A Chance Encounter

By Zhao Yanan

When I was studying in Sydney, I often walked home together with a Shanghai girl I met in my journalism class. Once she told me that she was in love with a guy from Hong Kong. They met in a Hong Kong-style restaurant at Sydney CBD. She was a waitress at that restaurant, and the guy was an assistant in the kitchen, and his daily job was handling buckets of frozen seafood—clipping crab legs, or peeling shrimps. The work left him full of cuts and scrapes on his hands in spite of the gloves he wore.

He taught her to speak Cantonese and make seafood congee. He always escorted her back home after getting off work at midnight for her safety.

I heard her pronouncing tā (he/him) as “koi” for a full semester. She always addressed the guy as “koi” to tease him, as “koi” shares the same sound as “he/him” in Cantonese, and, somehow, she couldn’t help but laughing whenever she heard the word. On Christmas Eve of 2010, we had a party, and I finally met “koi” in person. He had a plain look and was of medium build. There was nothing special about him. Later that night, we played a game—everyone was blindfolded to pick a gift. When “koi” blindfolded her with a strip of cloth, he was very careful and gentle so as not to hurt her.

After graduation, we bade farewell to each other. I went to Beijing, and she went to Shanghai, but he stayed in Sydney. Two years later, I received her call one day and learned that she was getting married to “koi.”

緣 分

文/趙雅楠

在悉尼上學的時候，經常和一個在新聞寫作課上認識的上海女生一起回家。她告訴我，她喜歡上了一個香港男人。他們在悉尼市中心一家港式酒樓認識，她是服務生，他負責在后廚打雜，每天做的事無非是侍弄大桶大桶冰凍的海鮮，剪蟹腳，剝蝦殼，即使戴上手套，皮膚上也滿是劃痕。

他教她粵語，教她做海鮮粥，凌晨下班怕她一個女生危險，把她送到家門口。

我聽她說了整整一個學期的“佢”。她經常打趣用“佢”稱呼他，因為粵語里“他”寫成“佢”，她看到這個詞就會莫名發笑。2010年圣誕節前夜，大家一起聚會，我終于見到了這個“佢”，面目模糊，個子中等，沒什么特別之處。后來玩游戲，每個人被蒙住眼睛挑禮物，“佢”給她蒙布條時輕手輕腳，小心翼翼把布蒙上，怕勒痛了。

畢了業，大家星流云散，我到北京，她回上海，他仍然留在悉尼。過了差不多快兩年，有一天，她打電話給我，說是快要結婚了，對方是那個“佢”。

原來，她回上海之后，考了股票分析師執照，被公司派到港交所實習，臨時在附近的太古廣場租了一間房。一天下班，她去樓下餐廳吃飯，點了一碗海鮮粥，喝下去第一口，分明是熟悉的味道，跑到后廚去，看到了他。

如果不是自己身邊真實發生的故事，簡直不敢相信人與人之間的緣分有這么奇妙。她后來有一次聊天跟我說，其實一切也可以不發生，她當時滿可以不去香港實習，不住在他告訴過的他家附近，不點那碗他曾經教她怎么做的海鮮粥。

說是緣分，卻不僅僅是緣分，還靠著一點點主動，一點點希望。

緣分到底是不是一種迷信？劉慈欣在《三體》里說，一切的一切都導向這樣一個結果：物理學從來也沒有存在過，人的生活完全是一種偶然。世界有這么多變幻莫測的因素，人生有這么多變幻莫測的因素，總結起來，整個人類歷史也是一場偶然。如果幾億年前有一顆小行星撞上地球，就不會有現在人類的一切。

It turned out that after returning to Shanghai, she became a qualified stock analyst, and was sent to the Hong Kong Exchange by her company for an apprenticeship, so she rented a room at the nearby Pacific Place. One day after work, she ordered a bowl of seafood congee at a restaurant downstairs. After taking a sip, she suddenly realized how familiar the taste was, so she went to the kitchen—it was “koi” that she saw.

This was a true story that happened to someone I knew. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have believed that such a fate between two people could be so miraculous. Later during one chat, she told me that everything could have been different—she could have rejected the company’s offer to Hong Kong, or rented a room further from his home, or ordered anything but the seafood congee that he once taught her to cook.

It was fate that brought them together, but not quite—there were also some proactive moves that lit up the sparks of hope.

Is believing in fate superstitious? In The Three-Body Problem, Liu Cixin wrote, “Everything leads to the same conclusion: Physics never really exists. The existence of human beings is entirely an accident. There are so many unpredictable factors in the world, just like in people’s lives. All in all, human history is an accident. If the earth had been hit by an asteroid hundreds of millions of years ago, everything we have today wouldn’t have existed.”

However, it is the one-ina-million accident that makes us believe even more in fate. How come you met this person today, and not that one? How come you’re working with these people, not some others? It’s all because of fate. No matter what impressions you have left for each other, you ought to cherish all that comes to you, as you have but one life to live, and not everyone in this world has the fate to be a part of it.

(From The Strings of My Skin, The Oriental Press. Translation: Zhu Yaguang)

可這種偶然中的偶然，只會讓我們更相信緣分。為什么今天你遇見這個人，而不是那個人，為什么今天你是和這些人一起工作生活，而不是另一些人，皆是因為你們之間有緣分，不管彼此之間印象好壞，都要珍惜。因為一世也就這么一回，認識的人也就這么多而已。

（摘自《切膚之琴》東方出版社）