An official CCP politician posts 4th of May holiday notice, saying that according to laws passed in 2007, today is Young Adult Day. Young adults over 14 years old should have half a day off. Did you have half a day off today?
Comments say, “Tell it to my boss. What’s the point of telling it to me?”
A Chinese Horror short story by Tang JiJing (唐极鲸).
“The Night Bride was a famous rapist. Every time she’d come, she would leave a shuriken with a “happy (喜)” character carved into it in the victim’s room. Well, we say victim, but men took it as a symbol of pride. Rumour was that the Night Bride was beautiful and extremely skilled in bed. There was even a saying going around among folks, that when you find a happy shuriken by your bed, you’re going to have a night better than your marital night! People called those who got a happy shuriken “One-Night Groom”. Most of these people were handsome, but physically weak men. Those who got two shurikens are always extremely good looking and physically fit. As for the blacksmith with seven shurikens on his belt, even if he was very ordinary looking, everyone knew he must’ve had some talent between the sheets.
After receiving a shuriken, most people would get a table at the best restaurant in town, Wang Tian Lou, so they can brag to all their friends. The restaurant owner even developed several new dishes, like “Hard-On Wine” made with bear gall bladder, or “Stamina Stew” made from tiger penis, or even the “Returning Shuriken” medicinal drink whose recipe was a secret.
Wang Er has been eating Returning Shuriken at Wang Tian Lou three times now. The four time he ate there, he didn’t show a new happy shuriken, but instead pulled out a similar looking shuriken with a “Day” character on it (天). When people saw, everyone said that he was the Chosen One. The Night Bride is going to settle down with him now, and come find him every day, so that he can be a groom every night.
People gathered outside his house that night to watch, and they saw the Night Bride come as usual, dressed all in red, with a red veil over her face (traditional Chinese wedding attire), walking over the tiled rooftops. Her narrow waist looked rounder and more curvaceous today than usual. She snuck into Wang Er’s house. The people watching outside began to bet how long she would stay. Some say an hour. Some say not until daybreak. But before the third person opened their mouth, the Night Bride already left Wang Er’s house. She hopped onto the roof top and disappeared like a red streak over the horizon.
The people watching began laughing uproariously, wondering whether Wang Er couldn’t get it up, or couldn’t keep it hard. Either way, he’s definitely not getting a shuriken anymore.
People returned to their own homes, and it was only three days later that someone discovered that Wang Er had become a decapitated corpse. Including him, there were eight headless corpses in the city that night. All of them were One Night Grooms who had received a shuriken before. And all of them had received a Day shuriken before they died. That’s when people figured out that Day didn’t mean Day (天), it was Groom (夫) without the head. The Night Bride was a Mrs. Mantis. She cut off all the heads of her grooms in a couple of days.
The detectives came to solve the case and discovered a treasure hoard of happy shurikens at the black smith’s house. They determined that he was the Mrs. Mantis. After starving for seven days, he finally could fit into the wedding dress. When he was sentenced to beheading himself, he also wore a red veil. The ground before him was scattered with happy shurikens.”
Comments say, “If you can’t get rid of a problem, you can get rid of the people who brought up the problem, huh?”
A relationship blogger writes, “It’s honestly super weird. The same superstitious beliefs that I scoff at from my mom or my MIL, I’ll believe instantly from my month-sitting nurse. It’s just two completely different mindsets I’m in.
My MIL said, “You can’t shower or wash your hair while in your first month, you’ll get cold. The sickness you get in the first month will last your entire life!”
Me: “It’s all about sitting the month scientifically now! The only reason that used to be banned is because people didn’t used to have indoor showers. Now you can totally shower or wash your head.”
Month-sitting nurse: “You should probably not shower or wash your hair. You’ve been through a lot, your immune system is very weak right now, it’ll make you sick.”
Me: “Oh! Really? Is it that serious? Alright, I won’t shower then.”
My MIL: “You can’t touch cold or hot things. Your joints will hurt.”
Me: “It’s fine. Joints hurting have nothing to do with this.”
Month-sitting nurse: “You can’t touch hot things. You can’t even peel eggs. See the red blood vessels in my hands? That’s from peeling eggs in my first month.” And then she peeled eggs for me every day.
Me: Very seriously avoids touching all hot things like she said.
My MIL: “You need to drink more millet porridge.”
Me: “It’s just carbs. There’s not that much nutrition in it. What’s the point of drinking all that porridge?”
