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

"He mended more than 3,000 bowls in 41 years; this kind of person should be remembered."

"The expression on his face when he said no one answered wasn't sadness, it was a sign of being used to it, and that's even more unbearable than sadness."

"An Shen, look at his hands. His fingers are covered in calluses from being hammered with copper hammers. There's an old white scar between his index and middle fingers. That must have been from when the iron shovel slipped and cut him."

Xu An squatted back down next to the old man, watching him hammer the rivets into the crack in the soup bowl, one by one.

Sunlight filtered through the leaves of the Chinese toon tree and fell on the surface of the bowl. Each newly inserted metal staple flashed briefly in the light before settling quietly onto the porcelain, like a scar that had naturally grown on the bowl.

"Uncle, may I try it?"

The old man stopped. He turned his head and looked Xu An up and down for three seconds before his gaze finally settled on Xu An's hands.

Xu An's hands were a size larger than the old man's, and his fingers were also thicker, but the old man wasn't staring at the size; he was looking at the stability of the finger joints. Xu An's hands were flat on his knees, neither deliberately tense nor deliberately relaxed, his ten fingers resting quietly, the fingertips not trembling.

"Okay, give it a try."

When the old man handed over the copper hammer and iron spade, his expression was subtly serious—not the seriousness of distrust, but the seriousness of a master handing over tools to his apprentice.

"Tap lightly, use your wrist, not your arm. Raise the copper hammer to the same height as the nail, no need to lift it higher. The iron awl must be pressed against the end of the nail to prevent it from slipping. If it slips, you'll ruin the nail and it might even chip the porcelain."

When Xu An grasped the copper hammer, he weighed it. It wasn't heavy, probably a little over two ounces, but the center of gravity of the hammerhead was forward, so he had to use his wrist to find the balance point.

He placed the iron shovel against the end of the next rivet, and raised the copper hammer to the same height as the rivet.

The first strike.

Ding.

The staple is crooked.

The old man slapped the back of his hand.

"It's crooked! You've veering half a millimeter to the left. The angle of the iron spike isn't right. Let's start over."

Xu An gently pried out the crooked staple with a shovel and repositioned it. This time, he slowed his breathing even more and spent three seconds finding the right angle on the bowl before inserting the shovel.

The second blow.

Ding.

The staples were straightened, but not deep enough; they only went in about a third of the way.

"One more blow, same force, same spot, but don't overdo it."

The third strike.

Ding.

The rivet was completely embedded in the bowl wall, and the rivet surface was flush with the porcelain surface. The gap at the joint was almost invisible to the naked eye.

The old man leaned over and looked for two seconds, then his lips twitched downwards.

"improvise."

The number of viewers in the live stream surged to over 500, with comments flooding the screen.

"An Shen actually learned how to mend bowls? He can get them in place with just three hammer blows?"

"Look at that old man, he said it was alright, but there was a glint in his eyes just now, he actually thinks this young man's hands are not bad."

"An Shen's hands are indeed steady. Look at the way he holds the hammer, it's exactly the same as when he changed the air pump hose for the old man. He controls the force very precisely."

"The stubborn type of cook, who is clearly very satisfied but insists on saying it's just so-so, is a typical old man. My grandfather was like that too."

Xu An hammered in four more nails. The last few were noticeably more stable than the first one. After hammering the last one, the old man took the bowl over to inspect it without saying a word, only snorting through his nose before putting the copper hammer away.

"Don't do this job, you'll starve to death if you do."

Xu An smiled.

"I'm poor to begin with, so I don't care if I starve to death."

The old man glanced at him and then smiled. When he smiled, all the wrinkles on his face were squeezed together, and there was a gap between his two front teeth, which was caused by a piece of broken bowl when he was young.

By the time Xu An finished mending the last few bowls, it was almost noon. The sun was shining directly down overhead, and the shade of the Chinese toon tree had shrunk. Half of the door panel was exposed to the sunlight, and the metal staples on the bowls reflected the sunlight in dappled patterns.

The old man pulled out a bamboo basket from the shade under the door and opened it. Inside were two rice balls and a pot of cold tea.

"Want some or not?"

"middle."

The two sat under the shade of a tree, each eating a rice ball. The rice ball was made of glutinous rice and filled with pickled vegetables and a small piece of cured meat. The herbal tea was served in an enamel pot with a dent on the lid, but it didn't leak.

While Xu An was eating his rice ball, the old man glanced at his canvas bag, his gaze lingering on the brass buckle on the side of the bag before moving away.

"Your bag is quite old."

"It was left behind by my dad."

The old man simply said "oh" and didn't ask any further questions.

After finishing his rice ball, Xu An rinsed his mouth with herbal tea and then stood up to help the old man tidy up the tools on the door panel. When he received the tin box, his fingers touched a small roll of wire pressed down at the bottom of the box.

The wire was tightly wound into a small loop about three centimeters in diameter, and the wire was the same thickness as the one that Grandpa Zeng had given him in his canvas bag.

He took out the wire ring and glanced at it.

The old man turned his head and saw it, then said "Oh".

"This was wrapped for me many years ago when a young man was resting here. The wooden clips on my worktable had come loose, so he wrapped a wire around it to reinforce it. His technique was very professional; it wasn't just a random wrap. The spacing between each loop was equal. I kept the extra wire in my box as a spare."

"What was that person like?"

"Young man, in his early twenties, carrying a big bag, walked here about the same age as you. He didn't talk much but was quick and efficient. After he finished wrapping the wire for me, he even sharpened my diamond drill bit. The way he sharpened the drill bit didn't seem like someone in our line of work; it was more like the precision of someone doing engineering surveying."

