1993; in the day when I was just born, the big-fat nurse who carried me with her big arms toward the baby room got slipped and pressed me under her big body. If not because this “father” was strong enough and have strong vitality, I would have been died flat downtrodden by this 200 jins (100kg) meat ball already.

My old man really had no common sense when he chose my name. He was watching the movie in television, Li Xiaolong (Bruce Lee real name) “Meng Long Guo Jiang” (lit: The Fierce Dragon Crossing the River or known as Way of the Dragon movie). Dad suddenly got his heavenly revelation and pounded the table: “It’s Li Xiaolong!”. And thus, in such heavenly coincidence, my father named me Xiaolong after Bruce Lee’s name.

Dad then brought my birth proof to the relevant government authority, and registering my name in a family register for me. But the next accident made me absolutely clueless, what kind of heavenly revelation did my father receive that day? He mistakenly wrote Li Xiaolong characters to Zhang Xiaolong! Thus, a new surname appeared in our household family register for the first time since the beginning of history, and my name had became the biggest joke of all! My biological father’s name was Li Guofu and my name was Zhang Xiaolong; “What the f**k?  Sometimes I wondered which brainless person named me Zhang Xiaolong? Have you ever seen a son follow other surname and not his own father?” However, since my family was living in countryside and my parent were not highly cultured, this kind of accident just pa.s.sed by without any big disturbances.

5 years old; that year, I was still wearing open pants (for infants before toilet training) and playing with pebbles accompanied by 4 other children, and then it happened; the windows gla.s.s on Uncle Lee’s house next door had broken, smashed by a stone! I swore that the stone smas.h.i.+ng Uncle Lee’s windows wasn’t thrown by me! But when Uncle Li furiously interrogated us to find out who had thrown the stone; the other four “honorable” kids simultaneously pointing at me in silent agreement! I was just silently petrified! “I was so good at them, and those kids cheating on me and pus.h.i.+ng me down to the hole?” I was so very angry that I swore to never play with them anymore… nevertheless; the final result was that my father compensated Uncle Lee and lost quite some money; and afterward, he dragged me back home and gave me some beatings.

6 years old that year, I was following my mother in the back, right at her b.u.t.t, but I forgot that mom has the habit of closing the door quickly, the result was, my head got clamped and squeezed by the door. I was of course screamed out and crying in agony. A large bruise grew on my head and made me looked like a strange alien baby. It took a month for the swollen bruise to subside and healed.

7 years old that year, because I mixed up the Chinese phonetic alphabet and English alphabet, the teacher didn’t allow me to advance from kindergarten to the first grade, resulted in my glorious achievement of getting squatted in the same grade.

8 years old that year, when the cla.s.s was on a break, Chou Xianbai opened a bottle of Lippo energy drink and drank it near the other children who were running back and forth. He got hit by the running child; the drink was spraying everywhere and made my desk mate, Xiaohui’s chest dirty and wet; of course I had to help her wiping and cleaning her chest. However, in a short while, a school lesson bell rang, and then a bald-headed middle-aged teacher came into the cla.s.s. He saw me rubbing Xiaohui chest especially on that little swollen part, with a dreadful face he pulled his throat and roared loudly: “Let loose that girl”.

He dragged me to the office and gave me some ideological lecture. He said that I was too precocious; blaspheming my female schoolmate, and that I have a very bad nature. He almost got me expelled from the kindergarten. Later on, my father sent him 2 big c.o.c.ks; presumably for c.o.c.k fights; and, my verdict became lighter; I could still remained in the kindergarten; however the bald-headed teacher also said that my capital crime might be exempted, but I was of course couldn’t escape the punishment I deserved. He let me continued in the kindergarten to squat another year.

9 years old that year, I finally graduated from kindergarten! Dad was so very happy, his eyes br.i.m.m.i.n.g with tears and said: “My son really has a promising future”.

11 years old that year, the factory that employed my father was going out of business, but at the critical moment, my Dad accidental action had rescued the entire factory unexpectedly. The chairman thanked my old man and promoted him to manager and gave him scholars.h.i.+p to study; and eventually Dad got a Financial Management grade from some Chinese College. Someone’s fate in life was really mysterious.  “Who could have thought that father who had been in rural work for all his life, had such luck and encountered such a good thing?”

