This time, the author starts writing because she feels she is going to die. She feels it in her body. She first writes on New Year's Eve, when her visitors have left, and she writes overnight. When she's writing her pain increases, in her shoulders, her nape, her back, her backbone and muscles. Her eyes sore. But she thinks the chief danger is in her heart, for it beats with such violence and difficulty as if it's going to exhaust itself. But the muscular pains feel more immediate, so she doesn't attend to her heart as she would otherwise do.

She writes about today. She had prepared for A's visit, but A didn't come. For this part refer to Ding Ling's Miss Sophie's Diary. The difference is, she had prepared to love A. She had made that decision because her best friend had persuaded her into it; or because she had seen something, the happy example of a poor but content family to awaken her from the delusion of the futile promise of perseverance, or something. So she had decided to step down and love. But then A didn't come, and instead another man came and warmed her heart toward him. Afterwards A will resent it, will be indignant, and accuse her of being changeable. But she is unable to communicate the subtle changes, the decision and disappointment, the unexpected attention, disturbance, and love.

So she writes.

In the end she will die when she is writing. Her entry is unfinished, stopping at the half typed character "want"

put an idle man on stage. he has nothing to do with the plot whatever, but he is constantly in the way, and has to be pushed aside to allow room for the actors. he is there doing his stuff, or doing nothing: he walks a little, eating snacks, or staring at the play like some Chinese street onlooker, very dull, apathetic, shameless.

A detail about character: someone who hugs the gift-giver before examining the gift.

Chinese-style diplomacy

A story set in a small city. Bureaucracy and red tapes. Sectioned by quotes from 19th-century writings about Chinese officialdom, in different languages. Model the plot after portrayal of Chinese affairs in the Qing.

a novel with forking endings?

To write for a future readership

When Natsumi divulged that a student in her class had copied an article from the internet for a group project, and was very likely to lose all the points and get a warning from the department director, she couldn't fight the impulse to ask, "Was he Chinese?" "Yes..." admitted Natsumi. That was so unsurprising. She knew that every semester the Japanese teaching group had to device strategies to discourage the Chinese students from cheating. It was humiliating, and she wanted to write to someone "in charge" of the Chinese population on campus about this and make every Chinese aware of this dishonorable situation.

For the last two years the Chinese language program had been losing students. True that there was an overall drop in enrollment in all the humanities programs, but she felt that Chinese itself was losing ground. In contrast, enrollment in Japanese increased. This year their program recruited a dozen new graduate students, including seven or eight TAs. That was like adding at least ten sections to their language courses, even after deducting the old TAs who had graduated. About eighty percent of the undergrads who registered for their language classes were Chinese. What could one do with it? The Chinese population at this college was growing exponentially, and most of those with language credit requirement preferred to learn Japanese, a language close to their own and attracting them through animations, food, and what not. In Natsumi's words, they, the Japanese TAs, depended on the Chinese students for their salaries.

After October break people came back to their offices with great reluctance. Aya was in a cold and seemed to have difficulty breathing. "How was your break?" "Oh it was the worst," said Aya, "I broke up with my boyfriend." "Oh--" she began, but then switched to Japanese, "Are you okay?" "Yes, it's just the cold." She went over to hug Aya. "You'll be fine. We need to find you a new boyfriend." "Yes please!" Aya cried, "Do you know someone?" She was unprepared for this question. "You mean--uh--ya," switched back to English, "of course I do. Let me think. I have a bunch of friends from church, whom I think are available." "Are they Americans?" "Are you looking for Americans?" "That would be the best." "Yes, there're several." "Graduates?" "...perhaps not." She thought a little. "Oh yes, there is one!" She thought of Chris. Chris was an American, same age as she, and used to be a Japanese interpreter. She told Aya about this, and seeing Aya was interested, began to pull up Chris' page on Facebook. She found it, and there was nothing on the page indicating that he was in a relationship. "So he may be available," she said, "you want to know him?" All the while she wasn't clear why she was doing this. She was never interested in being a matchmaker. Bringing people together made her feel old. Only old people were enthusiastic about arranging relationships. But she couldn't help thinking that this might be a good match. One was looking for an American, and the other speaking Japanese like native. She even showed Aya the group page of her bible study fellowship, with photos of its recent fun events, giving it a good advertisement.

So it was decided that Aya would come to a church meeting to know that guy.

Breakup

I vomit up my soul and set her free.

Office after 7 pm

She was resting, her feet on her desk. The door lock clicked, and she hurriedly put her feet down, when her officemate, Aya, came in. She said something in Japanese to her, but she didn't understand. She only caught the ending sound, "ka", and knew it was a question. So she said, "uh huh," not caring to understand what was asked. It was some phatic phrase anyway. Aya was with her boyfriend, an American graduate student in mechanical engineering. She had caught some glimpses of him before, but had very little idea what he looked like, for he never came in. She only knew that he was almost twice as tall as Aya. She heard that from someone else. That, however, didn't seem extraordinary to her. Rather, she would often wonder how people met and became lovers. Mechanical engineering and Japanese linguistics. They must have met at some party, or student club. For graduate students and teaching assistants, parties are clubs were luxuries.

On Contentment

I've heard so many people say that man can never be satisfied. We have desires that know no bounds. Although we deceive ourselves by saying "I'll want nothing if only I can have this," after we have it, we will always want something else. New desires emerge just as the old ones subside. It's also proposed that human desires actually feed on their achievements, like the appetite of the Chinese stock spectaculars. A better example: a man wants ten-thousand to buy a car. After he gets the car he finds that he needs another one thousand for insurance, maintenance, and parking. And then he needs some camping stuff too, and perhaps fishing tools, since he has a car now and is determined to make the best use of it. More travels, more entertainments. Always short of money.

But I doubt if that's always true. I admit I have often felt the same way, but I believe I have also felt very satisfied with life many times, so satisfied that I thought I was ready to die at that very moment. I have even prayed to God, at those moments, that He could take me right away. It always happened when I was with my husband, and life looked so sweet, so full, that we stopped caring for any material benefits. We would hug or simply lie besides each other and enjoy the fullness of our lives together, and wanted to cease to be. But we were not granted that privilege, so we lived on, almost forced to take care of life's new challenges, which never fail to present themselves. These days as I'm staying with my husband at his university, going with him to campus everyday, reading and resting and going to the gym, I feel so contented that I just want to go on like this forever. But that is not going to happen. I'm not allowed to stay where I am, without losing my salary, job opportunities, and even my status. See it's not that I can't be satisfied. It just life doesn't allow one's contentment to stay.

Droste Effect, or mise en abîme

It was Sunday, a bright day. She went to the discussion. It was about marriage.
[the debate]
...
"You may say that," she said, quietly. 
He lifted up his hands as if in despair. The debate cooled down. Conversation stopped. People stirred in their chairs. They got up. They began to leave her. They would not act with imprudence or discourtesy. They simply chose to ignore her. They passed by, going up to the center, greeting each other with gentle smiles and phatic words. They acted as if she were not there.
She took out her laptop, and began to type into it.

"It was Sunday, a bright day," she typed.