In this hotel near Beijing Tiantan Dongmen subway station, objects scattered in the 15-square-meter hotel room flickered like evidence, reflecting the temporary life of a 26-year-old girl, Zhou Qin.
There are two unsealed disposable toothbrushes on the washstand in the bathroom, and five disposable paper cups with the name of the hotel are stacked on the narrow long table below the wall-mounted TV.
At the other end of the long table, dinner was cold: the half-bitten patty was scribbled in a plastic bag, and two-thirds of the milk tea remained.
The yellow-brown marks on the inner wall of the paper cup are curved into an arc, and the brewed milk tea is a free milk tea bag that Zhou Qin took from the front desk of the hotel.
These disposables go through Zhou Qin's life with repeated use and replacement.
What she really has is the 24-inch suitcase at the door, which contains all her summer clothes, as well as a pair of slippers and a pair of sneakers under the long table and bedside table.
The kettle on the floor had never been used, and large black plastic bags of garbage were piled with trousers to be washed and bags of laundry detergent.
For Zhou Qin, these few items do not mean that they cannot be discarded. From February 2022 to the present, during the six months of traveling in many hotels, it seems that there is nothing that cannot be discarded.
The important things are in the black backpack: computer, computer stand, headphones, orange water glass.
She carried them on her back and kept leaving, making short stops at hotel after hotel.
The lifestyle of long-term hotel rental instead of renting is becoming a new choice for some people living in first-tier cities.
Leaving a place that can be called "home", they describe it as an "escape": some people want to escape from a stable life and regain the true feelings of daily life; some people hope to focus on themselves and find The meaning of withdrawing from life; some people want to find a sanctuary for insecurities and touch the possibility of nomadic life.
Living compressed into 15 square meters
Zhou Qin sat on the bed with her schoolbag within reach.
This 1.5-meter bed almost fills the entire room. From after get off work to getting up at 8 o'clock the next day, she sits on this bed and continues to work overtime, or play with her mobile phone and watch movies.
"Staying in a hotel means a kind of freedom," Zhou Qin said.
In the chat, the word she repeatedly mentioned was "possibility". The rental contract with one payment for three is a kind of bondage, which means a long-term binding with the city of residence and work, "like being in a prison".
Now, she signed a one-month short-term contract with the hotel. "I can leave as soon as I can," she said.
In terms of price and commuting convenience, long-term hotel rentals are also more cost-effective. The hotel is only 5 minutes away from the company's commute time. The monthly rent of the hotel is 3,188 yuan, plus 50 yuan for water and 20 yuan for sanitation. 3,258 yuan, which is cheaper than the previous average monthly rent of 3,300 yuan for group rentals.
The only thing that makes her unhappy is that the hotel room where she lives now has no windows.
The morning light cannot wake up the dream, "I'm always late for work." Outside the fake window is a decorative painting: "Outside the window" the morning light is illuminating a path in the dense forest.
The life of 27-year-old Liu Ying is also compressed into a space of 18 square meters.
Unlike Zhou Qin, in the express hotel near Chaoyang Park in Beijing, traces of disposable items were erased and replaced by Liu Ying's colorful personal items.
Two green and pink towels hang under the bath towels provided by the hotel.
The toothbrush is my own electric toothbrush, the comb is an air-cushion comb that is more suitable for long hair, and the shower gel and shampoo are also bought by Liu Ying herself.
Since there is no way to cook in the hotel, Liu Ying fills the long table under the TV with snacks and bagged coffee.
Order takeaway for lunch and dinner, and the hotel front desk will provide a collection service.
This is not a disadvantage for Liu Ying, "I don't like cooking at all."
Living in a hotel is a process of letting go of things.
In the past, Liu Ying's favorite things to buy were all kinds of storage tools, storage boxes, storage boxes, and storage racks. The items were placed in different categories, displayed, and then forgotten.
After staying at the hotel, Liu Ying realized the absurdity.
Now, on the desk of the hotel are three books that are not organized by small bookshelves, and the only storage box, which contains skin care products and cosmetics.
Her only three pairs of shoes are on the floor, and a few summer outfits hang in the closet, ready to pack in just one bag.
In May 2021, 34-year-old Xiaobei, who has lived in Hong Kong for a long time, checked into the Harbour Grand Hotel on Hong Kong Island.
