2025年9月的一个周日下午，我在香港的街头向左转过头，看到一个店面窗口下面写着两句话。具体写了什么字我忘记了，但我能回忆起来大致的意思是：“所求不是珍贵，真贵不是价高”。
A Sunday afternoon in September 2025. I was on a street in Hong Kong. I turned my head to the left and saw the two sentences written below a shop window. I could hardly recall the exact words written, apart from the rough meaning of “what you look for is not the precious things, and the really precious things are not those highly priced.”
我那时候游荡在旺角的街头。在一座天桥上，东南亚妇女的周日餐会正在进行，人们分享食物、聊天。我下桥后，扭头看到那写了珍贵和价格的牌子，心想：真是有佛学的香港人，看到这句话也是我和他的一种缘分吧。我随即就转回头，往前走了。当时，我走得很快，没有停留、更没有拍照。结局是，我发现自己在荣华饼家买月饼。月饼这东西是既不珍贵、价格又高，和那个标识想要告诉我的恰恰相反。可我当时没有意识到这一点，只是把我身上剩的所有现金都用来去买月饼了。好巧不巧，买完四块月饼后身上只剩十二蚊。
By the time, I was meandering in the streets of Mong Kok. On a footbridge, South-East Asian women were chit-chatting and having their weekly picnic en masse. I descended the footbridge steps and saw that board about preciousness and price, thinking, ‘they have Buddhists here in Hong Kong, maybe it is a mystic connection that I come to see them.’ And then, I turned my head back and walked away. I walked fast, did not stay, nor did I take any pictures. I ended up in the Wing Wah Cake Shop for mooncakes, which are not precious, yet highly priced, exactly the opposite of that sign I just saw. I was not fully aware of this contrary, and paid all my cash for four mooncakes, leaving myself 12 HKD in hand.
我走出月饼店，心里有些郁闷，这八十蚊一块月饼，他们明明可以直接抢我钱！要不是昨夜我把我的墨镜落在了桑拿房的置物柜里，我也不会这天下午在上海街附近瞎转悠等浴室开门，我也更不会想起来在上海的父母、想到要给他们买点中秋节的手信（他们最后也不喜欢这月饼）。这是赶的什么潮流！该死的上海，我来了香港还要和这两个字纠缠不清。上，海，根据我的人生经验来看，这两个字对我的意义约等同于性挫败，再加上医学折磨。
It was frustration I felt when I left the shop, believing that I might have been ripped off for paying 80 HK dollars for a single piece of cake. If I did not leave my sunglasses last night in the sauna locker, I wouldn’t mess about around Shanghai Street the very next afternoon until the sauna reopened, or remind myself of my parents in Shanghai who might like some Mid-Autumn Festival gifts (it turned out that they did not). What a trendy wave I was in! Why has it always been Shanghai that snared me, even when I was visiting Hong Kong? Shang, hai, those two words literally meant sex frustration and medical torments to me, during my life experiences.
昨天晚上我和男友去同志浴室。或许是出于我存疑的乡土情节和对繁忙主干道的厌恶，我特地挑了上海街这一后巷从佐敦走去旺角。在浴室里，我和男友一直有一个心照不宣的约定。我们会从一个瞬间开始不说话，径直走向与其他人发生的事件，哪怕在那幽暗迷宫里偶然又相遇了也可以选择忽视对方。直到又一个默契的瞬间到来，我们会在一个角落开始聊天，说说今晚的经历。我们可能会重复这个过程，可能不会。那个周六的晚上，浴室里的男人们像是吸盘一样将自己贴在墙壁上，泄欲的回音从四方传来。我在昏暗中摩擦穿行，后来得知他如鱼得水。我那晚运气不算好，不过两小时就没有了兴致。也就是在这时，一个愤世嫉俗的哲学念头从我的脑海里冒出来，来掩饰我的挫败——我厌恶遴选。在众人的注视下，一个性场景会变成展示和挑选，而从中胜出几乎成了男同志展现自己雄风的方式。
I went to a gay sauna the previous night with my boyfriend. Due to my questionable hometown complex and annoyance against the main road traffic, I picked Shanghai Street as the back lane, finding our way from Jordan to Mong Kok. The tacit rule between us in the gay sauna is that we would stop talking to each other from that moment on and then separately join what other men have to offer us. Even when we meet each other again in that maze, we might ignore each other and carry on. Of course, we would talk to each other again about the night experiences, after another tacit moment arrives. We might repeat this process; we might not. On that Saturday evening, the men in the sauna stuck to the walls like ventouses, echoing the sound of gratification from surrounding compartments. I rubbed against the arms and legs, and manoeuvred through the labyrinth of poorly lit corridors. Unlike my boyfriend, who got the scores, I did not tag out that night, and I lost interest after two hours. It was at this time that a cynical philosophical idea hit me as a veil for my frustration—I hate selections. Receiving the regards of too many, a sex scene turns into window shopping, that is, showing and picking. By winning this competition, gay men show their virility.
不久之后，我在桑拿房遇见男友，他说后悔自己没有吃阻断药，他做完后害怕感染。H，I，V，这三个字母就像是三把手术刀，细心地切开性愉悦、国籍、金钱的边界。阻断药在香港非常昂贵，这几乎是香港医疗体系的盲点，作为适应了免费医疗的他估计是不会想要去买这药的。我一时不知道该说什么好，一边安慰他单次暴露的感染概率很低，一边又带着嫉妒嘲讽、数落他。他也被我的脾气弄得没有了兴致，我们决定离开去喝深夜的粥。
Soon after, I met my boyfriend in the steam room, and he regretted that he didn’t take PrEP. He was afraid. H, I, V, those three letters are like three lancets, lancing the boundaries of sex pleasure, nationality and money. The HIV post-exposure prophylaxis is unaffordable in Hong Kong, which can be called the blind spot of its public health system. My boyfriend, who has been accustomed to free healthcare, probably would not be happy to pay that price for the drugs. I had to break my muteness, consoling him that the likelihood of infection is very low for a single exposure, while teasing him with jealousy. He lost his sexual interest because of my sarcastic speech, so we decided to leave for some midnight congee.
就是在那个离开桑拿前、合上寄物柜的瞬间，我忘记了我的墨镜还静静躺在那个黢黑角落里。离开香港，那座金融大哥们的游乐场，我回到了灰尘仆仆的上海，他回到冻雨连绵的曼城。这副失而复得的二手墨镜，你究竟看到过多少个城市各自的华灯和贫瘠？要是你有灵，看到那两行字后，你应该感触比我深。现在，我已经不确定那是不是梦的杜撰，要在我眼前浮现是“所求不是珍贵，真贵不是价高”。
It was exactly the minute when I returned my locker key that I forgot my sunglasses were still there in that dim locker corner. After we left Hong Kong, the city of finance brothers’ playground, I went back to the dusty Shanghai, and he went back to the rainy Manchester. I wonder, how many cities has this pair of second-hand, lost-and-found sunglasses seen, of their lighting and barrenness? If the sunglasses can talk, they will have more to say than I, after reading those two sentences. I cannot even fully rule out that those words might be a mere projection from a dream, “what you look for is not the precious things, and the really precious things are not those highly priced.”