The Game of Life

January 1, New Year’s Day.

Jiang Feng got up early, originally planning to make Wu Minqi a bowl of egg noodles and head out early to the newsstand to buy today’s issue of “Taste,” but he didn’t expect Wu Minqi was also up, preparing to make him a bowl of Xiaomi porridge.

The two bumped into each other in the bathroom, and Wu Minqi was a bit surprised to see Jiang Feng, since he rarely got up early—probably about once a month.

Jiang Feng had already risen early on Christmas Eve, prompted by a phone call from Mrs. Wang Xiulian. That day, the store was having a promotion, and she wanted to press-gang help without paying overtime, so Jiang Feng, as cheap labor, was snagged.

It was buy one, get one free—since Christmas Eve fell on a weekend, and Wang Hao didn’t have to work, Jiang Feng dragged him along too, to serve as labor.

New Year’s Day was a public holiday, and Jiang Feng planned to wait until after 8 a.m. to call and invite Wang Hao over, not to press-gang, but to join everyone for two meals at Taifeng Building’s staff canteen.

After all, you can never have enough hands on a holiday, and Wang Hao was always very willing to come to Taifeng Building to labor and frequently volunteered.

Whenever he ran out of ideas and couldn’t write his copy, he would find a weekend to spend the whole day as a private room attendant at Taifeng Building, and by the next day, he would be brimming with ideas, writing an excellent ad copy and receiving praise from his boss on the third day.

The current Wang Hao was no longer what he used to be, having become an outstanding private room attendant, adept, and courteous in answering all kinds of odd questions from guests, and when necessary, pretending to be deaf and dumb.

For some reason, Jiang Feng’s friends seemed to have a particular potential for being waiters, and Jiang Feng thought that next time, he might try inviting Chen Xiuxiu to Beiping to try their Taifeng Building’s staff meal.

Maybe while eating, she would discover what career really suited her.

Lost in his thoughts, Jiang Feng noticed that Wu Minqi had almost finished her skincare routine and was applying her moisturizer.

“Fengfeng, you can come and wash your face now,” Wu Minqi said, stepping aside to make room for Jiang Feng at the sink.

“Qiqi, I just remembered there might still be some of yesterday’s fried sauce in the fridge. How about I make you some fried sauce noodles this morning?” Jiang Feng asked.

Wu Minqi’s hand paused in the act of applying the moisturizer, and she let out an almost imperceptible sigh.

As expected, Jiang Feng hadn’t noticed that she had gained weight last month.

Although Jiang Feng hadn’t noticed, Wu Minqi felt she couldn’t just ignore it any longer.

Since dating Jiang Feng, in just over half a year, Wu Minqi’s weight had been on the rise. Sometimes it increased linearly, other times quadratically, and sometimes even exponentially. Wu Minqi’s weight gain chart over the past six months could definitely become a very complex composite function problem.

She didn’t want to touch fried sauce noodles, a high-carbohydrate staple, at all.

“Fengfeng, why don’t we go out to eat instead?” Wu Minqi suggested.

“Go out to eat?” Jiang Feng was taken aback.

With two chefs at home, one Sichuan and one Shandong, and now they were considering going out for breakfast, the suggestion sounded…

Actually, like quite a good idea.

Jiang Feng thought back to the rich variety of breakfasts when he was a regular college student at UAL University: fried dough pancakes, eggs, dough sticks, siu mai, sesame balls, buns, soup noodles, stir-fried noodles, wontons, huafas, all kinds of sauce pancakes and meat-filled pancakes, and porridges that were sometimes hard to swallow and sometimes delicious—enough variety to go half a month without repeating and still be budget-friendly.

The most famous thing about Food Court 1 at UAL was its breakfast, and the highlight of breakfast was the white sugar huafa, soft but chewy, smooth to the touch, and even smoother to eat, with a gentle osmanthus fragrance if you savored it carefully.

Most students who ate the white sugar huafa, however, wolfed it down in a hurry and rushed to classes, failing to notice the subtlety the cafeteria chef put into making the huafas.

Thinking about the white sugar huafas from UAL’s Food Court 1, Jiang Feng felt that going out for breakfast was indeed a great suggestion.

The new breakfast shop downstairs, although its Fa Gao doesn’t match up to the ones at UAL University’s cafeteria, still sells pretty decent Fa Gao. He could go with Wu Minqi to the breakfast shop downstairs to buy two pieces of Fa Gao, then next door to Mrs. Jiang’s favorite breakfast shop to buy two Pancake fruits, and enjoy them while walking. They could also take a detour to the nearby newsstand to pick up a copy of “Taste” magazine.

Perfect!

Jiang Feng was very pleased with his plans for the morning.

“Qiqi, what if we go downstairs to buy Fa Gao this morning and then turn next door to that shop my grandma always goes to, to get some Pancake fruit?” Jiang Feng suggested.

“Pancake fruit?” Wu Minqi’s face showed reluctance. “I’ll just have the Fa Gao.”