The long-term rental hotel in Hong Kong is also unable to meet the needs of three meals a day. Xiaobei, who is used to getting up early, has thought about how to make a simple breakfast in the hotel.
The table where the suitcases are placed is her food area, with a small sandwich maker, three small condiment jars, three dishes and some snacks.
Wash some fresh lettuce, fry an egg on the sandwich maker, heat up the ham and bread, and a hearty sandwich is ready.
In addition to the food area, traces of life can be seen in the body fat meter, pink pillows, flower-like ceramic cups and other objects in the bathroom.
In addition to the wardrobe for hanging clothes, the storage space under the TV cabinet is used as a locker by her, and the close-fitting clothes are rolled up and placed neatly.
Living in a hotel in Hong Kong, Xiaobei also continued the habit of recycling in daily life.
The large canvas bag next to the TV contained sorted trash, rinsed plastic bottles, paper products, metal drink cans and cans.
Every two weeks, she carries the recyclable garbage on her back and sends it to the "Green Day Queen" recycling convenience point, which is a ten-minute walk from the hotel.
escape from established life
In March 2019, Zhou Qin came to Beijing to work and lived with a strange couple and a boy through a rental platform.
"When I'm taking a shower, the male roommate will knock on the door outside, saying that he can't hold it anymore. I'm very flustered and just want to get out quickly," she said.
Sometimes in the early morning, roommates would knock on her door to borrow things.
The collision with other people's life continued to intrude on her personal space. After renting for half a year, she left the rented house and also left Beijing.
When she returned to Beijing, in early 2020, Zhou Qin began to rent a hotel.
Unlike Zhou Qin, who took the initiative to choose a long-term rental hotel, 27-year-old Liu Ying left her rental room under the impact of various unstable factors.
After graduating from university in 2016, Liu Ying came to Beijing and lived in a group rental house.
In the rental house she used to live in, Liu Ying used her heart to shape her life.
She plastered the walls with pink feather wallpaper, hung her own crocheted dream catcher by the bed, and bought a bedside rug.
The lights in the rental house were not good-looking, so she bought cotton online, glued it around the lights, drew stars and moon shapes on paper, cut them out, and decorated them on fluffy white cotton.
In order to take a more comfortable bath, she also bought an inflatable bathtub with a length of 2 meters.
Although the price is cheap, her roommates have different requirements for hygiene standards, and the messy and dirty common areas make her unbearable.
Tenants’ daily routines are also misplaced. Liu Ying often suffers from insomnia due to the noise next door, and scrambles for bathrooms often occur.
After giving up group rentals, she started renting a one-bedroom apartment with a private bathroom.
The status of a single woman also brings new problems.
When renting a house in a community in Chaoyang District, because the courier often directly put the fresh and frozen food she bought in the pick-up cabinet, and after communicating with the courier to no avail, she made a complaint call.
I thought the matter could be resolved, but after returning home at night, Liu Ying found that the keyhole at home was blocked, and her phone number was written on the small advertisement for sex services on the wall at the door.
"There is no camera at the door, and I have no evidence to confirm that it is him, so I can only be dumb and pretend not to know about it." Liu Ying said.
Afraid of being retaliated against, Liu Ying could only suppress her anger and keep a friendly face when she was with the courier.
In October last year, after the house expired, the landlord decided to sell the house and did not renew the lease. Liu Ying, who had been trembling to continue renting, ushered in a sudden change. She was restricted to move out of the rental house within two days.
After hurriedly packing up and leaving it in a friend's studio, Liu Ying checked into a hotel near the company with her belongings.
She thought that staying in a hotel was just a helpless move during the transition period, but she did not expect to open up a new way of life.
Compared with the previous rent of about 5,500 yuan in Chaoyang District, the monthly cost of renting a long-term hotel does not exceed 4,500 yuan, including cleaning the room and replenishing daily necessities such as mineral water and toilet paper.
The security issues that Liu Ying is concerned about have also been more practically guaranteed. The residents and visitors of the hotel need to swipe their ID cards and register, and there is 24-hour security.
When ordering take-out or receiving express delivery, you only need to fill in the hotel's address, the front desk will help to collect it, and then the robot will deliver it to your door.
Living in the hotel, Liu Ying felt at ease. She felt that she had begun to take control of her life and would not be harassed or driven out again. She had the right to choose to leave or stay.
Stripped from her life, there was something else.
Liu Ying describes herself as a typical Cancer girl, who is used to giving without expecting anything in return, and always takes care of the people around her as her responsibility unconsciously.