Xu An put the wire ring back into the box.

He didn't ask the man for more information. But he knew.

The person who could wind the wires at equal intervals had encountered traces of the same technique along his journey. The wires in every crack on Grandpa Zeng's Qinglong Bridge were evenly spaced; he had learned this technique there and used it in several other places.

The craftsmanship left behind by those who walked this road is being passed down, from the bridge to the bowl, from the wire to the nail, from the crack to the crack.

My phone vibrated in my pocket.

News about Zhao Nian.

"Brother Xu, where are you now? I checked the map. If you're on the provincial highway between Batou and Mangshi, it's about 6 kilometers from the post office. It should take two days to get there normally. But there's something you need to know: the old street where the post office is located is going to be demolished and renovated next month. The manager said the lockers must be emptied by June 24th at the latest. Today is the 17th, so you have seven days left."

Xu An finished reading the message and put his phone back in his pocket.

Seven days.

Thirty-eight kilometers.

enough.

He helped the old man carry the bamboo basket onto the back of an old tricycle parked by the roadside. A small copper gong hung on the tricycle's handlebars, clanging along with the bowls on the door panel. It was the old man's instrument for attracting business in the village; when he walked through the streets and alleys, he would knock it twice, and the whole village would know that the bowl mender had arrived.

Before leaving, the old man took a metal staple out of the tin box and placed it in Xu An's palm.

"Here, take this nail. Try it on something that breaks, so you don't get rusty."

Xu An held the metal staple, which was no bigger than a grain of rice, between his fingers and examined it for two seconds. The staple was made of brass, with both ends bent into inward arcs, and the straight middle section was polished smooth and shiny.

"Uncle, you said a broken bowl could be repaired, but where is the person?"

The old man had already mounted his tricycle, taken the gong off the handlebars, and held it in his hand. He paused upon hearing this.

"People are more durable than bowls. If a bowl breaks, someone has to mend it. But if a person cracks, it can heal itself, it just takes a little longer, but there's no rush."

After he finished speaking, he started pedaling the tricycle, and rang the gong three times in his hand. The sound carried far across the empty road, startling two birds from the tea bushes on both sides, which fluttered and flew into the sky.

There were over 400 viewers in the live stream. Someone posted a comment that scrolled slowly, but many people repeated it.

"If a bowl is broken, someone else has to mend it; but if a person is cracked, they can heal themselves."

"Is this old man a philosopher?"

"Have you noticed that everyone An Shen has met along the way has been doing the same thing: mending? They've been mending bridges, roads, shoes, photos, and bowls. An Shen himself is mending too; he's finishing the road his father didn't complete."

Xu An stood at the crossroads, watching the shadow of the tricycle grow smaller and smaller until it disappeared behind the bend of the provincial highway.

He glanced down at the metal staple in his palm, then opened the canvas bag and put it into the inner pocket of the keepsake, squeezing it together with Grandpa Zeng's wire loop, Old Han's pliers, the old man's whetstone, and the tire repair lady's cigarette box paper.

The bag is getting heavier and heavier.

But the weight on my shoulders is different from three months ago. Three months ago, the bag only contained my father's notes and my own change of clothes. At that time, the weight was a vague weight, not knowing where to go. Now, the bag contains the belongings of dozens of people along the way, each item with a name, origin, and destination. This weight is a reassuring weight, knowing where to step next.

He turned onto the provincial highway on the right and continued walking towards Mangshi.

The sun was slightly westward from directly overhead, and a breeze blew in from the south, carrying a sweet smell that I couldn't quite place—it was either mango or jackfruit.

About twenty minutes later, my phone vibrated again.

It's not Zhao Nian.

It's Grandpa's number.

Xu An accepted it.

"Master."

There was a two-second silence on the other end, one second longer than usual.

"Anwa'er, have you eaten?"

"I ate it, a sticky rice ball with cured meat inside."

"middle."

There was a moment of silence. Xu An heard the sound of wind on the other end of the phone. It was the kind of wind that blew through the courtyard of his old home, coming in from the east wall, hitting the west wall, and then turning out again. He had heard it since he was a child and could tell the wind direction with his eyes closed.

"Sir, what's wrong?"

Grandpa coughed, not from illness, but it was the kind of cough he made before he said anything, a habitual action.

"A letter arrived at home today."

Xu An's steps didn't stop, but the pace slowed down by half a beat.

Who sent it?

"No signature. No signature, no postmark, I don't know who slipped it under the door. It fell on my foot when I opened the door this morning."

"What did the letter say?"

Grandpa paused for a moment.

Just one sentence.

Xu An waited.

"The crabapple tree is in bloom."

The heat from the road surface rose from the asphalt, and Xu An's shadow shrank to a very short length beneath his feet. The strap of his canvas bag left a faint red mark on his left shoulder.

He took three steps before speaking.

"Sir, please keep that letter safe, don't throw it away."

"Okay, I put it in the cabinet."

"I'll hang up now, I'll call you when I get there."

"Middle. Drink water on the way."

The phone hangs up.

When Xu An put his phone back in his pocket, his finger lingered on the screen for an extra second.

The crabapple tree is in bloom.

Tang.

My mother's name contains the character "棠".

He looked up and saw that the provincial highway made a gentle bend about 300 meters away. There was a tire track on the road surface at the other end of the bend, which came from the south and went south again. The tire treads were clearly pressed into the soft asphalt and were recently left.

Xu An switched the strap of his canvas bag from his left shoulder to his right shoulder and continued walking south.

Thirty-eight kilometers.

Seven days.

enough.