Living in a Ghost Town

In the summer of 2015, longing for life in the capital, I came to Beijing and became a drifter. I struggled there for seven years; outwardly it looked glittering, but in truth I had nothing. I couldn't afford a flat in Beijing, and working wore me down in body and mind.In the summer of 2022, against the backdrop of the pandemic, I resolved to quit bare-faced and escape Beijing. I meant to go and live hidden away in a small seaside town. After weighing the choices, I set my heart on the legendary "e;ghost town,"e; the "e;Hegang by the sea"e; — the Silver Beach resort in Rushan, Shandong. At Silver Beach, flats cost only RMB 2,000 to 3,000 a square meter, and renting is cheaper still: an annual rent of only three or four thousand RMB, against Beijing's three or four thousand a month — one a paradise, one a purgatory.At Silver Beach I found inner peace; my spirit was no longer tense, my body no longer taut. Every day I watched the sea and the sunset, went to bed early and rose early, and spent two easy, happy, free years. I have felt the sea wind, watched the evening glow, admired the snow by the shore, swum in the sea; I have tasted the "e;ghost town's"e; slow life — foraging the shallows, going to the country market, pitch-dark nights, skies full of stars, spring, summer, autumn and winter. And I have come to understand that life is not only in Beijing: life can be open country, not a railway track; life can be the sea — boundless and wide.