In the same year, I and a few children broke into a certain family’s garden to steal apples; however we were discovered by the owner’s dog which gave us a hot pursuit! We were running so fast as if we were gambling with our life! And I never knew why, as I was absolutely sure that I was running faster and ran in front of everyone, but that dog seemed to fancy me! I got caught by the dog; it held me down on the ground; pounced and bit me. That several “honorable” buddies were absolutely had no “brotherhood” camaraderie, they quickly scattered and ran away to I didn’t know where, even I couldn’t find their shadows anywhere! I was sent to the hospital afterward, and got myself several rabies vaccine injections. The school feared that my schoolmate would be infected by me and they gave me a particular 6 months holiday on the line; it was even longer than summer vacation. That time I might really die for sure!

Meanwhile, the factory’s chairman gave Dad a house in the center of the city, so Dad would find it convenient for him to work. Therefore we moved. I took my time and said some farewell to those little “honorable” devils who always cheating on me. It was almost a decade did I see them again.

12 years old; Mom and Dad were not at home. I was so eager to clean the windows, and gave them a pleasant surprise. The later event didn’t lead to my expectations; I lost my footing and fell down to the ground. My family was living in the 2 stories house, and I lived in the 2nd floor. I fell from the 2ndfloor and broke one of my legs but still so fortunate to be alive.

13 years old; I was gone to the lavatory with my primary school cla.s.smates and learned how to smoke. However, The Teaching Director unknowingly started his inspection on that day and suddenly inspected the toilets. Those cla.s.smates of mine were really experienced; they quickly threw the cigarettes into the toilets and flus.h.i.+ng it; then deftly took out a chewing gum from their pocket. The foolish me could only stand awkwardly and caught red-handed with cigarette on my lips and foolishly laughed when the director reprimanding me and giving me some lecture.

14 years old; my first love confession to a certain female schoolmate had been rejected! I was so frustrated that I bought myself a pesticide and tried to commit suicide. I spent 130 RMB to buy that bottle of pesticide from the pesticide’s store boss. I drank the pesticide and instantly vomited when a toenail of that “liquor” entered my throat. I spat out for the entire night and collapsed in the next morning.

15 years old; I was looking back and contemplating about my past, and realized that my life had always been full of tragedy. The depressed feeling drove me to buy a bottle of pesticide for a second time. But this time I was smart enough to buy the pesticide from different pesticide store. Finally, after buying a bottle of it, I opened the bottle cap and drank it! My eyes were br.i.m.m.i.n.g with tears as my heart whispered: “Lord, it’s been 15 years! 15 years!”, but a tiny bottle of pesticide didn’t seem enough to get me killed. So I took the bottle cap, back to the pesticide store and asked another same bottle from the boss; I smiled at him and finally returned home, and found Mom and Dad sat on the couch. There was an empty pesticide bottle with no cap on the edge of the table. Their faces were very dark as they looked at me with burning eyes. And then, I was severely got beaten again. That day I swore that I would never ever drink any pesticide again.

16 years old; I was standing under the electric pole and p.i.s.sing; I never knew that the electric pole was in leakage. The electricity paralyzed me and got me electrocuted!  I was just cried at that time:“Which G.o.d that had truly been provoked by me? I was only wanted to pee but how could peeing almost cost me my life?”

17 years old, I was successfully admitted to a nearby high school thanked to my own effort of pa.s.sing the test; My own transcript grade was only below average among the average, so the result was really to my surprise; therefore being able to be admitted to a high school with my own efforts was really a grateful achievement for me. Although the result was not good enough and placed me at the bottom-most ranking, but still I pa.s.sed the test and got admitted. Dad was so elated that he threw a feast for me.

In the same year, Mom bought me “the basket 1258” bicycle for me to ride forth and back to school. I didn’t have any objection though, since my school was not far from my house; even it took only 15 minutes by bike.

Riding a bicycle to school every day gradually upgrading my bicycle skill to a new height. I could even loosen the steering handle when riding and I could imitated some acrobatic moves. However there always something happened contrary to my expectation; one day when I was loosening the steering handle, I didn’t even realize that there was a cobblestone lying in front of my bicycle, surely the tire was rolling over and I fell straight to the asphalt. The final ending was my lower jaw dislocated and the arm bone fractured. Mom and Dad hurriedly rushed to the hospital and got me hospitalized.

