As the engine got started, the bus slowly moved away from the depot and hit the road, my thoughts started to roll like the spinning wheels. I wanted to go to Taipei to meet my younger sister and brother. A bag stood beside my seat, in which there was a large pop-up book I bought on line to be a gift for my niece. She is just three years old. When she opens the book, there will be various birds singing and chirping from every page which pops up the landscape where specific birds inhabit, like desert, marshland, rain forest, and so on. I am not sure if she will like it or if it is suitable for her age. It has been a year since the last time I saw her. The book could be torn down in a few days by her curious fingers. Even so, I hope, she can finish it with an exhalation of awe, because it is as large as an illustrated Oxford Dictionary. I remember when I was a little boy, I got a pencil-sharpening machine, stylish and practical like any Japanese goods, from my aunt. I thought I could bring it to school to show off the next morning. But my father smashed it against the wall the very night, on his outburst of anger with my mother. I was woken up by the noise to find the debris of the gift and the mismatched marriage. Nothingness is happiness.
