Walking Past the Future

For Yang Yaoting, a second generation migrant who works a dehumanizing job at a production line, hope is faint. Her parents came to this megacity 25 years ago from their agricultural background, hoping to leave behind a harsh reality for a land of dreams. But in a whirlwind that sweeps them off their feet, they realize that the ground they stand on is an illusion in the first place, and wonder if their dream is after all to be found with ploughs and sickles, underneath the very piece of land they left behind. They are harrowed to find, upon returning, that it has long forgotten them too. Feeling rootless, and in all her desperation to belong, Yaoting readies herself to sacrifice her life for the future of her family, just as they once sacrificed their future for her life…