I was bedridden for 7 days; my arm was covered with gypsum and braided myself a suspension hook on my jaw.

My newly three-months-girlfriend visited me at the hospital telling me that I was a good person and left. My mind was telling myself: “You are perhaps wanted to scold me of how stupid I was”. Maybe she was right, “What kind of girl could have enough strength and kindness to see her boyfriend getting squeezed by the door; squatted in the kindergarten for 2 years; fell from 2nd storied house and broken his leg; failure to kill himself after attempted to suicide by drinking pesticide twice; almost died electrocuted when peeing under an electric pole; and broken the jaw and bone while riding a bicycle?”s

When I was about to get discharged from the hospital, the doctor told me that after my jaw dislocated and fell off, it would be very easy for it to get dislocated again. He taught me to take care of my own jaw if necessary and leaving me a note that I must not chew too fast when I was eating, must not speak too fast, and even I couldn’t deliberately shouted and singing without a very very thorough consideration.

Although I have tried to pay attention to these problems, but still accidents occurred. There was a time when I was eating at the cafeteria at noon; my jaw accidentally fell off, which of course causing my saliva to flow down from my mouth; and the three women with their son furiously, reprimanded me as a smelly mouth and a smelly hooligan. I cursed the heaven; “Why did you still torture me? Didn’t you see how those three dinosaurs open their mouth and “drooling” at me?” I was really speechless.

Soon after, my name was known throughout the high school.

In Qing Tians.h.i.+ High School you might not be familiar with the first school beauty. However, you must definitely be familiar with the biggest-ever loser; and Zhang Xiaolong was absolutely this biggest loser.

Anyways, this kind of reputation could also be said that I was some kind of celebrity; although wherever and whenever I go, there are at least 90% onlookers at school that would have diverted their attention only to have some look at me and talked behind in whispers. Either in the cla.s.s or even the whole school, n.o.body wanted to befriend me. They were really unable to identify a person of great ability like this one, even the girls never knew that there was a macho man standing next to them.

Today, is in the middle of October; it was already night when I left the school as the sky had completely darkened. I cycled back home and found people crowding in the street watching something.

“Was there any car accident?”

I was pretty curious and immediately pushed my favorite little “Basket 1258” bicycle forward and approached the crowd; and finally arrived at the front. I couldn’t wait to see the situation when a coa.r.s.e old voice shouted in a trembled tone: “Grandson, grandson save your grandfather quickly!”.

The dirty old man was lying on the side of the road and pointing out his index finger on me.

I pointed my nose and replied, “Me?”

I really didn’t recognize this old man, but I was absolutely sure that he was pointing at me. I knew that bad luck had always been following me, and this time I was picked by this cheap grandfather. I was too overly familiar with this kind of script; it seemed that this time I would have to endure the test of luck again.

“Yes, you, my grandson!” said the old man with cordial voice.

Although I knew that I was always out of luck, but it didn’t mean that my intelligence was so low I couldn’t even realized this trick, “Do you know my name?”

“Zhang Xiaolong”, the old man quickly and concisely replied.

“How did you know?”, I asked in astonishment.

However, one of the pa.s.sers-by said: “Hey boy, are you a high schooler?, How could you pretend that you didn’t know your own blood grandfather. This kind of morality and personal character are not good, I must go to your school and talk with your princ.i.p.al.”

The old man quickly followed the mood: “Hey big grandson, come help me, Grandpa has been raising you since you were small, you need to show your filial obedience to your grandpa.”

What the… Grandmother…What the h.e.l.l was this filial obedience could be?

This day was absolutely my most unlucky day since the beginning of my life history. If I didn’t hold this old man up, I would have been expelled by my school. But if I propped him up, this old goat would surely take advantages of me and used me to the death…

However, right now I was surrounded by many people and they would definitely act if I didn’t do anything, so the poor me could only resigned to my fate. Thus, I walked to the old man side, and propped him up. And to my surprise the old man whispered, “Hey, did you feel so puzzled about me knowing your name? Your chest’s school name tag exposed your ident.i.ty to me”.

If I had not crouched at that time, I would absolutely had him thrown to the ground.