My friend (Urby)

Urby is again one of my college friends. He has curly hair and positive energy. He is smart but low-key, has an appropriate manner in social interaction, always have more friends than you can imagine. He does not seem to be selective in making friends, but strangely, after a while, only honest ones stayed friends with him, while others left. I do know why, maybe charisma?

I was definitely not a friend of Urby back in college. In fact, I barely knew him. The only incident I still remember is as following. In senior year, he posted some ads for buying a second-hand bike around the campus. One day his room phone rang and I picked up. It was a potential seller. I came down and was ready for doing the transaction for Urby. God damn it! The campus security guards were following the seller. When the bike was about to change hands, we were caught. Both the bike and my money were confiscated. Worse, I had to wait in the campus security for an hour and then was shipped to Hai Dian Security Bureau. Nobody cared to talk to me there, so I left after a while. That’s what happened. Not exactly about Urby, right? Yep, that is to show you how little I actually know Urby back then so that I have to use this filler materials.

Things changed after college graduation. I still needed to work in CCTV and Clady after graduation, so I needed a temp housing. Mr. Q and Urby were living in a shabby place around Beida then. Mr. Q. was going back home, so I took his place (or something like that). Now Urby and I were stuck in Beijing together in the cheap place. Then, I did not know that I was about to start my best time in four years of college.

Life was hard back then. I had day shift and night shift unpredictably. Once I had about 40 hours non-sleep: a day shift in Clady and a night shift in CCTV, followed by going to the US embassy for visa the next day! I forgot what Urby was doing then. Probably also earning some money. Despite harsh life, we still had quite some spare time. I think I went through all the books by Jin Yong, one by one, rent from a place within Beida. We also bought eggs and Man Tou every day, cheap, but tasty back then. We had a rice cooker, and we used it to cook everything: vegetable, egg, corn, and even hot pot. We also had a rabbit, inherited from a friend who stayed in Beijing for a short period (I remember I blogged about that friend in a previous blog). We were talking about killing and eating the rabbits in the end of our stay, but eventually, I let the rabbits go in a residential area in Renda.

Urby was a great conversational partner. He still is. Some people (for example, me) were picky in conversation topics and easily got impatient if the conversation did not go the way I wanted it to be. For Urby, anything goes. One night, we debated a very stupid topic: In order to get the most out of a electric fan in the summer, shall the fan face inward or outward, stand on the table or put on the ground? (Until today, I still think it is one of the most stupid debates I have ever engaged. But hey, it is really fun!) I forget what’s my view and what’s his view on the debate. Maybe we just tried to disagree to make the fun conversation going on. The conversation soon went louder. I used a lot of knowledge from physics, and he used his everyday experiences. We could not convince each other. Then followed the best part. Our landlord came and knocked our door like a monster. We were very scared and shut up immediately.

Well, when I wrote the story out here, it does not sound as good. But it is indeed one of my best memories in college. Now every time when I met Urby, we would digest this episode again and had a good laugh. Laughing at the stupid landlord? Laughing about our poor but happy life? Laughing that the college life had finished? Laughing at this last episode of our soon-to-be-lost innocence? Maybe all of them, I guess. Maybe Urby and I were meant to be friends. But in college, we missed the chance. After college, I went away to another country. The two months in transition, living together, is the only memory that we can grab on to make a statement, “Look, world, we are friends!” Poor landlord, who lad her day that night, became our laughing materials for ever. Without her, Urby and I wouldn’t be as close as we are now.

I saw Urby two weeks ago in Beijing. He looked all right. Still happy and positive, laughing all the time, still acted like the Urby I used to know. He switched job from a famous company, and I believe that is good for him. For one thing, I would never question Urby’s judgment. Of course, we had a good laugh about the landlord again.

I guess I really miss the time then. Life was so simple. All the classmates just started a career, so no stupid comparison needed to be made. Everyone was poor and everyone was aimless. Now the class is stratified. I hate very much to be labeled as someone from overseas and already seeing the world. That’s why I made every effort to recall those stupid episodes and pretended that I am still one of them. And I believe other classmates are making the same effort. However, when time passes, we will soon be alone again. If I predict correctly, Urby will disappear from my life sooner or later, because the only things that connected us are just some fading memories of stupid events. This blog is to remember a perfect friendship that never existed and a golden time that would never come back again.