Against the Current Hong Kong 1979

The crew quickly got everything ready.

It didn't look like there was much stuff, but it was still crammed into two delivery trucks and a bread truck.

There was also a car, but it was the private luxury car that Miao Kexiu, Chen Huimin, and Wu Ma were riding in.

"Didn't you say you wanted to mentor them?" Wu Ma asked Chen Huimin in the car.

Chen Huimin rolled her eyes: "Just kidding. I've said I'd mentor at least a thousand, if not eight hundred. A simple promise is enough to get people to risk their lives. How wonderful."

Wu Ma said, "What if they take it seriously?"

"What do you mean, 'what to do'? What's it to me?" Chen Huimin sneered. "They do the work, I pay them, it's that simple. If they want more, they're just being stupid."

The van was filled with stuntmen; people like Zhang Shuai'an and He Jiatong could only sit in the back of the truck, among the miscellaneous items.

"Get in the car, let's go."

Production assistant Zheng Kangye got into the driver's seat and waved to Zhang Shuai'an and He Jiatong.

He Jiatong instinctively reached for the passenger side door of the truck.

"Hey, what are you doing?"

Zheng Kangye glared at him and pointed behind him: "Sit in the back, there are people sitting in the front."

"Oh, oh." He Jiatong smiled a little shyly, then nimbly climbed into the back of the car.

Zhang Shuai'an waited deliberately, thinking that Chen Huimin or Miao Kexiu would help him out, but after waiting for a long time, nothing happened.

He couldn't help but chuckle; he had inadvertently overestimated himself.

Zheng Kangye waited for several seconds and found that Zhang Shuai'an was still standing there. He couldn't help but yell, "Hey, what are you doing? Get in the car!"

The truck drove for quite a while before finally arriving at a street corner in Shek Kip Mei, bumping along the road.

"We're here." Zheng Kangye parked the car, turned around and saw Zhang Shuai'an and He Jiatong jumping out, so he asked, "Where in Kowloon do your relatives live?"

Zhang Shuai'an's cousin's address had long been washed away by the waves, so he could only go to He Jiatong's aunt first.

He Jiatong thought for a moment and immediately replied, "Oh, at Chungking Mansions."

"That's not Kowloon, that's Tsim Sha Tsui." Cheng Kang-yip said with a speechless expression, "Go straight along Shek Kip Mei Street, turn left onto Tai Po Road, and go straight along that street... until you reach Nathan Road, then go straight, it should take about an hour and a half to get there."

He Jiadan was completely confused and couldn't help but ask, "Brother Kang, what road is Tai Po Road, and what road is Nathan Road? Are there any obvious landmarks there, or...?"

"Didn't you bring a mouth? Ask for directions yourself." Zheng Kangye retorted irritably, "You guys can't even miss it if you're going straight? You're all hopelessly stupid."

Zhang Shuai'an and his companion thanked him and then followed the directions he had given them.

"Hong Kong is so prosperous, with shops and skyscrapers everywhere."

Along the way, He Jiatong would occasionally look up at the high places and then down at the shops on the street: "They sell all kinds of things. Unlike where we are, there are only cooperatives in the town, and they sell very few things. If you want something good, you have to go to the Overseas Chinese Store in the county, and you have to use remittance coupons to buy it."

Zhang Shuai'an felt a sense of familiarity, as it was not much different from when he came to Hong Kong before his time travel.

The shop assistants on the roadside were still acting all high and mighty, and I even saw them trying to drive customers out.

After walking for a while, He Jiatong suddenly felt a little guilty and whispered to Zhang Shuai'an, "Shuai'an, why do those policemen in blue hats keep staring at me?"

Following the direction he was looking, Zhang Shuai'an indeed saw two PTU officers standing at the street corner, looking at them from afar and talking to each other.

Zhang Shuai'an knew very well that the two policemen probably suspected them of being illegal immigrants, but they hesitated because their clothes were normal and they didn't look as disheveled as other illegal immigrants.

If they hadn't run into Chen Huimin's film crew and were still wearing the same clothes, they probably would have come over and questioned them right now.

Zhang Shuai'an was unsure whether the Hong Kong government was still implementing the "resistance policy," so he figured it was best to avoid provoking the police if possible.

Zhang Shuai'an calmly said, "Don't look at them. Just walk straight ahead as if you don't see them. The more you look at them, the more suspicious they will become."

He Jiatong did as Zhang Shuai'an said, paying no more attention to the police, and walked forward naturally.

Sure enough, the two PTU officers looked at them for two seconds longer before turning around and leaving to patrol other areas.

Although it was supposed to be an hour and a half journey, it took Zhang Shuai'an and He Jiatong nearly two and a half hours to find Chungking Mansions. This was only because Zhang Shuai'an had visited the place before his time travel and had some memory of it, which allowed him to find it easily.

"Which building and floor does your aunt live on?" Zhang Shuai'an asked. "The Chongqing Building has five buildings, and each one has 17 floors."

This building was originally built in 1961 by an overseas Chinese from the Philippines to commemorate the victory in the War of Resistance against Japan, hence the name Chongqing, the wartime capital.

He Jiatong scratched his head; he couldn't remember some of them, so he had to find a secluded corner and pull out his crotch.

"Hey, don't you have any public decency? Peeing in the corner in broad daylight."

An older woman walked out of the building and immediately spotted He Jiatong in the corner, and started cursing loudly.

"Ma'am, I'm not..." He Jiatong tried to explain, but the other woman was so frightened that she ran away in a hurry.

Zhang Shuai'an looked at this scene and almost laughed.

"I saw it, it seems to be room 86 on the 6th floor of building 8." He Jiatong took out the small note and read it aloud as she looked at it, but what she read out left Zhang Shuai'an full of questions.

