I like this entry alot, from Ah Shin's blog.

The Window Washer

As though washing a loved one, he carefully wipes clean every pane of the clever window. He places the sponge saturated with grimy, soapy water into the small pail suspended near his waist, and focuses completely on rinsing the window with his hose, letting the falling water drops drip from forty or fifty meters high. The wind is loud, so the window washer doesn’t hear the lament of the water drops hitting the ground.

The glass reflects the window washer’s own image, just like a girl looking into his eyes. That’s the one thing he doesn’t want to remember, though it’s further and further away, that memory from Gravel Town.

The window washer came from Gravel Town, where there were dark gold rays of sun shining through brick tiles and broken walls. All around you, the air in the little alleys was filled with the smells of cooking, wafting with sincerity through the town and into every household.

Of course, the little alleys were formed of gravel blasted from the local mountains. The gravel was full of sharp edges and corners, so children couldn’t run through the alleys barefoot. But here even the cows wear shoes made of woven grass, much less the tender soles of children’s feet.

Traveling to or from Gravel Town isn’t easy. First a long ride, back and forth through countless tunnels, sleeping and waking, waking and sleeping, until finally waking in a daze, grinding your teeth as you enter and exit still more tunnels. At last the bus stops at a desolate stand beside the highway and leaves you off, and that’s when you finally realize what it means to be rid of Gravel Town.

If you looked carefully into the gloomy expression in the window washer’s eyes, you’d think that old Gravel Town is a curse that he’ll never be rid of. The window washer actually doesn’t believe that modern society has such things as curses, so he carried his fat wad of five kuai and one kuai bills and leapt onto the bus heading through those countless tunnels, escaping Gravel Town.

That’s how the window washer arrived in this city. The girl who came to the city with him ran off after two weeks. In Gravel Town, they had dated solidly for two years; he never imagined that after two short weeks in the city, what remained of their destiny was all used up.

It seems the hearts of these Gravel Town girls are also made of coarse, sharp gravel.

The window washer rubs his nose, a bit broken-hearted. His one lucky break in the midst of his misfortune is that he hasn’t any time to listen to any of those popular songs of turbulent love and hate tearing you to shreds, so he can avoid crying even more wasted tears.

He’s been washing this building for nine years. Although in the end a building isn’t a lover, still people in the end are emotional creatures, and over the course of these years he has washed this building with his emotions. