|
Hunger 饥饿 [1]Believe it or not, I've been starving for four days on end. [2] At first, I ate nothing but four baked cakes or two small buns per day, then I cut them down by half and then by another half, until I didn't even own a copper for buying boiled water. When I was thirsty, I would stand under a tap and let its running water pour down my throat through my wide-open mouth. I felt bloated. There was a pain and chill in my stomach. I cannot tell you enough how miserable I was. [3] How did it come that I had been reduced to such poverty? It was because the school where I studied had got into trouble. Many students had been arrested and taken to the police station. Some students had moved house and some had gone home. The school canteen was closed because it refused to serve meals on credit. While trying to rescue the arrested fellow students, I meanwhile had to find enough money to pay my living expenses. So I was terribly busy. [4] Pressed by hunger, I would visit Chunchao Bookstore every day to seek a loan of money. When Kang Nong or Fu Hua was there, I would have no problem in borrowing a couple of silver dollars through them. But I seldom found them in the store and the clerks of course had no say in this matter. Therefore, in nine times out of ten nothing would come of my visit there. [5] 1 was beside myself with joy the day when I found my book The Diary of a Woman Soldier published at long last. Pasted up at the door of the bookstore was an eye-catching colourful poster advertising the book. I went into the store full of curiosity, and, as an ordinary customer would do, took from the shelf a copy of the book, which had on its bright-red front cover a cartoon by Feng Zikai's daughter portraying a little woman soldier riding on a cow. I didn't buy it for I knew I was entitled as its author to at least ten complimentary copies. | 