Zhang Shuai'an reached out to take the note, but then remembered that he had hidden it in his crotch, so he pulled his hand back.

He leaned closer, glanced at it, and immediately glared at him: "This is the letter B, room B6 on the 6th floor of Building B."

"Wow, Shuai An, you can speak English?" He Jiatong looked at him with surprise and admiration.

Zhang Shuai'an patted him on the shoulder and went inside first: "Stop talking nonsense, let's go upstairs."

"Oh, oh." He Jiatong immediately followed behind Zhang Shuai'an, her eyes still darting around, curiously looking at everything around her.

"It's so narrow, and the ceiling is so low, but there's a cooperative in the hallway?"

"What is this metal box that can go up and down? Is it an elevator from a movie?"

"Wow, what's wrong with that person? Their skin is so dark, and they smell a bit. Could they be one of those Africans?"

"..."

He Jiatong was like a curious child, always exclaiming about everything she saw and asking Zhang Shuai'an for advice.

Until a dark-skinned South Asian man in the elevator looked at him with strange eyes, occasionally blinking in an ambiguous way.

He Jiatong didn't understand what he meant, but instinctively felt that there was some danger, so she shrank behind Zhang Shuai'an.

Zhang Shuai'an turned and glared at the South Asian man, which stopped him from going too far.

The Indian guy went out on the fourth floor.

Zhang Shuai'an explained to He Jiatong, "This building has everything, not just shops, but also hotels, restaurants, and general stores. It has everything you need. You could live here for ten days or half a month without leaving the building. That South Asian man is most likely from India. These Indians are strange, and many are sexually frustrated; they might even be interested in you."

He Jiatong was so frightened that her anus tightened and she broke out in a cold sweat.

They took the elevator to the sixth floor.

As Zhang Shuai'an stepped out of the elevator, he suddenly paused, because he saw a pink light on in one of the rooms.

"No way?"

A strange thought popped into Zhang Shuai'an's mind: Could it be that He Jiatong's aunt... has gone into the sex industry here?

Upon closer inspection, it was indeed room B6.

"Hey handsome guys, is this your first time here?"

Before the two could even step inside, a heavily made-up young woman approached and said in Cantonese, "The peaches here are beautiful and juicy, perfect for playing instruments and singing, three hundred dollars... I guarantee you'll be satisfied."

"Shuai An, what is she saying? I don't understand a word she's saying. What does she mean by mosquitoes and water? Is she selling fruit?"

He Jiatong didn't understand Cantonese to begin with, let alone the glamorous woman who used a lot of technical terms, which made her even more confused.

"We're here to find someone."

Zhang Shuai'an spoke in his not-so-standard Cantonese: "Is there a woman here named He Cuilian? We are her nephews."

"He Cuilian? Who is she?" The glamorous woman looked puzzled. "We only have one person with the surname He here, she's He Xiangu."

He Xiangu?

That's most likely a nickname he got after going into business.

This thought flashed through Zhang Shuai'an's mind.

He Jiatong was starting to have an existential crisis: "Did my aunt give me the wrong address? What do we do now?"

The glamorous young woman winked playfully at Zhang Shuai'an: "How old are you, handsome boy? You're good-looking and have a sweet tongue. You really don't need me to serve you. Just based on your looks, you can get a 20% discount!"

"I'm 19 years old." Zhang Shuai'an glanced at He Jiatong, who looked blank, and said, "Please, beautiful sister, pass on a message to He Xiangu, saying that He Weibing from Xiahu Village is looking for her."

"Tch. Boring." The glamorous woman lazily turned around, went back into the room, and shouted loudly, "Aunt He, there's a guy named He something from Xiahu Village who's looking for you."

A moment later, a middle-aged woman with curly hair came out, looked at Zhang Shuai'an, and then at He Jiatong: "Which of you is from Xiahu Village?"

"Auntie, it's me, He Weibing." He Jiatong was taken aback when she saw the middle-aged woman, then overjoyed: "I've come to seek refuge with you!"

"Ah Bing? It really is you!" The middle-aged woman became excited and quickly went forward to hug him. "How did you get here? Where are your parents?"

He Jiatong lowered her head and said sadly, "My mother died of illness last year. I couldn't stay in the village anymore, so I swam here with Wei Chao and a few other people from the village. In the end, only Wei Chao and I survived."

"You're Mr. Zhang Zhihui's son?" The middle-aged woman looked at Zhang Shuai'an with some surprise. "You've grown so much, and so handsome! You're five or six times as handsome as your father was back in his day. I remember you were a very good student, so why did your parents let you swim here?"

"Hello, Aunt He." Zhang Shuai'an naturally addressed her as "Aunt He." "My parents went abroad two years ago, and we don't know if they're alive or dead. I had no choice but to come and stay with my cousin. But I've lost his address, so I can only trouble you for now, Aunt He."

"We're all from the same village, and we're all related. It's embarrassing to talk about this."

Aunt He was indeed a magnanimous person, and immediately shouted, "What are you standing there for? Come inside and talk to me."

Upon hearing this, He Jiatong tried to sneak into room B6.

"Snapped!"

Aunt He slapped him and scolded, "Where are you going? This way!"

Zhang Shuai'an looked and found it was room B8.

It seems that the note got a little wet, which distorted the writing. The number 8 is not very clear and looks more like a number 6.

"You're not allowed to come this way!"

Aunt He solemnly announced, "I'm here to play mahjong too."

Zhang Shuai'an naturally had no interest.

He Jiatong's eyes darted around, clearly the image of that glamorous woman was now deeply etched into his mind.