How did hiring someone to press a pig image during Chinese New Year become a top trend?

Xu An helped him tighten a loose knot in the lower left corner of the screen. While tying it, he noticed a row of small words written in marker on the bottom edge of the screen.

The dates and locations were written down, arranged in dozens of dense rows from 2003 to 2026, with each row formatted as "Year, Month, Day, Village, Number of People".

He glanced at the most recent few lines.

"June 9, 2025, Batou, 6 people."

"June 22, 2026, Batou, 4 people."

"June 3, 2026, Batou, 5 people."

The first line is on the far left of the screen; the text is blurred but still legible.

"June 14, 2003, Batou, 47 people."

From 47 people to 5 people.

Twenty-three years.

The live stream was quiet for two seconds, and then the comments slowly started appearing one by one.

"Twenty-three years ago there were forty-seven audience members, now there are five."

"What's written at the bottom of the screen isn't a recording of the screening, but the process of a village disappearing."

"You see, the number hasn't been in the double digits since 2015."

Xu An didn't ask about the numbers. After tying the last knot, he stood up and found that all five old men were already in place.

The old man with a cane sat in the very center of the front row, with his cane lying on the ground in front of him, like a dividing line.

Two old ladies sat side by side on bamboo chairs, one fanning herself and the other peeling sunflower seeds, the shells falling neatly at their feet.

The elderly couple sat on a long bench. The woman placed a bamboo basket between them, while the man was already munching on a corncob, making a crunching sound.

Three dogs were scattered around the perimeter of the stands, with two yellow dogs lying on the left and a black dog lying on the right, occasionally flicking their tails as if to sign in.

As darkness fell, the sun disappeared completely behind the mountains, leaving only a lingering orange-red glow on the horizon, but faces were no longer clearly visible on the open ground.

The projectionist picked out a disc from the box and inserted it into the machine.

Then he did something.

He walked to the front of the screen, facing five old men and three dogs, straightened his polo shirt collar, and cleared his throat.

"Good evening, everyone. Today is June 17, 2026. Thank you for coming to watch the movie. The film we're showing today is a new release from last year, and we guarantee it will be great."

When he said this, his voice was so loud it sounded like he was announcing an event at a stadium, and his tone was so formal it didn't sound like he was speaking to five people in their seventies, but rather like he was giving an opening speech to hundreds of audience members.

The old man in the front row with a cane chuckled.

"Old Zhou, you always do the same thing. Why are you shouting so loudly when there are only a few old bones like us?"

The projectionist grinned.

"The rules cannot be broken. The projectionist's opening remarks are standard. Without them, the ceremony is incomplete."

The number of viewers in the live stream had climbed to over 600 at some point, and the density of comments had increased.

"This projectionist is so cute, the five audience members are ready to officially start the show."

"He has a firm grasp on the concept of 'sense of ritual'."

"When my grandma was a child, this was how the outdoor movies started. The projectionist would say, 'Good evening, everyone,' and then the whole audience would applaud. I thought this kind of thing had disappeared long ago."

The projector started humming, and a cone-shaped beam of white light shone from the lens onto the screen. It took about three seconds for the image to go from blurry to clear. There was a little background noise when the sound came from the speakers, but it didn't affect the listening experience.

The film is a rural comedy. Xu An hadn't seen it, but he could tell it was the kind of film shown in rural areas. The picture quality wasn't high-definition, but the colors were accurate, and the characters' voices carried far in the quiet open space.

He didn't sit down to watch the movie.

As he squatted down next to the projector to help the projectionist tidy up his toolbox, the projectionist took out a notebook from his pocket, opened it, and wrote a line after today's date.

"Batou, 5 people, 1 dog (black), sunny."

Xu An saw the notebook.

The notebook was barely bigger than the palm of his hand, with a hardcover of kraft paper, worn smooth and shiny, clearly having been flipped through countless times. The page he opened to was about two-thirds of the way through the notebook, and the beginning was densely packed with notes in the same format.

Each line contains the date, location, number of people, and weather.

Xu An flipped through a few pages.

"September 3, 2025, Ma'anling, 3 people, cloudy."

"August 12, 2025, Walnut Flat, 7 people, rain turning to sunny."

"July 27, 2025, Shibanhe, 2 people, sunny."

Scroll back further.

"March 15, 2020, Batou, 9 people, cloudy."

"November 2, 2018, Walnut Grove, 14 people, sunny."

"June 8, 2012, Batou, 21 people, thunderstorm."

The numbers are decreasing year by year.

Xu An closed the notebook and handed it back.

"Uncle, how many villages are you visiting?"

The projectionist put the script back in his pocket, his eyes fixed on the two characters arguing on the screen, a slight smile playing on his lips—a smile that was hard to tell whether it was directed at the film or the issue at hand.

