Where Reunion and Departure Conspire
(Note: this letter was originally written in English, on 25 Apr, 2025. There is no plan to further action, incl. translating, because it's structurally unsound. However, it is a witness to my rather recent life.)
Dear Salem,
First, I wish you to take note that this letter has been BCC’ed to Cindy, a friend of mine in Vancouver who has of great help recently, and someone I have had the honour to acquainted.
2024 is a year of exceeding sorrow, mirth, suffering, and joy alike. In this year, I have witnessed changes a regular individual in China might not be able to see in a decade.
From a chronological narrative, I’ve spent my New Year’s Eve of 2024 in a slum. The slum serves as an inspiration to me, then, now, and I expect ever to come.
Salem, I know you have been long dismissive towards my aversion of slums, but it engraved in my mind – the garment workshop just right next to my unit gate, where those people toiled from the moment, I left my room and the moment of my return. With those people I have beholden, I felt as if my heart has been purified – purified into the struggle to aid those most downtrodden most sad.
For long I have seen people living in a hive, in mindless pursuit for their monetary gain; this, again, renewed my pledge made in Burger Bar, to study something for the gain for all people. Merrily my prayer was answered, I was sponsored with one sixth of my tuition fee towards a law degree in English law.
I have spent my Lunar New Year in a peculiar way – upon the moment of New Year’s Eve, I was on final approach to Chengdu Shuangliu Int’l. Seeing fireworks cracking over the entirety of Chengdu, in the sky, wasn’t a common experience. As usual, it’s a moment of mirth and sorrow, when I was filled with the light joy of reunion and the lamentation for my friends who can see the scene no longer. It was to a furtherance of my earlier meeting with Lena Shizuki, who was kind enough to invite me to her residence in suburb Chengdu. I just parted my way from Hanlu (one of those 24 solar terms, literally Cold Dew) who was visiting me in Longyan from Shijiazhuang.
In Lena’s residence we talked a lot whilst her girlfriend was away. Lena is one of the most unhinged people in sinophone transgender community, being put under the limelight of national premier TV for saying the 支那 word – an equivalent of saying niggers to the Black community. I liked the way she says it. She's unhinged by all metrics, also not taking showers (but I reckon it is due to the fact she grew up in Henan).
Later in Shanghai, I was confronted with the true meaning of unhingedness to me. For me, conforming in a milieu that's deeply sick is immoral in itself. I've often questioned myself, if I live under a great evil, yet I have done a small deed, how could I come home receiving the praise of my family whilst being silent to the greater evil?
For me, I can manage staying conforming for my families and those whom I love. But Salam, despite that my profound gratitude to you, I can never come to terms with this society that murders my peers.
After the stay in Chengdu, Lena came to Canton for an HSBC interview which she passed. However, she refused the offer. She felt obliged to stay in Chengdu caring her girlfriend (primary partner?).
In this polygamous relationship, Lena wasn't expressing her feelings to me, at least not in the way I knew. It resulted in final breaking up. However, I still see Lena with a pair of fond eyes. I can vividly recall when Lena went to church with me. She's a staunch Protestant, if not Calvinist. In transgender term, she was entirely 'passing' (being recognised as the identified gender). Yet, she chose to sing.
Basically, no training or surgery can alter one's voice for performance purpose. Yet she sang. I still remember her eyes when she focused on the cross. We were gathering in a Protestant church at Shamian Island, with Anglican heritage. Priests there were absolutely terrible and prejudicial. Yet she stared at the Cross. I later on was practicing the art of focusing on the Cross, the only important thing to me.
She has always been saying that 'Jesus Christ is my only blood family.' She did not talk about her family too much. But during a time, she mentioned when China NSA wanted to warn her father about the upcoming Tian'anmen Massacre Anniversary for her known dissenter status, and her father answered in awe, 'Can you reach her? I haven't heard from her for three years!'. Albeit our relationship ended up toxic, she reminds as an inspiration to me, ‘where one cannot be happy, the world cannot achieve happiness’. Her speech summarises one of the tenets I’ve hold so dear. What good will it do, if we couldn’t love each other? There was a time we had a major conflict with our landlady, and dozens of village dwellers went out. Fearing attack, I pray the Hail Mary, even though I could only pray half of it. She, a staunch Protestant, prayed along me. That was the one of the deepest resonating prayers for me.
What is a prayer? A prayer is a child in the arms of their father. And I, despite all the dramas we had later, shall forever remember the prayer – a prayer one of the profoundest in my life.
Later on, we met the challenge of life. My meagre pay as a teacher could not sustain my expense, especially my charity expense. Before I met her, there was a time I had only 700 CNY to spend (cash + credit limit), and I met a homeless person, freezing to death. I donated my coat and my last banknote (100 CNY) to him, and even till this day, beating myself asking why I gave him so little. I had Influenza A later, with no freight to spend to heal my disease. On the edge of death, I apologised to all people I have offended, even though in many cases I was not at fault. However, with Lena, I have a home to support.