Wu Minqi had finished applying her face cream and was about to apply her primer. Seeing that Jiang Feng had almost completed his twenty-second tooth-brushing technique, she suddenly remembered something: “Right, is the breakfast shop that Mrs. Jiang often visits the one that sells Douzhi?”

Jiang Feng was rinsing his mouth and couldn’t speak, so he nodded.

“Then let’s go for some Douzhi. I haven’t tried it since I came to Beiping!” Wu Minqi proposed.

Jiang Feng swallowed his mouthwash.

As everyone knows, Douzhi is a miraculous food made from mung beans by filtering out the starch and fermenting the remaining residue.

Those who love it find its flavor unique, and those who don’t think it’s just slop water.

Jiang Feng thought for a moment and said, “I’ll go next door for the Pancake fruit.”

His determination not to drink Douzhi was resolute.

Wu Minqi nodded in agreement.

Though she had expressed a desire to try Douzhi and Jiao Quan, Wu Minqi was quite sincere about buying a piece of Fa Gao at the shop downstairs as a backup plan, leaving it as her last-ditch escape route.

Since Wu Minqi had never been to that breakfast shop, it was Jiang Feng who led the way, while he kept thinking about today’s issue of “Taste” on the way.

Every time Jiang Feng thought about the issue of “Taste” he had been looking forward to for days, now waiting at the newsstand for him to purchase, and how he was going to eat Pancake fruit before gracing “Taste” with his attention, he felt like an inconstant jerk.

After some thought, he decided to take a detour to the newsstand to buy “Taste” before going to get the Pancake fruit.

Thanks to the opulent spending of Xu Cheng, the owner of “Taste,” despite its not-so-impressive sales, it is still available nationwide. Especially in a major city like Beiping, you can find “Taste” at any newsstand, even issues from a few years back that didn’t sell out.

Jiang Feng heard that the magazine “Taste” is running such a loss that bookstore and newsstand owners get subsidies just for stocking it, limited to 5 copies. The first 5 copies are not only free of charge, but the magazine also pays you for taking them.

This bizarre practice is said to stem from Xu Cheng’s desire to have “Taste” magazine spread throughout the cities of the country.

The clout of a big shot like that is beyond poor people like Jiang Feng.

So, under normal circumstances, newsstand owners don’t mind letting 5 copies of an unsold magazine collect dust in their stands.

Previously, when Jiang Feng wanted to buy a copy of “Taste” to catch up, he casually asked a newsstand owner if they carried it. To his comfort, the owner brought out all the unsold issues from the previous years, making Jiang Feng doubt whether he was actually in a second-hand bookstore.

The whimsical generosity of Xu Cheng, the owner, greatly facilitated Jiang Feng’s magazine shopping.

“Qiqi, I remember there’s a newsstand just up the street. How about we take a little detour to buy ‘Taste’ first, then go for Pancake fruit and Douzhi?” relying on Wu Minqi’s unfamiliarity with the area, Jiang Feng suggested.

“Sure,” Wu Minqi had no objection.

Jiang Feng, with Wu Minqi in tow, took a detour that lasted almost 10 minutes before finally arriving at the magazine kiosk.

The kiosk owner was listlessly playing with a cellphone, a steamed bun dangling from his mouth, a sight far removed from the stereotypical image of a magazine seller always buried in newspapers.

“Do you want corn or grilled sausages?” Seeing two young customers, the kiosk owner took a bite of the bun and placed it in a bowl, then asked.

Jiang Feng: …

Business is really tough these days, to think that life has pushed a magazine kiosk owner to such straits.

“Boss, do you have the latest issue of ‘Taste’?” Jiang Feng asked.

“Yes, just wait a bit.” The owner bent down to fetch the magazine for Jiang Feng, muttering, “It’s really strange. Usually, I can’t even sell this magazine, but just this morning, right after stocking it, I’ve already sold three copies.”

“28 yuan, scan it yourself on the right side there.” The owner tossed the ‘Taste’ magazine in front of Jiang Feng.

The deluxe edition of ‘Taste,’ twice as thick as a regular travel magazine and full-color, was only 28 yuan.

It must be nice to have money.

Jiang Feng felt that if he were wealthy, he couldn’t even conceive of such a play.

The brand-new magazine was still in its packaging. The cover, identical to the images posted by the magazine’s publisher, seemed nicer to Jiang Feng when held in his hands, more tangible and realistic than the HD images seen on a phone.

This was indeed the real ‘Taste’ magazine.

The cover too was real, genuinely depicting Taifeng Building.

The photographers at ‘Taste’ were skilled, capturing the old-world charm of the newly renovated Taifeng Building, which looked historic and full of a sense of the past.

Traditional crafts often emphasize lineage and blessings; the grander the ancestor, the more accolades for the heritage and craftsmanship.

Take Wu Family Restaurant, for instance. To an uninformed diner, it might not seem special, but the moment someone tells them it dates back to the Song period, they’re impressed. “Wow, from the Song period? That’s amazing, so historical.”

And with that, even the food they taste carries a hint of the Song era.

As for Taifeng Building, being a new establishment among Beiping’s multitude of old restaurants, it seemed to pale in comparison regarding heritage and prestige.