"At most, eleven villages left. Now there are only four villages with residents. They rotate every month, leaving one village for one night."

"Eleven villages have been reduced to four."

"People have left. The young ones went out to work, and the children went with them. Those who are left are the ones who can't leave."

After saying that, he paused for a moment, then took out a kettle from under the folding table, poured two cups of water, handed one to Xu An, and kept the other for himself.

"You ask me why I'm still doing this? To tell you the truth, it started out as a job assigned by the government, with a monthly subsidy. Later, the subsidy stopped and the job was terminated. They said that everyone is on their phones now and they don't need a projection team anymore. All my colleagues have changed careers, and I'm the only one still doing this."

"If there are no subsidies, are you going to pay out of your own pocket to run the business?"

The projectionist took a sip of water and smacked his lips.

"It's not much of a loss. The cost of gas and DVDs is three or four hundred yuan a month, which my pension can cover. It's just that motorcycles are a bit of a hassle to repair."

The live stream chat was flooded with even more comments.

"He spends three or four hundred yuan of his own money each month to show movies to less than twenty elderly people in four villages. No matter how you look at it, it's a loss, but he's been losing money for twenty-three years."

"You'll notice that he even wrote down the dog's name when he was taking notes—a black dog. That kind of seriousness is really touching."

Xu An held his cup but didn't drink; he was watching the five old men in front of the screen.

The old man with the cane sat upright, his eyes fixed on the screen. When someone in the movie told a joke, he chuckled twice, then straightened up and continued watching.

One of the old ladies stopped fanning herself while looking at the scene. Her mouth was slightly open, and something was flashing in the corner of her eye, but she didn't wipe it away, letting it flow down and into the wrinkles on her face.

The elderly couple's husband had already finished eating the corn, but he was still clutching the cob in his hand. The woman, at some point, leaned on the man's shoulder, her eyes half-closed, looking more like she was listening to a movie than watching one.

Xu An took a sip of the water in his cup.

"Uncle, they're crying."

The projectionist didn't even glance back.

"Grandma Liu cries every time, no matter what movie is playing, she cries whether it's a comedy or a war movie. She's not made to cry by the movie itself, she's made to cry by the bright screen. Usually, the house is too dark and quiet, and when there's sudden sound, light, and people talking, she can't hold back her tears."

When this sentence hit the live stream chat, the speed of the comments slowed down, and they floated up one by one, each one a complete sentence.

"She wasn't moved to tears by the movie, she was moved to tears by the silver screen. I will remember that sentence for the rest of my life."

"Think about the daily lives of these elderly people. They sit alone in a room from morning till night without anyone to talk to. They can only see light and hear sound once a month when the projectionist comes and they sit among the crowd."

"Although there were only five people in the group."

"Five people are also a group."

Xu An helped the projectionist change the disc. The second one was an old movie. He couldn't remember the name, but the projectionist said that the elderly loved to watch this movie and it had been shown at least ten times. It was always the most requested movie.

During the disc change, the old man in the front row turned around and called out.

"Old Zhou, did you bring any candy today?"

The projectionist took a handful of hard candies from a cloth bag next to his tool bag. The candies were wrapped in colorful plastic and he gave two to each person.

The old man peeled one, popped it into his mouth, puffed out one cheek, and let out a satisfied hum.

Xu An's lips twitched slightly as he watched the scene.

"Uncle, you're even in charge of distributing sugar?"

When the projectionist returned, he casually brushed a twig off the black dog's head. The black dog snorted, rolled over, and continued sleeping.

"Watching a movie while snacking on sunflower seeds and candy is the standard routine. Without this, what's the difference between watching a movie at home and watching TV?"

When Xu An squatted down next to the projector, he looked down and saw several round boxes at the bottom of the box that were different from the other discs.

Those round boxes were old-fashioned film canisters, made of tin, with handwritten labels on the lids. The labels were much newer than the ones above, but the writing was older, and the ink on some of the labels had smudged, leaving only a blurry year.

Xu An's finger paused on one of the boxes.

The label reads "2003, Going to the countryside, Preparation".

"Uncle, what is this scroll?"

The projectionist leaned over and took a look.

"Oh, these rolls are spare footage left over from the old film camera era. They're not official films, but random shots taken during my trips to the countryside back then. They include people, roads, and mountains. I've kept them as souvenirs because I couldn't bear to throw them away."

"From 2003?"

"Yes, that year I first started running this route. It was my first year, and everything was new and exciting. When I arrived at a village, I would casually shoot a couple of clips to record it. Later, I got busy and stopped shooting."

Xu An looked at the round box.

"Uncle, can we put this roll in?"

The projectionist thought for a moment, then took out the round box and opened it. The film inside was neatly rolled, without any mold or sticking, and was well preserved.

"It can be installed, but it needs a film mount. Let me change it."