Old Film, New Fire

Lu Chen looked at her and did not say forgiven or it's fine. Aunt Fang sighed and broke the silence. "Enough. Don't dig up old accounts under the air conditioner. If you're going to film, film properly. Get the whole street. If we really want to stand our ground, more people need to know this place isn't an empty shell." So over the next few hours Xu Zhixia filmed from the cinema to the barbershop, from the barbershop to the auto repair bay, and then to the corner grocery that kept its doors open late. She filmed an old man fanning himself at the doorway, two children fighting over ice cream after school, a mechanic with black grease that never quite came off his hands, the laughter and argument of a mahjong table on the corner.