floor, moving shadows with feigned laughter and joys accompanied by jazz music. Snuggled closely with coquettish whispers, womanizers are carnally satisfied. Laborers are now lying down disorderly in their thatched shack. Some are consoled by groundless teasing dreams – a realm so beautiful and felicitous, while others, still scared of hideous looks, are awakened by lashes and still nervous and sweating! And those working at night are struggling against their drooping eyelids under the noisy mechanical sound. At this time, thefts and robberies are under way, committed by desperados and miscreants who might in the darkness rob the life out of any rivals in strife with their masters. Probably there is also a loser in the battle of life who has decided to plunge his life into the turbid flow of Huangpu River with his ruefulness at the dead end, and after a little wave is provoked, everything goes back to normal. We may also see from a dimly-lit secret place where some people are tempting fate for their lofty ideal, and if fails, the less fortunate will be sent to the suburb, suffering from brutal and vicious death penalty under the starless sky…

You may conjure up such things as what is performing in the real world. However, all presented before our eyes at this moment are nothing but a stretch of calmness, the only peaceful moment in Shanghai that should otherwise be buried in huge crowds of people.

Noisy airs agitate our mood, complex interrelations roughen our soul, and ugly realities wear our human nature out. It is only until this moment can we be like lake water purified by the storm, serene and limpid as a mirror under the shadowy and glimmering sky. Even with few passers by on the street, you will never therefore feel alone.

In the last run of the trolley bus, a few passengers, usually staying out late, will sit down together face to face, a picture of idleness and pleasure as if they were close friends who do not bother any exchange of words. The conductor takes out the paid fares insouciantly from under her seat, a pile of shinning nickels and dark yellow copper coins, and while counting them one by one with all the patience, she is prepared to settle the account as soon as the bus enters in the station so that she may go home and rest. The conductor and the passengers will accidentally strike up into conversation in a casual way as if they were old friends, in which the unnecessary feeling of distance in the day time is quickly dissipated.

A rickshaw puller in his yellow uniform is walking on slowly with his empty vehicle while a policeman is quietly standing outside the sentry box as usual, but this time he ceases to glare at him. By looking at the scene that this two stay in peace without competing with each other, I always have such an indescribable impulse that I need to go there and have a few words with them, expressing my untainted encourages and admirations.

If you happen to be hungry, you may be a guest of honor in any one of the small restaurants. Though small and dirty, it is for sure that you only need to spend a little money to feed up your stomach. There will be no service of expensive western food, Manchu Han Imperial Feast, fine desserts from Suzhou and Yangzhou, and other exquisite delicacies. However, if your look around, you may find those gourmets, with a bowl of beef soup, or a plain noodle, plus a small cup of white spirit for sipping, have all the air of satisfaction, being as an urban petty bourgeois. By looking at these carefree and contented faces, you can’t help but savor in your heart the flavor of this world that is sour, pungent, bitter, and astringent, topped with a bit of sweet, as described in an over-quoted lousy verse:

A cup of wine in hand

All worries out in mind

Few lives have no shade

As moon seldom seen over my head  

Glancing over the scene inside the eatery, you are fed with other kinds of flavor: simple layout, oily shabby tables and chairs, huge blue-rimmed bowls, small wine cups imprinted with a character 'Longevity', a portrayal of mighty 'Guan Gong' on the wall, shinning knives on the cutting board, red beef, and raging fires in the stoves reflecting on the greasy faces of the cooks who are shouting loudly to one another – the scene that will remind you naturally of the one in the Water Margin (a story about rebels in the Northern Song Dynasty 960AD to 1127AD) as if you were in the remote ancient times.

For the time being, schemes in cunning and falsehood are put to a halt, and a temporary ceasefire sign is on to make a pause of the cruel killing.

The night deepens, putting our giant Shanghai into a sound sleep and us a momentary peace. However, what we are expecting are not those elusive fantasias but a real dawn with the ascending sun.

[Images via Baidu]