Gone with Hongqi Elementary School (1) 风雨花——红旗小学往事(1) | Monthly Review

Lilykitty cuddles up by my pillow meekly, licking its soft and edelweiss like hair quietly. Unknowingly, my mind drifts off to where I was still at elementary school.

My parents brought spirit of “Moving three evictions“ to the extreme.

Shuiguo Middle Shcool and Mountain Hujun left great memories full of happiness and excitement to my childhood.

How time flew, it was time for my brother and I to go to elementary school. My brother is one year younger than me. But my parents decided to send us to school at the same time, so we could look out for each other. For the sake of better education of us, we moved to a place right cross the street of Hongqi Elementary School in downtown. It was very convenient commute for us.

I guess life at elementary school was probably the same for most kids in the 80’s. There wasn’t too many after school classes to go to, and there weren’t many specialty classes either. My father thought after school programs were just repeating what was learned at regular school, he never considered signing my brother and I up, especially when we already were getting pretty good scores at regular school.

For our summer vacation after finishing 3rd grade, to kill our time, my father suggested us to go to marshal training, which was organized by the school. I clearly remember what happened at the registration. My head teacher Mr. Liu was sitting by the table, right in front of her was the registration form. I walked to him happily with registration fee in my hand. “Teacher, I want to sign up for the martial class.”

Mr. Liu hesitated for a while, wasn’t sure what he just heard, and then asked. “Are you sure? Is it art you want instead?”

Every time when I recall the look on her face, I just couldn’t help laughing. As now you can see how my father raised us, purely free-range style.

Back at that time, there was no electronic products and internet, but we had our ways to entertain ourselves at the recess, like Kicking shuttlecocks, playing rubber bands, throwing bean bags, hopscotch, tossing pebbles, turning paper cards, flipping horizontal and parallel bars.

I was fortunate to be assigned to a very friendly classroom. Xiaoyu was my best friend.

She was skinny and had a pointed face. She had very beautiful big eyes that could speak for itself. Her eyelashes were long and thick, like flying butterflies when she blinked. How I wished I had her deep dimples on the face, that gave her the sweet and pretty smile.

The Legend of The Condor Heroes led by famous actress Barbara Yung Mei-ling was hot on TV. As I was few months older than Xiaoyu, she called me “Sister Jing” and I called her “Sister Yu”. She had very sweet voice, and was good at declamation and singing. She was the most favorite student by the literature and music teacher. I was favored by all the other teachers. We hang out and did homework together, we became best friends.

Because we moved around a lot and with musicican talent, our father was always able to find a place for us to play. On the Northern suburb from where we lived, there was a river, let’s call it “North river”. There was a huge field of wheat by the river. During the weekend, my parents would bike us to north river to go fishing, kiting, and digging shepherd’s purse. Sometimes we would be lucky enough to catch eels.

All of a sudden, I am brought back to reality, when I felt a something itchy on my face. It was Lilykitty, she yawned and stood up, sweeping my face with her fluffy tail. She then ran out from the window and left me a meaningful look, that seems to say, “there is always some people and some things that you will never forget, no matter how long it goes.”

Original post written by @wangwenjing: 风雨花——红旗小学往事(1) | 月旦评
Translator: @susanli3769

“往事猫”温顺地蜷缩在我的枕边，静静地舔着它那柔顺的雪绒花似的毛，不知不觉中，思绪将我带回了我的小学。

我的父母把“孟母三迁”发挥得淋漓尽致。记忆中的税郭中学和护君山，给我的童年带来了无限的乐趣与美好的学前回忆。

转眼间，我和弟弟到了上小学的年龄。我和弟弟相差一岁，爸爸妈妈决定让我们同年上学，以便相互照应。为了让我们接受更好的教育，我们搬到了市区，红旗小学对面。我和弟弟每天上学十分方便。

80后的小学生活应该都差不多吧。没有那么繁多的补习班，也没有那么丰富的特长班。老爸一直认为，补习班无非是把课堂上讲的重复一遍。因而从来没有给我和弟弟报补习班的想法，况且以我的成绩也不需要上补习班。

在我们升三年级的暑假，爸爸为了让我们打发时间，提议给我们报学校组织的武术班。我清楚地记得当年报名的场景。班主任刘老师坐在书桌前，面前放着报名表。我带着报名费开开心心地过去报名。

“老师，我要报武术班。”

刘老师愣了一下，试探着问道：

“你确定报的是武术，不是美术？”

每每想起这个场景，我都忍俊不禁。老爸的育儿之道，由些可见一斑。他对我们，纯粹是放养的态度。

没有电子产品和网络的时代，我们的课间活动反而更加丰富多彩：踢毽子、跳皮筋、丢沙包、跳房子、丢石子、摔元宝、翻单双杠等等。

我的运气很好，被分到了一个友好的班级。班里我最好的朋友要属小瑜了。

瘦小的身板上顶着一个小脑袋。标准的瓜子脸上长着一双会说话的大眼睛。长长的睫毛忽闪忽闪的，像只蝴蝶在飞。最令我羡慕的，就是她那对深深的酒窝，笑起来，甜美极了。

那会儿，翁美玲版的“射雕英雄传”正在热播。由于我比小瑜大几个月，她管我叫静姐姐，而我管叫她瑜妹妹。她声音很甜美，擅长朗诵和唱歌，是语文老师和音乐老师最喜欢的学生，而我则基本上包揽了其他老师的喜爱。我们常常一起玩耍和做作业，成了形影不离的好朋友。

不论我们搬到哪里，爸爸像个魔术师一样，总能找到让我和弟弟驰骋的地方。在我们家的北边郊区，有一条河，我们管它叫“北河”。北河周围是一大片麦地。周末的时候，老爸老妈就骑着自行车带我们去北河捉鱼、放风筝、挖芥菜。运气好的时候，还能够捉到鳝鱼。

突然觉得脸上痒痒的，这才缓过神来。原来往事猫起身打了个哈欠，尾巴扫到了我的脸。然后，她顺着窗台，溜出去了，留给我一个意味深长的眼神，仿佛在说：

“有些人有些事，不论过去多久，都不会忘记。”

原文: @wangwenjing 风雨花——红旗小学往事(1) | 月旦评
译者: @susanli3769