But if Jiang Feng started boasting that this restaurant had been passed down from his ancestors, originating in the Qing period, with an Imperial Chef in the family and a signboard to prove it, then suddenly Taifeng’s status would soar, matching the old-line Beiping eateries in terms of lineage.

Jiang Feng believed that Xu Cheng, who loved to pad his stories, would certainly spice up the history of Taifeng Building he had shared, embellishing his article with a wealth of adjectives.

Unable to wait, Jiang Feng tore off the outer wrapping, preparing to flip through the magazine.

Then Wu Minqi took the magazine from his hands.

“Alright, stop looking at it, we’re not in a hurry. You seem so anxious. Let’s go have breakfast first, come on.” Wu Minqi signaled for Jiang Feng to lead the way.

Watching Wu Minqi hold the magazine without being able to flip through it left Jiang Feng with the same longing Ji Xia felt as he watched carbonated drinks in the fridge, unable to drink them.

The journey to the breakfast joint, lasting a mere fifteen minutes, felt unusually long and arduous.

It was still early, and even though Jiang Feng and Wu Minqi had been delayed by their detour, it was only a little past seven when they arrived. The customers sipping soy milk and eating fried dough sticks were primarily elderly men and women, with just one or two young people up early.

With no open tables, Wu Minqi went to share a table with an old man, and before she left, she returned the magazine to Jiang Feng.

The street food vendor selling Jianbing Guozi was bustling with around ten elders queuing up. While waiting in line, Jiang Feng could skim through the article about Taifeng Building in “Taste” magazine, especially the one he wrote, which needed to be reviewed carefully, highlighted, and taken back for Ji Xia to read over and over again.

Holding the magazine, Jiang Feng stood at the end of the queue and just as he opened the first page, he caught a glimpse from the corner of his eye of an elderly lady ahead who also seemed to be reading a magazine, her silhouette strikingly resembling his own grandma’s.

That couldn’t be right, could it? Mrs. Zhao LanHua couldn’t read, could she?

If Jiang Feng remembered correctly, his grandma could only write the numbers one, two, three and her own name, something she was forced to learn when people from the literacy class had dragged her in to eradicate her illiteracy back when she was young.

As a child, Mrs. Jiang had often told him the story of her being “captured” by the literacy class to learn to write, which led him to equate literacy classes with prison for quite a long time.

“Grandma?” Jiang Feng called out uncertainly.

Mrs. Jiang turned around.

“Oh my, if it isn’t Feng! That’s wonderful. I can’t read, so come over here and help me understand what’s written in this magazine,” Mrs. Jiang said elatedly, not even bothering to stay in line anymore and instead stood right behind Jiang Feng, at the end of the line.

Jiang Feng: ???

So what exactly are you looking at?

Pictures?

Jiang Feng took the “Taste” magazine from Mrs. Jiang’s hands and found that she had indeed proven her illiteracy.

She had flipped to the article about Jubao Building, which seemed to be about Sun Guanyun’s new dish. Jiang Feng didn’t look at the specifics; he just glanced before quickly flipping to the contents page to find the article about Taifeng Building.

Jiang Feng began to read the article at a glance.

“Grandma, which article do you want me to read to you?” Jiang Feng asked.

“Just read the one about our place,” Mrs. Jiang said cheerfully.

She had been looking at the pictures for a while before Jiang Feng arrived, and thankfully, “Taste” magazine had plenty of them, otherwise she wouldn’t have had much to look at.

“Alright. As everyone knows, I am not one to fancy sweet foods. I was brave enough to try them when I was younger, but now that I am older, I tend to stay away from overly sugary sweets. The Sweet and Sour Yam is…” Jiang Feng had just started reading the beginning when Mrs. Jiang interrupted him.

“Not that one, wasn’t there a photo of Wu earlier? Read the piece about Wu. I’ve already seen—and eaten—the photos of your Sweet and Sour Yam and the Li Hongzhang hodgepodge, so there’s no point in reading those. I even cried when I ate that Li Hongzhang hodgepodge; it was quite frightening. Read about Wu,” Mrs. Jiang directed.

Jiang Feng: …

What was frightening about it? The Li Hongzhang hodgepodge also included the deeply touching story of Li Mingyi and Jiang Huiqin, imbued with national and familial hatred. Grandma, you love those kinds of dramas, don’t you?

The writing of Xu Cheng was excellent, and he even spiced up the article with many details that Jiang Feng himself was unaware of, enriching the whole story and transforming a mere food article into a short story.

“Oh, wait a moment, Grandma. Let me flip to it,” Jiang Feng said as he turned the pages and saw the full-body picture of his cousin Qiqi, wearing the Taifeng Building kitchen uniform, posing with a blank expression, exuding an air of aloofness.

A powerful CEO vibe hit him square in the face.

Just replace the kitchen uniform with a suit, and it was the kind that could grace the cover of a finance magazine.

“Spicy, which is an ability to…” Jiang Feng started reading Wu Minqi’s feature article to Mrs. Jiang.

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