LA CITADELLE

The Sojourners' Smiles is NOT my love story; and it is NOT a love story in its very essence. Shixi and Erqing are both part of me: one is willing to give up anything for secular success; the other yearns for the absolute freedom that denies any moral dilemma. Neither works; and both would lead to death, of the soul if not of the physical. The story is therefore about two lost souls that find home in each other. The two splitted parts must be reunited and reconciled, so that Erqing would remain loyal to her principles, and Shixi would learn about the eternal struggles in the torrents of a world with no absolute truth. They would both discover a life between tears of lucidity and smiles of sweet dreams.They are the "sojourners," or the wanderers, the ones in exile, so utterly alone that they have no one else to rely on but each other; that is the only basis of such desperate love. 

    

“撕碎后拼贴起的照片，周游世界后回到家的小矮人。”这是我看了《天使爱美丽》后写的，我想这也是我对2011年的总结。

大概是这样的，最深的伤，最深的忧虑，最深的担惊受怕，往往是自己与自己过不去，不干他人的事，怨不得其他。

I was running by the river this evening, as I always did, and a random thought came to my mind all the sudden: “You know what the worst feeling is? You took a long run. It was a great run and you didn’t even feel tired. You thought you could make if further the next day, and all the sudden, in the middle of these thoughts, you collapsed. ”

我过去一直不喜欢，生命和生活到了英语里都成了life, 以至于我每次写paper想要强调生命时，总被迫不得已地肤浅成了生活。我今天才懂得，真正肤浅的人是我，生命和生活，本就应该是一个词，本就是你中有我，我中有你，又该如何区分？

Dear all,

Blinding sunshine, glittering glasses, broken coconut shells covering the ground. I opened up the curtain of the bus window, half-awake in the afternoon heat, and realized that I finally came to the land of Africa. This is Zwelethemba, a black township outside Cape Town in South Africa, where we stayed for 10 days. We next moved to Bo Kaap for another two weeks. Bo Kaap is the so called Malay Quarter of Cape Town where houses are painted with bright colors and looked as if in fairy tale. However, people living there are not really “Malays,” but descendents of slaves from India, South-east Asia, and Africa. South Africa is definitely the most beautiful country on this trip. It was not until we landed in Cape Town did we realize how long we had been away from blue skies and natural beauties. The dust in India and the smog in China now seemed far away, and the clear sky of Cape Town indicated the start of a new adventure.