After the age of 18, she achieved financial independence and no longer asked her family for living expenses.
Liu Ying graduated from the media college of a university in Changsha. Since her sophomore year, she has accumulated work experience through internships on major platforms such as Hunan Satellite TV and CCTV. At the same time, she has also taken part-time jobs in editing, directing and filming, and part-time in training institutions for art examinations.
During the period of working hard to save money, Liu Ying said, "Money is my sense of security."
The sense of security built up with years of hard work was shattered by successive vibrations.
In a love affair during college, Liu Ying habitually paid for her boyfriend, "giving him all the money she earned".
Her boyfriend is addicted to gambling, and Liu Ying spends her money and energy in this relationship, trying to "bring her boyfriend back to the right path".
When her boyfriend asked her for money again, but she couldn't get it, her boyfriend dropped the phone angrily. "It woke me up, so I decided to break up." Liu Ying said.
After ending this close relationship, she lived a life of saving money with peace of mind, and was dragged into the quagmire again.
In Bengbu, Anhui, Liu Ying's mother participated in informal micro-loans online, and the money she owed became more and more. Liu Ying could only bear the pressure to help her mother pay back the money. At most, she needed to pay 50,000 yuan per month.
This is not a small amount for a student in college. Liu Ying was helpless and felt wronged, "It seems that I have worked so hard to earn so much money and haven't given it to myself."
The road of security paved with saving money finally collapsed after experiencing the explosion of Internet lending platforms.
In 2018, after working for two years, Liu Ying saved 300,000 yuan to buy a small apartment in her hometown.
After the house is optimistic, the money scattered on various platforms can never be recovered.
"Effort will be rewarded", the belief that supported him began to shake.
In the following 4 years, Liu Ying healed the loss with relaxation, and no longer believed in the meaning of hard work and making money as in the past.
After the rent didn't go well, she checked into a hotel and suspended all work. "It seems that my life goals have changed. I may not want to be rich, and I don't want to take care of my boyfriend or my family. I want to take care of myself first. ."
Liu Ying, who decided to take care of her own feelings, has been living in the hotel for more than half a year.
When asked how long she plans to stay in the hotel, Liu Ying replied: "As long as the price is controlled within 5,000 yuan, I will continue to stay. The price is low, safe, and there is an aunt to clean up. There is no reason to stay."
For 35-year-old Xiaobei, the long-term hotel rental is also an escape from the established life trajectory.
Living alone in Hong Kong for 16 years, Xiaobei said, "I have been following a step-by-step life for more than ten years. Living in a hotel for a long time, I finally have a sense of emptiness that is outside of life."
Before that, life was a solid and open road, all she had to do was believe in it and walk on it firmly.
In 2006, Xiaobei was admitted to the University of Hong Kong with the college entrance examination results of a city in Henan.
The girl who grew up in a small city came to Hong Kong through the single-plank bridge of the college entrance examination. After graduation, she successfully found a job in a local media.
In the first year of graduation, like most of her classmates, Xiaobei rented a house near the school.
Walking on the road in the Western District to eat and buy things, you will always meet acquaintances of the same school in the crowd of people.
This made Xiaobei feel pressured. In a group that was not harmonious, as an outsider, she refused to be disciplined by the circle of acquaintances, and her strong self-awareness drove her to escape.
In 2011, with the support of his mother, Xiaobei decided to buy a house.
"A house is a safe and stable place to live. It means ending wandering and regaining a sense of belonging." With this thought in mind, Xiaobei inspected the house alone. She set her sights on Lantau Island in the outlying islands, where she could stay away from Downtown and crowds, seem to finally feel safe.
The pain of pursuing worldly standards
Du Sujuan, a professor at the Wenbo College of East China University of Political Science and Law, once said in an interview, "Faced with attitudes with different secular standards, there are probably two types of societies. One is that they really want to meet the secular standards, but they agree with them but do not achieve the pain they felt before; One is to doubt the existing standards. When you refuse discipline, you will definitely feel pain, and this pain will manifest as social fear." Both Xiaobei and Zhou Qin jokingly called themselves "social fear", and they once catered to the mainstream Lives and standards, to strive for, also suffer from doubts about this order.
In Hong Kong, most people plan their life with a fixed life goal of "getting on a car" (buying a house): living independently, saving money, buying a house, and paying off the mortgage with the rest of their lives.
