昆明孩子
Oral History
Single Channel Video
Kunming Mandarin with English Subtitles
10’44”
2023
口述史
单频录像
昆明话
十分四十四秒
二零二三年
School ends at 5:30. I rode my bike crossing the Chengdu–Kunming railway behind my middle school. I was listening to Come As You Are by Nirvana on my MP3, recognizing only a few English words in it. My uncle Xiaowei told me about how great Nirvana was. I thought that was my whole world.
After coming home, while putting the rice into the rice cooker, I plugged in my Panasonic CD player and began to do my homework. This once portable CD player wasn’t portable anymore, since the rechargeable “gum” battery was no longer in production and became obsolete. So, listening to CDs became a home activity, while the emerging MP3 was getting popular. I brought mine to school every day.
I remembered my dear friend Xie in middle school, her writings and singing feel like a warm river. She tried to translate her favorite song into Chinese. We exchanged our CDs. She told me besides listening to the CDs during long commutes from school to home, home to school, she only sneakily listened to them as relaxation on the big clumsy radio machines that played all types of media—CDs, cassettes, and radio. Each of us had one to practice English at home by listening to the education cassettes that came with the English book. But we rarely used it for English learning purposes.
This was the beginning of the 2010s.
// This video retrospects to the obsolete music fandom scene of “dakou” CD, meaning puching a hole, which refers to foreign music CDs that had been punched a hole in the middle as a sign of the destruction of illegal, uncopyrighted, or unapproved products by the custom, nonetheless sold and exchanged in various fixed and nomad locations during the 1980s and 2010s. Focusing on its circular but always partial listening experience, this project proposes the pirate culture of “dakou” composes its own rhythm of lingering and spinning as geographical encounters of the shared urban through the lens of rhythmanalysis.
学校五点半放学，
Return
返回
After coming home, while putting the rice into the rice cooker, I plugged in my Panasonic CD player and began to do my homework. This once portable CD player wasn’t portable anymore, since the rechargeable “gum” battery was no longer in production and became obsolete. So, listening to CDs became a home activity, while the emerging MP3 was getting popular. I brought mine to school every day.
I remembered my dear friend Xie in middle school, her writings and singing feel like a warm river. She tried to translate her favorite song into Chinese. We exchanged our CDs. She told me besides listening to the CDs during long commutes from school to home, home to school, she only sneakily listened to them as relaxation on the big clumsy radio machines that played all types of media—CDs, cassettes, and radio. Each of us had one to practice English at home by listening to the education cassettes that came with the English book. But we rarely used it for English learning purposes.
This was the beginning of the 2010s.
// This video retrospects to the obsolete music fandom scene of “dakou” CD, meaning puching a hole, which refers to foreign music CDs that had been punched a hole in the middle as a sign of the destruction of illegal, uncopyrighted, or unapproved products by the custom, nonetheless sold and exchanged in various fixed and nomad locations during the 1980s and 2010s. Focusing on its circular but always partial listening experience, this project proposes the pirate culture of “dakou” composes its own rhythm of lingering and spinning as geographical encounters of the shared urban through the lens of rhythmanalysis.
学校五点半放学，
放学后用MP3 听着涅槃乐队的《Come As You Are》，
骑车穿过初中后门的成昆铁路，
一首歌里好像就听懂了几个英文单词，
舅舅晓巍告诉我涅槃是个很厉害的乐队，
我以为那是整个世界。
回家淘好米，
插上松下 CD 播放器，开始写作业。
因为可充电的“口香糖”电池已经停产，
这台便携式的 CD 播放机也不再便携。
只能在家里听 ，
当时 MP3 刚刚开始流行，
我每天都偷偷带着我的 MP3 去上学。
想起了初中的好友谢，
她的文字和歌声就像一条温暖的河，
她试着把自己喜欢的英文歌词翻译成中文。
我们交换了各自的 CD。
她告诉我，除了在从学校到家、从家到学校的漫长通勤路上听CD，
她只在放松的时候，
在那台笨重的大收音机上偷偷地听CD。
我们每个人都有一个那样的收音机，
都是为了听英语书附带的教育磁带买的，
但我们很少真正用它来学习英语。
这是 2010 年代初。
//本视频回溯了“打口”CD这一已经不复存在的乐迷文化现象，“打口”CD意指那些被海关收缴的非法、无版权或未经批准售卖的外国CD，他们会被打一个洞，以示销毁。尽管如此，除了被破坏的几首歌，这些CD仍然可以部分播放，在1980年代到2010年代期间，他们在各种固定或流动的地点被销售和交换。以CD的“循环播放”为线索，本视频关注打口CD和盗版媒体不完整的视听体验，通过韵律分析的视角，本作品提出“打口”文化构成了城市中不期而遇的徘徊与旋转的节奏。
Return
返回
Special thanks:
特别感谢：
Min Luo
罗敏
Jincheng Xie
谢京辰
Shuyin Zheng
郑舒尹
Xiaowei Li
李晓巍
Xiaodan He
和晓丹
Xiaolan Li
李晓岚
Yunbo Chen
陈云波
Music credit:
音乐：
Kunming Bus Legends
By Situ Junwen and Friends
Dancing Banquet
By Sani Band Manhu
《跳菜》
特别感谢：
Min Luo 罗敏
Jincheng Xie 谢京辰
Shuyin Zheng 郑舒尹
Xiaowei Li 李晓巍
Xiaodan He 和晓丹
Xiaolan Li 李晓岚
Yunbo Chen 陈云波
Music credit:
音乐：
Kunming Bus Legends By Situ Junwen and Friends
《昆明公交风云》
司徒骏文和雅歌联盟
Dancing Banquet
By Sani Band Manhu
