"Isn't that what makes Van Gogh so cute? The girl joked, and he took it seriously. That night, Chen Ying wrote down her thoughts in an email to Liang Jing in her hotel room, telling her best friends what she had learned during her travels. In the white room, only a lamp is lit on the desk against the wall. The whole room was bathed in dim light. In the upper right corner of the table, near the windowsill, is a stack of postcards, the front of which is full of colorful oil paintings. A staccato guitar melody came from the computer, and a hoarse female voice echoed the phrase "starry starry night," and Chen Ying's shadow was reflected on the half of the glass window that was not covered by the linen curtains. She tapped the keyboard, quickly relaying lines and lines. Before she knew it, she began to defend the painter, even though she knew that he had been dead for more than a century, "as an unknown painter who was poor and unappreciated, could he give more valuable gifts to the people he liked?" ”

Halfway through writing, she looked up and noticed that the glass was covered with water droplets, and it was drizzling outside, with a row of raindrops hanging from the edge of the balcony railing. Hearty laughter came from the next room, and the shadow shimmered on the corner wall. She was reminded of the Dutch writer Nottebohm's remarks about the territory of his homeland, and he thought that it would only take an hour's ride to the Dutch border to visit another country. It was his sigh. Chen Ying heard a similar sigh from John in Denmark. She remembered that John had just proudly introduced Danish historical figures and then moved on to the topic. He lamented that his country had only six million people and that government programs to encourage childbearing had little effect.

The city where she grew up has a permanent population of 20 million alone, and with the floating population, it may exceed 40 million. But in such a lively place, it was difficult for her to see her friends. The few that are either out of time or too far apart to meet each other take far more time on the road than the date itself. What should have been a stress-relieving conversation became as urgent as a rush to the market, and all interest was lost, so I had to give up and use the phone or other Internet means to communicate. In the end, she even gave up this method of communication and left a message in a place where she could see it. Write down what you want to say, then turn around and jump into the flow of strangers, compensating for the wasted time for money.

"For individuals, perhaps the size of the country and the size of its population have nothing to do with life. No matter what kind of life you have, you have to face it alone, and when you can't control it, you can only move forward firmly. ”

She wrote these words at the end of the email. After sending it, she opened "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" and continued reading from the bookmarked chapter until her eyes were too sleepy to open. Blues music came from the hall downstairs, intermittently. She got up to make sure the doors were locked, and tossed the business card she had received that morning into the trash.

She slept peacefully all night and left for The Hague early the next day. The day shift staff at the hotel had just arrived, and she casually made a bowl of cereal with cold milk in the restaurant, and spread strawberry jam on the bread slices with a spoon, with ham sausage in between. The waitress watched curiously as she enjoyed her own way of eating. Then she put on her backpack and headed out for the central train station. That's the center of the multiple rings, and you don't need to ask for directions to find them.

After arriving in The Hague by intercity train, the weather became colder and colder. Chen Ying gets a map of the city at the tourist information desk. It is not difficult to discern the direction, and the urban pattern of The Hague is clear and straightforward. She followed the route drawn by the staff with blue ballpoint pens to find the world-famous international court. Although she had taken classes on law in school, she could not fully understand the mysteries of law. It was her weakness, but it didn't affect the silence that emanated from the red building. The International Peace Flame burned quietly in the cold at the entrance, surrounded by open rings of stones sent from all over the world, and there was not even a single pedestrian on the surrounding road. Chen Ying picked up the camera and captured this solemn moment. She wanted to pass it on to Qin Hong after returning to the hotel, and he mentioned this inconspicuous place several times with an expectant look before coming to Europe.

After a tour of the interiors, she took the return train back to Amsterdam. It was still early for lunch, and she decided to wander around the historic city. Passengers on a cruise ship in the canal waved at her, and she responded politely. She walked along the waterway, found a bakery and asked for a piece of bread, and filled her stomach with slices of cheese. Gray pigeons walked around outside the glass window, looking curiously into the store.

There are several middle-aged painters by the river, huddled in dark green coats, creating. They probably knew each other well, and they sat together to share the same bottle of soju during the break. Chen Ying looked at the watercolor paintings hanging on the easel from afar, and accidentally thought that she had met a future art master.

"Have you ever been to Anne Frank's House?" The waiter asked as he served the juice. She pointed to the house opposite with two red shutters open near the roof, "It's very close to here, it's rare to have fewer people today, so there is no need to wait in a long line." ”

"Okay, let's go when you're done." Chen Ying replied happily and added a few more coins under the plate.

After lunch, Chen Ying walked across the bridge connecting the two banks and pushed open the heavy dark green wooden door on the banks of the Princes Canal. Climbing up the narrow staircase, she saw photographs of the diary writer, relics, and the low rooms where she had lived for more than two years. She couldn't imagine how Anne's family had lived in such an environment for so long, and still helped a bachelor hide in a shelter within the limits of what they could. She looked at them one by one in the order of the display panels, and there were many photos and scattered letterheads.

"What a pathetic girl is, I'd rather there had never been a war." Someone said it behind his back in German. Chen Ying looked sideways, and there were two gray-haired old men, one fat and one thin. They were all bareheaded, with one hand pressing their hats to their chests.

"But the damage has already been done, and the only thing future generations can do is remedy." This time it was the stocky old man who said.

"Not all apologies can be exchanged for forgiveness." Said the tall and thin old man.