Main technology: Touch designer video to particle wave effect.
"I truly found my hometown by leaving it" is inspired by Jia Zhangke's rural feature films and a time I walked to the clinic with a cold and fever. The once ordinary street scene, in my fragile eyes, became a childhood memory transported through a time tunnel. These scenes are actually common in big cities, but are obscured by the glamorous cityscapes and rarely seen. Yet, often, only these childhood environments truly belong to most people. Due to uneven regional development and resource asymmetry, our childhoods are often stuck in the past century. We learn within limited resources to become what some call geniuses, only to discover our own insignificance and mediocrity upon leaving our homeland. As we study and work in modern cities, striving to understand and integrate into the rhythms of urban life, our childhood memories are constantly fading. Some of us will always pursue these memories throughout our lives, seeking comfort, confidence, and a personal stamp of our own time.
Amidst the intense and internally draining work and study, I had no idea how I was faring. I didn't have a group to connect with, and my interactions weren't as frequent as before. Gradually, I became unwell amidst the relentless pressure of homework, sick and bedridden. This fever helped me escape from my current situation, giving me an irresistible reason to rest, and I wanted to possess this feeling even more deeply. I chose to walk to the doctor, and the people and things I saw along the way brought back a sense of my former, purer self. In that environment, I felt simple joy, my most primal passion. I had to ask myself, where had that former self gone? Had I become alienated along the path of growth? That original me was clearly untouchable. The dreamlike memories no one could bear witness to. It was as if the innocent, happy me had vanished, like the contents of a dream vanishing after waking, leaving the dream lingering. But now, sick, I felt like I was already in a dream, observing everything around me with an unusual calm, a more real presence than my usual hurried gaze. The world seemed to have quieted down. This calm had permeated my entire formative years, but now I find myself losing track of the passage of time. Perhaps this era no longer belongs to us. Many of the seemingly insignificant and messy scenes along the way became deeply romantic at this moment, dusty as my childhood. The migrant workers working on the construction site reminded me of the busy farming days of my childhood: simple yet busy, moments that felt most alive to life. I continued walking, sweating slightly, my breath unsteady, my legs occasionally weak and my tongue aching. I knew this moment could only be felt at this moment, and I still had to immerse myself in the present, to keep looking forward. "Home" in my mind is a silent movie, waiting to be quietly watched in the screening room. It doesn't express feelings or emotions, but you'll always be moved by the vivid fragments. After taking the medicine, the discomfort in my body gradually dissipated, taking with it these feelings that had already disappeared.