The Journey and Creation of a Courier: 20 Years, 19 Jobs, and 1 Book Editor | Beijing | Journey
After graduating in 1999, Hu Anyan worked in Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Shanghai, Beijing, and other places. He worked as a comic editor, convenience store clerk, bicycle salesperson, logistics picker, and courier... Over the course of 20 years, he changed his job to 19 different jobs.
In 2020, Hu Anyan, who had been unemployed for several months, published an essay online, one of which, "A Year of Working Night Shift in Debang," went viral. Taking this as an opportunity, his non fiction work "I am delivering packages in Beijing" was officially published in March this year. Through this book, those who wander on the periphery have been brought into the public's view. But in Hu Anyan's view, these records have nothing to do with the bottom or suffering, but only witness a person's ups and downs and the life they have experienced. "They are just means of making a living," Hu Anyan said. "I hope to establish myself through writing."
one
"I always fall into unbearable situations time and time again, and then I am forced to flee."
44 year old Hu Anyan is now settling in Chengdu. In the 60 square meter cabin he and his wife rented, in addition to boxes of books, they also kept a cat. The house is exceptionally clean, giving people a feeling of orderliness. Perhaps this is the projection of his current state - "peace and harmony," Hu Anyan said with a smile, "to put it in a vulgar way, it is reconciliation with life."
Before reconciliation, his life experiences were like the Chekhov novels he interpreted, "a huge question mark that left people without belonging.".
Hu Anyan was born in Guangzhou. He studied home appliance maintenance in a vocational school and advertising in a college, but I attended night university. And his early work, such as being a hotel waiter, clothing store and gas station salesperson, and fast food chain deliveryman, inevitably collided with night school hours.
He struggled to maintain a balance between learning and work, even causing dissatisfaction among colleagues due to his hard work, which invisibly raised the "standards" of everyone's work. Despite this effort, it's just something like "adding a few extra chairs".
Colleagues often have conflicts and calculations related to interests, which makes him uneasy. I don't like to talk about interests and conditions with people.
He thought that after graduating from college, finding a job that matches his major would eliminate the need to frequently interact with people. He successively entered a Guangzhou comic club and comic information magazine, and as a result, almost all the products produced here were crude pirated works and cheap humorous works. He and a few passionate friends decided to resign and head north to live a "wandering" life.
In 2004, Hu Anyan came to Beijing and found his ninth job at a printing shop. His friends who came with him insisted on living an idealistic life, believing that "work is the enslavement of people by social machines," and advised him to quit his job. He obeyed. In order to save expenses, they also moved from Tongzhou to the more remote Yanjiao, where everyone shared the rent, which was only 500 yuan per month. But the economic predicament was a practical problem, and in the end, he returned to his hometown.
However, this experience in Beijing made him accustomed to introspection. Those "childish" friends, their rebellion and pursuit, "were an enlightenment for me, making me realize that there is still such a way of life in the world.".
After being idle at home for several months, he went to work as an editor in a video equipment journal, and then started a car magazine with his colleagues. After his father fell ill, he took care of him at home for several months and returned to the animation industry. The company's operating model forces them to frequently "wash their manuscripts", and he feels "too incompetent", "even if he is immersed in the polluted current, the economic situation is still in a moonlight state.".
At that time, his girlfriend was very dissatisfied with him. In order to make money, he and a classmate went to Vietnam to explore business opportunities. However, there was too much uncertainty, so they had to compromise and cooperate to open a women's clothing store in Nanning.
Apart from various difficult customers, what frustrates him even more is the competitors on the same floor. Later, his girlfriend broke up with him, which made him feel a sense of relief, but at the same time, he was shrouded in a sense of loss.
After staying in Nanning for two years, he broke up with his classmates and went home.
That year, he happened to be 30 years old. Facing old friends with financial freedom, there is still a sense of inferiority in their hearts. His 10 years of working experience have also deepened his fear of crowds. So Hu Anyan began writing. He studied under a renowned scholar, imitated and practiced, took notes frequently, and spent two years on literary forums. But the remuneration was meager, making it difficult for him to sustain his life, so he had to continue working.
In the following years, he first worked as an online store selling clothes in Guangzhou, then moved to Xiaguan, Yunnan to work as a mall security guard and a bakery apprentice, went to Shanghai to work as a convenience store night shift clerk and bicycle shop salesperson, opened a snack shop, set up a street stall, and made braised dishes in Dali, and finally returned to Guangdong to work as a night shift picking clerk at Debang Logistics.
"Almost all work is a futile repetition for me," Hu Anyan said. "I don't know how to improve myself, I always fall into unbearable situations time and time again, and then I am forced to flee."
two
"You are the most conscientious and responsible courier I have ever seen."
In 2018, Hu Anyan came to Beijing again for his current wife. Unlike last time when he was full of passion, on his first day back in Beijing, he started looking for a job. The recruitment website recommended him to SF Express.
