A half-hour vacation

It's not so common to see snow in my hometown, Nanjing city. But this year the cold air is clearly stronger than ever, making most areas from north to middle of China covered by snow. I hear railways and airlines have been delayed or canceled since Sunday. I was lucky to get home last Friday.

Chinese Public Official Holidays usually take some of the Saturdays and Sundays nearby to form a slightly longer holiday, to cover the fact that there is only a few dayoffs. This year is no different. As a result, we all have to work 6 consecutive days before and after the 8-day holiday. To make things worse, the new year eve becomes work day this year.

I have been absent-minded working from home. Because I have absolutely no idea what to do along with my family. Nor do they have any idea. Also the fact that I have to work 6 days in a row bothers me. After lunch I decided to walk around for about half an hour before the meeting. So I took my camera and went out.

Outside was freezing cold, even at the middle of a day. It was cloudy. Everything looked plain without shadow. Near my home is the construction site of Nanjing Metro. They are building a new metro station. But it suspends from time to time due to the poor funding. This is quite common for the construction programmes in recent years. Local government is heavily debted and the constructors couldn't get paid sometimes.

Not to my surprise, the metro wasn't in construction. Probably because the lunar new year. Construction workers work even at weekends, but go home earlier to prepare for lunar new year. Most of them come from rural areas. So it takes very long time for them to get through a long way from major cities to their hometown. Besides, this is probably the only chance for them to get reunioned with their families.

Near the construction site there still remains the ruins of the houses that once someone lived in. They are waited to be cleaned up as the construction proceeds. Fireweed scatters around the ruins. Nearly, vehicles park on the muddy ground. They all covered by thin snow. I wonder where the original residents went. Maybe somewhere similar, or maybe they got conpensated with a decent apartment. I woundn't know.

The construction site is covered with temporary fences so I couldn't see what's inside. There are 2 cranes inside both around 50 meters high. One or two turtle doves fly by and rest on the top of crane.

Few buses and people were passing by. The vacancy brought up some loneliness. The loneliness made me feel free. At that particular moment, I was focusing on observing. At one side of the road, a tree with only the trunk left stood there. Just like the crane. The frosty wind makes the atmosphere even more depressed, just like the plunging stock market since 2024.

Half an hour was short. It soon ran out. I forced myself to take photos on everything I might be interested in, without hesitation. Then I had to stride toward home.

In the half-hour vacation, I found a moment of peace. The empty houses and still cranes showed me how fast life changes, especially the new challenges brought to me during the past few years. Going home, I remembered to enjoy the quiet moments in life.