I went to Donggua Mountain in Changsha, and now I want to move my registered residence to Hunan.

I firmly believe that you are tired of the same cookie-cutter snacks at tourist attractions. Those fried grasshoppers, takoyaki, hand-made peanut candies and Mongolian barbecue can no longer make your heart stir.

 

Like African tambourines, fish spas and antique clothing stores, they are just some kind of solid tourist attractions. You get used to their existence out of boredom, and you have paid for them, but you have never been moved by them.

 

But Changsha Donggua Mountain doesn’t require you to do this. It is not a scenic spot, and it even has the dirty and messy style of a typical Changsha city, but as long as you have been there, you will purely remember it.

 

In Changsha, Donggua Mountain is not a secret base. It is not the kind of underground place that can only be found by veterans who have been in Changsha for twenty years, have been in a gang, and have sold driving license points five times.

 

Donggua Mountain is located in Tianxin District. You can get there directly by taking bus No. 139. At night, you will feel like half of Changsha people are wandering here.

 

Local friends told me that their trip to Donggua Mountain is as punctual as a sand truck driving into the city.

 

Unlike many artificially built food streets full of business-like antiques, Dongguashan does not have those carefully decorated shops, no deliberately crafted night scenes of the Song and Ming Dynasties, and no brainwashing slogans revised twenty times by advertising companies. After being baptized by too much consumer culture, it still retains the true character of the underground of more than ten or twenty years ago. Friends from out of town may even think that the late night restaurants here seem a bit stubborn and old-fashioned, but Dongguashan doesn’t care at all.

 

People in Changsha don't like this. Whether you come or not comes, that's all I am. I concentrated on making my goods, and it took me 20 years to make them. After 20 years of word of mouth, many people came.

 

It was still messy, but apparently purer for it.

 

The first time I went to Donggua Mountain, it happened to be twelve o'clock in the evening. The narrow streets of Dongguashan seemed overcrowded, with as many diners passing by as the moonlight pouring on the rooftops.

 

Dilapidated storefronts, simple decoration styles, smoke suddenly coming out of your hair, and irregular road planning... Donggua Mountain is so rough, it seems like all the vendors in front of middle schools in the country have gathered in Donggua Mountain .

 

Even at this point, you still can't find a seat in almost any store. You have to queue up honestly in order to enjoy the eating time squatting on a twenty-centimeter-high bench like everyone else.

 

Most of the shops look like dens selling fake certificates in the 1990s. It seems that you can get a diploma from Changsha University of Science and Technology just by going upstairs. Greasy dining tables are placed everywhere, and there is always a lingering smell of oily smoke on the table tops. Every low table and bench has a thick paste that has passed through the years. Wear hip-hugging short skirts and old man shorts. People were constantly flowing on it, and the bench was always as warm as the buttocks of the people on the previous table, but they never minded each other, all their reserve and roughness were calm and relaxed in front of that bowl of lard powder.

 

The names of Dongguashan's restaurants are very casual. The name is not important. What you eat is not the name. Shops with an overly business-like taste simply cannot open here. What can remain are local and authentic Changsha tastes. Some shops don't even have signboards. They just open on the roadside and sell dumplings in a 5-square-meter shop. The queue stretches 20 meters away.

 

But different from the simple name, whether it is the happy taste of perilla peach or the lard mixed noodles of Ruyi snacks, they are enough to let you experience the taste buds being rebaptized by Huxiang water.

 

The boss of the foreign trade business, the big star invited by Hunan TV, the member of the expert group of the Federation of Literary and Art Circles, the plumber who just got off work, the Internet cafe e-sports player who was scolded by his mother...

 

You can meet all kinds of social people in Dongguashan, queue up with them at the entrance of Ruyi Snacks, and experience the happiness of market culture through the second-hand smoke of a certain section manager and other daily conversations with your mother.

 

Bullfrog, grilled sausages, rice noodles, meat skewers, crayfish, hot stew - Donggua Mountain has almost all Changsha snacks. In Dongguashan, you give money, you spend, you cry, and then you can leave.

 

In addition, there are young girls and old men on Dongguan Mountain, teenagers in school uniforms who are unwilling to go home because they covet delicious food, ID cards that have fallen on the ground unclaimed, and vomiting that suddenly falls under the tree. things.

 

These are all things I have seen with my own eyes.

 

Dongguan Mountain is not big. You don’t need to have the courage and determination to hike from Qiqihar to Urumqi. You only need to consume a few hundred calories to treat your stomach, duodenum, pancreas and The esophagus makes a solemn confession.

 

That day, my friend and I originally made an appointment to have a barbecue at Mengzhong, but accidentally walked into Changsha Lishou. All decisions seemed so careless, as if no one would regret going to any restaurant.

 

Friends in Changsha told me that Donggua Mountain does not have a long history, and there are no famous monuments standing at the entrance of the alley. It emerged naturally and has never been carved and polished in the surging commercial torrent.

 

Twenty years ago, Donggua Mountain was still the border between desolation and civilization. Fighters fought bravely and fiercely on the dilapidated streets, sometimes even causing death. The rent there was as cheap as the chicken nuggets sold at a fast food restaurant in the middle of the night, and it was really possible to apply for fake certificates in Dongguashan at that time.

 

"It's all because of the Dongguashan sausage," the friend said.

 

Dongguashan Grilled Sausage has been working in Dongguashan for decades, and the boss is nicknamed Chen Wanwan. He worked hard and relied on a broken stall. In addition to sending his children to study abroad, he also turned Donggua Mountain into a gourmet sanctuary in Changsha, attracting countless capable people and people with lofty ideals.

 

For decades, without branches, without franchises, without natural expansion and mergers under business rules, with just one stall, hard work and persistence, we have realized the dream of wealth that is unimaginable in an impetuous society.

 

Dongguashan Grilled Sausage defeats the chaotic order. It is like a mysterious signal from the Orion Nebula, attracting the attention of countless craftsmen in Changsha. Until now, Dongguashan Grilled Sausage is still the uncrowned king of Dongguashan.

 

A homemade sausage, a splash of secret chili oil, and the right Maillard reaction...

 

When you take a bite of Dongguashan Grilled Sausage, and the farm-style sausage mixed with hot condiments rushes into your throat, you will understand everything. You will understand why Dongguashan Grilled Sausage can be so famous. The force pulled out a food street.

 

"Hunan people are just as miserable as they are domineering. As long as they can bear it, they will carry it to the end." A friend said.

 

Before I left Changsha, I burned all the photos of Donggua Mountain on my phone, because if I had not relied on photos instead of taste buds to recall Donggua Mountain, the memory would be meaningless.

 

And, most importantly, I felt something beyond food. Friends said that this is the spirit of Huxiang.