Last House Standing

In another month, the old mansion will be torn down. He awakes often, only to say farewell to the house. The owner, Mr. Jiang, would repeatedly say that he hates this house, that it has held his entire life hostage. The old mansion bears witness to the decadence of 1930’s Shanghai—its liberation after the civil war, and the storms of the Cultural Revolution, to the vast changes occuring in modern-day Shanghai. The house is no longer a mere inanimate object, but a living blend of history, family and emotions that has dumped its burden on Mr. Jiang to bear alone in a cycle that has lasted 60 years. The reporter vaguely senses that Mr. Jiang’s emotional cyclone stems from the house. He is unmarried because he detests his family; he has no friends because he venerates suspicion; he cannot change his custom of Western dining and writing English letters because he longs for the bygone days. Yet what does all this have to do with the mansion? The reporter daringly plunges into the inner recesses of the old man. Sixty years of resolute steadfastness is finally breached. The night before the relocation, Mr. Jiang sings his final revelry...