After escaping from the circle of acquaintances, Xiaobei finds herself falling into another mainstream order, and she needs to work hard for another secular standard: be pragmatic like most people, buy a house to repay the loan, work hard to complete the promotion, get married and have children .
Living on Lantau Island in the outlying islands of Hong Kong, at 9 a.m. every morning, Xiao Bei takes a boat to the Central Pier, eats breakfast amid the waves, and then transfers to the subway for half an hour to go to work in a company in downtown Hong Kong.
After get off work at 7:00 p.m., take the boat back home.
This kind of life is leisurely, but also static.
When he first bought a house, Xiaobei took a fancy to the seclusion of the outlying islands, without the crowded and cramped feeling of downtown Hong Kong.
In the more than ten years of living in this house, other friends have either married and had children, or immigrated overseas for further study, and only her life has remained in place.
Because of the unmarried age, the conflict with his parents has become increasingly fierce.
The outbreak of the epidemic in 2020 hastened the time of loosening.
The closed life makes Xiaobei eager to make some changes.
In the ten years after graduation, Xiaobei has changed jobs three times. A large number of repetitive affairs and tedious cooperative relationships consume the meaning of work, and work can no longer provide her with a sense of value.
At the same time, in concrete life, she finds that she seems to have lost her sensory experience.
Disney can be seen from the window of Xiaobei's residence. Sometimes at 7:30 at night, the Disney Castle will light up in the night, and the bright fireworks will explode one by one.
In the past, these unexpected fireworks were the reward of life. Gradually, Xiaobei discovered that the waves, rain, flowers, and even Disney's fireworks on the island no longer touched her.
The house soothed the wandering sense of outsiders, but it also brought her new imprisonment.
"It seems that in this city, my choices in life tend to be more conservative," Xiaobei said.
One night in 2020, Xiaobei saw a woman sharing her life experience in Thailand on Douban. In her description, Thai people don’t pay much attention to worldly standards and desire for success. Life.
As if he suddenly touched another possibility, Xiaobei turned on the computer and started to read it. He saw that Chulalongkorn University in Thailand was still recruiting master students, and immediately submitted the application.
In May, after receiving the admission letter, Xiaobei resigned, rented out the house, and moved into a hotel.
Talking about why she decided to stay in a hotel, Zhou Qin remembered a book she read when she was a child called "Tear Down the Wall of Thinking".
Until now, she can still remember a sentence written in this book: "From the perspective of career development, a house destroys a dream."
Zhou Qin's dream is to be a "digital nomad". One of the core characteristics of a digital nomad is that his work is not limited by geographical conditions and time, but under this premise, he can choose to live in different parts of the world.
This new way of life means breaking free from stereotypes, disciplines and established barriers.
Living in a hotel, living a temporary life, in her opinion, is the protection of her dreams, with a black backpack on her back, a computer and headphones, she can leave at any time.
The "nomadic" life that Zhou Qin expects may be a form of self-protection.
In 2018, after graduating from journalism, she entered a new media job. The daily work content is to output some branded new media articles. She calls this job "an editorial writer".
Sometimes the assignment is to write what appears to be a news story, but in fact the direction of writing is a pre-arranged press release.
In new media marketing, it is not uncommon to wash manuscripts. She needs to plagiarize some articles from leading companies or competing companies under the guidance of the leader. The leader told her that this is a "splitting explosion".
In addition to conflicting with the work content, Zhou Qin needs to unconditionally obey the company's disciplinary norms.
New media companies work overtime seriously, but no matter how late the overtime is, the company requires employees to clock in before 9 am every day, and those who are late will be criticized.
Inside the company, she faced many competitors. "They are younger, with good education and strong work ability." She felt anxious and always worried that she would be fired.
In the communication with the leaders, the leaders also mainly focus on suppressive communication.
From the campus to the society, although Zhou Qin has already made preparations for a "hard landing", this time's work experience and the "social rules" she has not been able to deal with maturely still make her feel pain.
She remembers the questioning tone of her leaders at work, mulling over the emotions at the end of each day.
"This feeling of not being trusted is like a Trojan horse program in my body. Whenever I encounter something, it will produce this kind of stress response."
"I think when you don't have a choice, or when you feel that you are miserable, you will choose some correct actions that the society tells you." With this sense of failure, Zhou Qin returned to her hometown of Anyang, Henan, and began to prepare at the same time. Examinations and postgraduate studies.