As the "Hai Di Lao" in the express delivery industry, SF Express has a good reputation, but Hu Anyan, who is in it, feels exhausted.
Some rules set by the site supervisor, such as requiring employees to actively help with garbage during delivery, ranking higher in positive reviews will be caught and "publicly displayed", and holding regular meetings to enforce discipline after work at night... These all make Juan, who is extremely "socially fearful", uncomfortable.
Until July of that year, he was infected with viral pneumonia and the hourly workers did not have medical insurance. This gave him the idea of resigning, and before the Double 11 holiday, he switched to Pinjun Express.
Relatively speaking, each courier at Pinjun is more equal and does not interfere with each other. Although newcomers also need to start from poor areas, there are more opportunities for adjustment and it is more fair. But in the workplace, various accidents still arise. He has been stolen from packages worth thousands of yuan before, and has also paid out of his own pocket multiple times for his customers' mistakes, such as customers filling in the wrong address but insisting on blaming the package. It takes several times to go back and forth, not to mention the time it takes, and sometimes he may even face unreasonable complaints.
"But delivering packages has never made me feel humiliated," Hu Anyan said. "Most of the people I come into contact with at work respect me very much." He explained that some of the experiences in the book, whether for business or narrative purposes, inevitably involve some friction and collision, but the overall experience of this job is still good.
He has calculated that the average monthly salary of a Beijing courier is 7000 yuan, and based on 26 days of work per month, the daily salary is 270 yuan. Excluding the fixed time costs of unloading, sorting, and loading, leaving about 9 hours of delivery per day, the output will be 30 yuan per hour. And an average of 2 yuan per package is equivalent to delivering one package every 4 minutes. In this situation, whether eating or using the restroom, it is "too luxurious."
Nevertheless, he does not believe that the express delivery industry has exploitative or exploitative attributes. "Essentially, this job is one's own choice, and its salary is relatively considerable."
During his time at Pinjun, he lived a relaxed and comfortable life, no longer seeing himself as a delivery machine with an hourly salary of 30 yuan.
Later, Pinjun disbanded and the business was transferred to SF Express. At the end of 2019, Hu Anyan also ended his work in Beijing. Before leaving, he posted a friend circle informing customers that he no longer delivers express delivery. Many customers left comments and liked him, thanking him for his efforts. One of the comments said, "You are the most conscientious and responsible courier I have ever seen."
"He didn't exaggerate," he wrote in the book, because this client didn't need to flatter against his heart, and this sentence is also his self reflection on his last job so far.
three
He expanded his various work experiences into a book
Juan Yan is his pen name. "Hu" refers to "why" in classical Chinese, and "An" and "Yan" are both interrogative pronouns. He used this pen name to express his inner unease.
This "unease" became his motivation to restart writing in 2020. He wrote about his experience as a night shift picking clerk at Debon Logistics from a first person perspective. I didn't expect this article to unexpectedly become popular, receiving over 3700 reposts and tens of thousands of likes on Douban. In April of that year, two editors from the literary organization "Copy Production" contacted Hu Anyan and invited him to try non fiction writing.
"When opportunities arise, I will go and fulfill them," Hu Anyan admitted. The feedback from the outside world gave him a sense of vision that he had been walking in the darkness for many years and suddenly saw the light. For this reason, he attempted to intervene in non fiction writing and extract content worth writing from his long work experience.
According to the editor's suggestion, he wrote about his experience of delivering packages in Beijing. This article was initially titled "Dispatch" and later published in "Reading Library 2103" with the title "I Dispatch Express in Beijing". With increasing feedback from various sectors, the editor of Purui Culture approached Hu Anyan, hoping that he could expand his various work experiences into a book. Quickly, he completed this manuscript.
In recent years, "working writers" such as Chen Nianxi, Fan Yusu, and Wang Jibing have emerged one after another, and Hu Anyan is the latest member of this collective. Some people refer to their writing as "low-level writing.". Hu Anyan disagrees with this statement.
"I have never written with the so-called 'bottom consciousness', nor do I write from the perspective of' bottom concern '." He emphasized, "I write about personal experiences, not the current situation or situation of the group or class I belong to." He wants to clarify that from beginning to end, he is only writing about' how to accept and establish oneself ', and tries to be as objective as possible to avoid teaching others. ". "I increasingly feel that many ordinary and meaningful moments in life are more decisive than facing all aspects of life that are troubled by reality."
Once Hu Anyan withdrew from his job as a means of livelihood, he would devote himself wholeheartedly to writing. "I am writing a novel," he said with an almost mysterious sense of happiness.
On Hu Anyan, you can feel a rare clarity. Although he loves writing, he does not belittle "working" as a result.
"A person's value or dignity is not closely related to their external achievements, but to what kind of person they are fundamentally." Hu Anyan said, "Sending packages, as long as you do it seriously, sincerely, and sincerely, your value will not be lower than that of a writer. I have never believed that publishing or publishing works is a more remarkable, noble, valuable, and successful thing than sending packages."
