In terms of the linguistic aspects, i think it has to do with my hesitations about the propagation of ideas and beliefs in the first place… how we live and die and shun and fraternise and conspire and love and love and loselove by these things, all framed for and to one another by these very fragile things such are words. Please excuse my feeling a bit pessimistic tonight, but it all feels very silly and futile when looked at from this context, as most of the time we’re simply misunderstanding one another in language, not so much that you or i or we or other are necessarily so different.

But through this comes the power of the translator as an in-between, a conductor, a metaphorical parlay and/or very possibly subversive player. We cannot ignore the importance of this in the thinking about why we should translate texts, but also maybe why we shouldn’t. There is no one-to-one here, no 辅导, not even you and me. That parlay is neither yours nor mine, yet what stakes should we play to come to something new, to something better?

As he speaks, his gesturing hand inadvertently slaps a loaf of bread.

I laugh in my own thoughts;

he won’t stop talking to me about the better.

I leave, feeling upset.

He likes discussion. I keep thinking of productivity. Yeah, yeah, yeah… boil it all down to 语言, to 文化区别. So where is the translator? Can we add to meaning? Can we destroy it? What was that term of vital nourishment, about boiling the thing down until only its essence is left? Oh right, so sorry. I’m neither the chef nor the translator. But let’s put that in motion, a blurry train ride, a thought of chasing down your unmade sculpture. What is hidden laid bare behind our backs. Like the difference between a solitary fish leading the others, a single fish swimming in front of a shoal.