It isn't as wicked as it sounds, indeed, and when the mind circles back to this thought, it isn't non plus an indication of gloomy mood. It is, I guess, a simple fact for me.
Three or four years ago I was on a trip into the desert in the hope of finding a tomb I've heard about in my childhood. It was not a tomb of some extraordinary historical legendary personage. In fact, she was supposed to be very close to me as we are said to be related, only never met. But her story has been legendary for me, who is born and has been raised in the city. Streets, buildings, crowds and artificial gardens, the only sand I'd seen was the sandstorm blowing down the billboards on the roadsides. My hope to find it was full of "perhaps, possibly, if I am lucky...", so when I returned without precisely locating it, I wasn't that disappointed, and my state of mind hadn't changed much, ' someone was still lingering somewhere in the past.'
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One day later, I was able to successfully to situate myself in the middle of the desert, near the site where all the tombs were supposed to be. The landmark was an ancient beacon tower for warfare, which was still there and yet the cemetery at the foot of it was gone. Both remote, I was less interested in appreciating the story of a group of defunct people than that of a single person. A camel driver told me in a strong accent that two or three years ago, the whole cemetery was moved, and the cab driver claiming to know the new site told me on our way there in his taxi that the relocation was announced on local TV so that the families could find the new place where their beloved ones were buried. I wasn't local, I was from thousands of miles away and I did not know if I loved her for we'd never met. The cab driver kept talking nicely, almost too emotionally during the whole trip, but my mind slipped away, thinking how paradoxical it was I could be this close to tracing down the spot where a person for whom my feeling was unclear slept for eternity, while it was possible that a place in the city near me, the existence of which I am sure of and yet probably I am never able to discover, a place where the person I'd loved as a kid was sleeping. I guess it is just the way it is. You are still connected to those who no longer exist for the unanswered questions.
When we arrived in the middle of the desert, where more stones and the color of the sand redder, I was astonished by innumerable tombs, some with tombstones, some without, some just heaps of stones or piles of earth. All in the open, no boundaries within my sight. You did hear the whisper of the sentimental poems written by the living to mourn and to imprison the dead, instead, you could hear the wild cry of the passed away in the wind, so freely and so carelessly. Despite the driver's kindly offering to accompany me to look around, the moment I got off the taxi, I knew the chance to find it was small. But we still spent quite some time walking amongst piles of earth, reading the words on the tombstones of those that had one. A name, a line, a sign, but how much can I learn from them? Nothing really.
After a few hours, we came to the agreement that it was impossible to find it, we got back to the taxi and started heading back to the near town, that was when he showed how moved he was to see 'a young person would do something like this'. I smiled and didn't tell him it wasn't that big deal and him being touched was more sincere than what I could feel at that moment, because I didn't even understand why I was doing it or what I was doing, maybe just to experience the ambiguous line between the dead and the living. Thinking about the dead is proof of being alive, isn't it? I don't know if I will return to that place. I'd like to, since I'd never felt that carefree anywhere else.