After both failed, in 2022, Zhou Qin returned to Beijing, determined to adjust herself. She began to live in a hotel and embarked on the difficult journey of "being yourself".
some new possibilities
In early 2022, Zhou Qin returned to Beijing and stayed at a youth hostel.
All kinds of young people stay here every day. They tell their stories after meals, play guitars and hold concerts in the small living room, watch the all-English musical "Hamilton" together, and recommend jobs to each other.
Zhou Qin felt that the things she cared about most that she gave up during the preparation for the postgraduate entrance examination and the public examination had come back.
However, it is impossible to live in a youth hostel all the time, and it is exhausting to be exposed to a high-intensity social environment. In April 2022, Zhou Qin moved to a hotel with more personal space.
In May 2022, during the epidemic in Beijing, Zhou Qin became a close contact group. After the isolation, in order to reward her tired self, she chose an express hotel with an average price of about 300 yuan.
Because of the high price, the next day, she moved to a nearby hotel that only cost 150 yuan a night.
Because she used to be a "close contact", her room was arranged at the end of the corridor, and she was asked not to enter and leave the room at will.
For the first time, Zhou Qin realized that staying in a hotel does not mean the freedom to "just go".
After the phantom of freedom was broken, very accidentally, in June, she swiped on a friend's circle of friends. In the photo, the friend's cat was lying lazily on a quilt. The quilt was the most common plaid pattern.
The cat is cute and the picture is warm. Zhou Qin commented on the circle of friends: "I envy you for having your own quilt." The friend replied: "Don't you have your own quilt?"
The quilt beside him was a white quilt that smelled slightly disinfectant in the hotel. Zhou Qin replied, "I have it, but it's not mine."
There aren't many moments that feel lonely like this.
Most of the time, Zhou Qin still enjoys the days in the hotel, and she still believes in the possibility of a "nomadic" life. In her specific work and life, she makes a long list of books and movies, and runs her own social media platform. , In her opinion, the end of life is not Kao Gong or Dachang, and she hopes that one day she can become a real "digital nomad".
The postgraduate course began in late August. From May to August, Xiaobei spent the most "doing nothing" period in his life.
In the previous 33 years of her life, Xiaobei tried her best to be a daughter who "does not cause trouble for her parents, does not idle hands, and can be recognized by her parents". Self-control, lost happiness in the predicament.
Xiaobei described the days in the hotel as the summer vacation after the college entrance examination, "I feel like there is finally some hope in life, some new possibilities, a lot of rest, and a lot of plans for a new life."
Xiaobei became accustomed to waking up naturally and made sandwiches every morning.
When I was wandering around the hotel at noon, it happened to be the office workers' tea break. Under the office building, the office workers dressed in formal attire, gathered together in twos and threes to smoke, and there was a long queue outside the restaurant.
Because of the rush, many people can only pack takeaways. Even if they have time to sit down to eat, most people will order foods such as siu mei rice and beef brisket noodles that can be prepared quickly.
Xiaobei eats alone and often shares tables with other people. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see the fingers of the people around her constantly wandering on the phone, replying to various messages.
As an observer, Xiaobei looked at them as if she had seen herself. She found that she had too much extravagant time, "I can do whatever I want at any time."
The lost consciousness is slowly being regained.
Near the hotel, Xiaobei's favorite place is the "Oil Street Realization" art space on the waterfront of Victoria Harbour.
This Grade II historic building with a red brick and tile roof has a two-story building for exhibitions and events, as well as approximately 3,000 square meters of outdoor space for large-scale outdoor art installations.
In this "art oasis in the city", Xiaobei spent one afternoon after another.
"I can feel a kind of insignificance of myself, a kind of the same goal of all things in the world." Xiaobei said.
She has seen this exhibition many times.
Until the color of the green space outside the building changes from green to colorful, and the fallen leaves are colorful, it is autumn.
After completing his studies in Thailand, Xiaobei returned to Hong Kong and lived in his own home again. Like a small light spot in an art installation, after a short deviation from the track, it still flew to the same return path as millions of people. , belongs to her avenue.
During the time she stopped, her previous questions were not answered, but at least, Xiaobei said, she began to admit her vulnerability.
She finally touched the lightness that she had envied when she first arrived in Hong Kong.
Beijing News reporter Yang Liu Xu Xuefei