新龙门客栈

China’s entertainment industry never stops making new programs, they are already broadcasting ‘浪姐5’ while the memory of ‘浪姐3’ is still very fresh in my mind. The new element in 浪姐5 which caught my attention is 陈丽君 who is a professional Chinese opera (越剧) actress of ‘新龙门客栈’ fame. I always find it interesting to see what, artists of traditional performance art like 唐诗逸 and 朱洁静, can do in modern pop entertainment. The fusion of modern and traditional art often can bring unexpected pleasant surprises.

Going from ‘浪姐3’ to ‘浪姐5’ makes me think of ancient travellers who traversed the old silk road from China to the west (西域，天竺) or present day India, Nepal and other central Asian countries, for trade, cultural and spiritual reasons. They will need to make a stop at the ‘敦煌石窟’ which was mentioned in ‘浪姐3’, and then the next stop at ‘玉门关’ where the ‘新龙门客栈’ was supposedly situated along the ancient silk road. 

After ‘玉门关’ will be the harsh and arduous trek across the Taklamakan desert ‘塔克拉玛干’ and the Tengri Tagh mountain range ‘天山山脉’. It is really hard to imagine how ancient people can withstand such strenuous expeditions across the lands to trade or gain knowledge. If I am an ancient traveler, just thinking of these obstacles makes me want to give up on the journey and seek shelter in ‘新龙门客栈’ to enjoy the amenities and entertainment such as opera and music provided by the inn.

Traditional opera, I believe, can be regarded as the movies and TV dramas of the ancient world. It shows that we have this natural tendency to act and tell stories, it is not something created by modern capitals purely for the purpose of commercial exploitations.  To me, storytelling is somewhat similar to having wandering thoughts (妄想/杂念) during the process of meditation. My mind will keep churning out all sorts of imagination or ‘stories’ and it makes me very restless and wants to go do something else instead of sitting still, and if I tried very hard to stop these fleeting thoughts, I will fall asleep in meditation instead.

I believe this inclination to have wandering thoughts is the reason behind why we love to tell stories and project our imaginations onto novels, comics, operas and movies. But meditation masters on the other hand are more able to sit still without wandering thoughts but also do not fall asleep while being in a state inaction and tranquility. I found out later from Zen masters (禅师) that the reason they can do it that way is because they have less blockages in their meridians (经脉), and thus the circulation of Qi (气) in their bodies are smooth and ample, and that is why even when their minds and bodies are inactive, they are still able to have sufficient energy to stay awake. 

Ordinary people like myself have low circulation of the Qi, we are like a car air conditioner with low level of refrigerant and we need to keep the car moving in order to push the circulation of the limited refrigerant to keep us cool. Similarly, the blockages in our primary meridians causes a low level of Qi in us which made us restless/unstable and involuntarily force the mind to switch on other ‘action-oriented’ circuits to activate extra sensation/current to compensate the short fall of Qi  in our systems. These extra sensations may come in the form of wandering thoughts, dreams and fantasies, and if these are not strong enough, then we may just go do something else like listening to music or other outdoor activities.

This is quite similar to the storyline of a recent movie, ‘被我弄丢的你’, which I watched because both 黄小蕾 and 刘恋 from ‘浪姐3’ are in the movie. Many people have the same experience of the character, 王斤斤 in the movie where unpleasant childhood experiences created obstacles which made them turn to movies, story books and comics as means to escape from the harsh obstacles in their lives. Just like the blockages in our meridians, these real-life obstacles interrupted the flow of our energies and we seek supplementary energies from the sensation we get from movies and music. 

The energies of good stories and movies come from its nature of being ‘情理之中, 意料之外’, kind of mean surprising/innovative but within reason, or a good balance between utility and style. It is the interaction between these 2 elements that produce the current like in a ying-yang circulation or the ‘若有若无’ effect that give us sensation. The character 王斤斤 could escape to and got energy from the dark and macabre stories of Edgar Allan Poe is because the stories bear some semblance to her reality but also come with delightful twist. 

I do not know how exactly things work inside her head, but these monsters and ghouls in Allan Poe’s stories reminds me of the cover art of hard rock albums in the 80’s and 70’s which were replete with grotesque beasts and demons. Rock fans are people who are angry with something, maybe injustice or in the case of 王斤斤, a broken family which made them feel insecure. In order to compensate, they subconsciously think of themselves as these grotesque beasts and demons who are powerful and fearsome; who can create chaos and over power human as a way for them to get even through dominance. 

So, anger and hurt is the ‘情理之中’ which resonate with the rockers while the powerful and fearsome appearance of the beasts are the thing they fantasize (意料之外). This sort of reaffirm my belief that when one is inclusive like ‘温良恭俭让’ then one is beautiful but if one is spiteful and angry then one will resemble the beasts, demons or even Adams family if you give it a comedy twist.

As we can see in the movie, there are many other things people do to escape from reality such as role-play games like ‘escape room’ and ‘haunted house’ for city folks who want to leave behind the hectic urban living momentarily. Some escape through the sugar-coating effects of romantic movies and sentimental songs while others prefer the ignorant and take-it-easy effects of comedy. I remember by the time I was nearing the completion of my last essay, ‘The Purpose of Arts and Music (5)’, my mind was already congested with the contents and images of the 4 essays I wrote since June 2023. I could feel that the logic and style circuits of my brain at that time couldn’t move anymore, and it involuntarily inclined to switch over to the kindred and light-hearted circuits with the mention of big brother Jacky Chan, in order to get things going and prevented ‘内卷’. So, it is for the same reason why urbanites who are constantly under heavy pressures, allowed their brains to take a stress-relieve detour in these role-play games.

Maybe the fact that I wrote about ‘新龙门客栈’ is itself some kind of role-playing because the silk road reminds me a lot of ‘玄奘’ and ‘西游记’. Spiritual cultivation is a long and arduous journey and ‘新龙门客栈’ is a metaphorical inn where we can seek temporary relief with entertainment and sustenance. Besides that, I found traditional Chinese health care methods are also very effective at temporarily relieving the blockages in our meridians to help reduce anxiety and stress so that we can be more focused in our work or meditation.