It wasn’t easy. Our budget for our two was 7,000 CNY, inclusive of everything we have in Guangzhou, meds, utility, etc. But Lena wasn’t exactly fond of me, partly because of my masculinity, and another part my borderline personality disorder [BPD]. But, let’s not find reasons to hate me myself, but rather to describe the fact she doesn’t like me. Our stay was depressing, my capacity to work was diminishing, and in the end, I quitted my job; things had become more depressing since then.
In May 2024, she parted earlier to Shanghai, and I sent all my belongings to Chengdu and followed suit. I offered 01 (an old soulmate of mine) and Lena, along her another partner, to stay with me. I had serious emotional outburst, and she fed me with Clonazepam. Finally, the clonazepam she fed me exceeded my bodily maximum, and triggered a paradoxical reaction in me – I became violent and smashed things. She as a result abandoned me around 22 June, and I was absolutely devastated and stoned from that on, and some friends, called Artoria, and her (current) wife Elethom came to visit me, helping me to spend the time. Finally, on 26 Jun I scheduled an interview, and on 28 Jun I passed the interview, and I started to work as a Senior Consultant in a study-aboard consultancy by 1 Jul. To this day, I still thank my resilience.
I kept a praying habit by then, first For the Fallen for my transgender friends (at the going down of the sun and in the morning, we remember them), and then the Lord’s prayer, and the Nunc Dimittis, for should God decide to let me die, I respond to him that I am prepared. I kept praying every morning and evening at my office, then my residence (company provided). I became the most diligent one, even HR talked to me to work less. I was always the first to appear in the office.
I was promoted a fortnight after for my expertise and diligence, and I hired Altoria since she was desperate for a job. I provided lodging for her. She was then promoted with me when I became the Department lead. I was still the first to arrive, organising overdue tasks and assigning them before my subordinates arrive. I taught them how to do things properly and communicate effectively. However, with life with Altoria, I became more and more unstable, till the day she swiped my American Express to send me to a psych ward, because I attempted suicide amidst of mounting pressure and Altoria’s partner’s lie of me causing her attempting suicide.
Eventually, I helped Altoria and Elethom to get married in Utah. They revoked my invitation. The pressure mounted at its summit when my boss invited Mei, another friend that I hired, to another place around 10 pm. I took that as a sign as my managing partner wished to sexually assault her and called police. It finally turned out it was merely Mei’s cowardice refusing to say that she called my managing partner. It turns out to be the ugliest eviction from my residence and resignation. When I was cast out 30 Sep, I found a job 3 Oct. My pay increased from 8,000 CNY pcm to somewhere 20,000 CNY pcm. We had a nasty, mutually-assured-destruction termination, and Altoria started to hate me – an action persisted to this date.
I regret hiring her, but I never regretted to help her. When I lived alone, I started to ask for help, and in the meanwhile hurt many. I made many faults, and hence I forgive those who fault me. One thing I realised during my months living alone at home, working remotely is that hatred never helps people.
Now have I receive the Five Precepts, I know by my heart that hatred never helps, but love helps. I started to learn from the very best from all religions – where Buddhism offers me peace, Catholicism teaches me ritual, and Protestantism gives me passion. My heart has deteriorated since December when my commission number falls, but my community commitments remain the same. In retrospect, my community commitments, albeit annoying, have become the sustenance of my life. Living at the island in the CBD of Nankin, my life was truly lonely with only myself.
Litz showed up, as my nursing worker, so to speak. She bought a lot of dramas to my life, since she was, at least at that time, in some ambiguous relationship with others. We had numerous police reports filed onto us. But when Litz cooked me the fist proper dinner, I cried and called my parents to say that I have never eaten a properly, at home, cooked meal for so long. With the emotion of a reunion-like, I cried for one of longest. I have many things in my life – the glory to achieve a lot when I am young, the knowledge which impressed many, the glamour of spending for decent things – but none of those comes close to anything that resembles a reunion.
What is a reunion, what is a home? I seek those two simple items for the entirety of my life, I write lots of them too. But home is a cooked meal, it’s the dawn and dust by the Yangtze River, it’s the chimney smoking timidly across the banks.
Litz finally left me, citing my risk-likeness. I like risks because never have I treasure my own life. I am running multiple charity project, including an encyclopaedia and an oral history project for psych ward survivors (https://psychreview.su ), among with my many projects. Where is reunion, Salem, after all the broken pieces?
Reunion is in our hearts, Salem; reunion is peace, it’s now and only the present. Today I finish my work diligently, today I witness the sufferers with all my heart – today I treat them as my least peer and brethren.
Reunion is now, with you, with Cindy, with all who are with me.
I hope this long overdue letter can serve as your impending birthday’s (27 Apr I gather?) present.
Kind regards,
Yonah C