Month-sitting nurse: “You need to drink a lot of porridges and broths in your first month to make sure you’re saying hydrated and making lots of milk.”
So I very obediently drank a lot every day.
If my mom was still alive, she could probably also tell me a lot of stuff I can’t do while in the first month, and I’d probably argue back with her just as defiantly. It’s not that I’m just feeling rebellious or I have a bad relationship with my mom or MIL. I just feel like older people have a hard time persuading me. I want them to present me with scientific proof. They don’t know what science is. Every time, they’re like, “Well, so-and-so did this and that and ended up regretting it!” like they’re trying to threaten me or something.
I’d never stay away from something just because of whatever happened to other people. It would only rile me up and make me more determined to find out for myself how it would end up.”
An askreddit, “What is a secret you only dare to share anonymously?” The top reply is, “I’m in Beiing. My kid’s in 2nd grade, and it’s a total and utter idiot. Second to last place in his class. The kid who’s in last place is just too rambunctious and won’t pay attention, but he’s super smart. I found this out listening in on their online lessons. If he was willing to put in effort, he’d at least be middle of the class. But my kid comes home every day and I spend hours helping him with homework. I signed him up for extracurriculars and tutoring and IQ improvement classes since he was a baby. He honestly tries too, but he’s still the worst in his class.
But that’s not my secret. My secrets is that I, his father, am actually the idiot. My wife, child, relatives, friends, coworkers, and boss will never know. As far as they’re concerned, I’m a Master’s Degree graduate returned from overseas, working at a well known nationalised company in Beijing, with a Beijing hukou, with a car and a house, an enviable Beijing middle class man. But all of this is actually fake.
Only my parents know this secret, because from middle school to high school to university to going overseas to the job I got, it’s all because they paid money and pulled connections on my behalf.
In reality, I come from a small town in northern China. My parents ran a business. I’ve always been bad at my studies. In middle school, I was the bottom of my class. There wasn’t a chance in hell I could make it to high school. My parents had to pay money to ensure I got in. In high school, I was once again bottom of the class. No way I could make it to uni. But at my national exams, my parents pulled connections with the exam proctor and a really smart kid sitting next to me, to let me copy off of his exam. That’s how I got into university in Beijing.
Once I got to Beijing, I was bottom of the class in uni too. I failed several classes. I was honestly worried I might not graduate. My parents had to come to Beijing and get in touch with the headmaster of my uni through their connections, and then paid off all the teachers of my mandatory classes to do one-on-one tutoring with me, and grade me very forgivingly. I did honestly try super hard, and still only barely made it past the graduating line and got my diploma.
Because my parents worried the entire four years I was in uni, they frequently came over to maintain their relationship with my headmaster, sending money and giving gifts and such, and even actually became friends. Just around graduation, our school started a school-funded business, and the headmaster made sure I got a job there. I’ve never actually worked a day of that job, but it was a way to get Beijing hukou (residency).
During this, my parents’ business was doing very well, so they bought me a house in Beijing (this was back around 2000, then house prices were only a couple grand per square metre). I lazed around at home all day, got a girlfriend, broke up, and suddenly wanted to go overseas. I told my parents, and got sent to language class and studied there for a year. I never could pass the language requirement of overseas unis, so I had to find a for-profit college (the kind that’ll take anyone if they have the money) and studied there for three years. Basically, I paid money for a worthless Master’s Degree, and came back to China.
I laze around for another year, and began looking for a job. But my for-profit uni diploma didn’t mean anything on the job market, so my parents had to pull connections with an HR Department Head of a famous National Company in Japan, gave him a shitton of gifts. And finally, I was accepted as an employee, and I’ve been working there since.
After that, I met my wife, who’s from Beijing. For someone who doesn’t know the story behind this at all, I was the absolute ideal man—house, car, Beijing hukou, overseas Master’s Degree, employment with famous National Company—we only met twice before we got steady, and got married after a year and had kids quickly.
Until today, I’ve never shared this secret with anyone. I feel very insecure. I get anxious all the time. In my head, I’m always like, “If it weren’t for my parents, I would be scum. I just got lucky. If it wasn’t for all the opportunities my parents created for me, I wouldn’t be able to accomplish anything. If it was just up to me, I would still be at the bottom of society. There’s no way I could get a wife.”
For my wife and kid who know nothing, they still think there’s a halo around me, that I came back from overseas so I must be super smart. But I know that my kid will have to depend on himself—I’m not nearly capable enough to create a happy future for him the way my parents did for me. My kid is just as stupid as I am, but he’s not nearly as lucky…sigh.
Edit: Wow, I was just venting into the void of reddit. I didn’t think I’d get so much attention and so many replies. Thanks for all your suggestions. I’ve read everything seriously. A couple of questions came up that I’d like to answer:
First, why did I write about this secret?
The traditional business that my parents ran has fallen apart as they aged and the industry itself died. They’ve closed their company a couple of years ago to come live with me in Beijing. Now we live together as a big family. I’m really the patriarch of the family now and need to support this family. But the first half of my life, I relied on my parent’s direction and support. And fate was very kind to me. I’ve been too lucky. It’s to the point where there’s honestly something wrong with me mentally now. I often think of sayings like, “If your talent cannot match your position, disaster will surely befall you.” or “She’s still too young to know that every gift from fate has been marked with a price secretly.” I think about it all the time and often feel a fear and helplessness for how little control I have in the future. I don’t have confidence in myself. I don’t have confidence I can take care of my parents, or educate my kids. But I’ve been packaged too well, like celebrities with a persona. It’s not real. I just wanted to talk to somebody about who I really am anonymously on the internet.
Secondly, about my wife.
My wife was born and raised in Beijing, went to community college, has average looks, a little bit of an idiot too but very optimistic and kind. So like a lot of people have said, the fact that my kid’s a total idiot is the fault of both of us. Why didn’t I find a super smart post-doctorate to try to improve my genes? Because, as an idiot, I’d like to be looked up to and admired by someone. My wife is actually a little worse than me. And it’s nice to get looked at with stars in her eyes once in a while. And also, it’s because smart girls really don’t want to date me.
Third, about my parents.
A lot of smart commenters have figured out that the most important period of my life all happened around the 90s and 2000s. That was the fastest period of growth in China and a transition of the market. A lot of the rules of society were getting shaken up, and the new rules hadn’t yet been thoroughly established yet. So a lot of lucky geniuses appeared in that era, and my parents were one of them.
My parents, especially my father, isn’t just a businessman. He’s a strategist. He’s the person I admire the most. I’m not even a tenth as good as him. My story is actually a lot more exciting and complicated than what I’ve described. It’s honestly like a TV show. But to make it more understandable, I’ve blurred a lot of the background information and how a lot of things happened. Honestly, every major event in my life is carefully and calculatingly set up and designed, with resources already set aside to make sure it goes smoothly. And he has to be brave and adventurous. But no matter how well you design and plan for everything, there are still times when you find yourself at a dead end, and amazingly, those few times when you’re about to give up, an invisible hand of fate picks you up and puts you at a new exit. I honestly feel like my entire life has already been written out by fate, I’m just a cog in the machine.
About my kid.
We’re…trying out best to love each other. Although we hate each other whenever it comes to homework time, we really do have a special bond that only idiots share. Why don’t I spend money on tutors? Because only idiots can understand idiots. Only I can put myself in his shoes and help him from his point of view. I understand him. From middle school to uni graduation, I’ve had an endless parade of tutors and none of them ever helped at all. I stayed bottom of my class. Maybe we just can’t learn. Either way, I’ve made my peace with it. If he’s got bad grades, he’s got bad grades. I won’t let him give up the confidence and ambition to learn. As an idiot father myself, I never gave up on myself. What I should do now is that whatever my parents left me, I’ll stop eating from it, or just eat the crumbs, and try to leave as much of it intact as possible for him.”
Comments say, “It wasn’t until I got to uni that I found out, fairness in the national exams is an ideal that only exists in first line cities. My roommate is from a fourth or fifth line city (think Des Moines, Little Rock) and had good grades. At the national exams, the principal changed the seating arrangement so that a kid with connections could sit behind her and copy her answers. Before her exams, he’d already negotiated this deal with her family with a mix of threats and bribes. But because she was hurrying too much, she forgot to answer one of the big questions on her maths exam. It was only after she handed it in, that the kid with connections told her. That’s how she didn’t make it into a better uni and became my roommate. I was totally shocked at the time.”
That anonymous story one is amazing. On one hand, it's surely envious to have parents willing to do that much for you. On the other hand, now it's like there's the sword of Damocles hanging over your head.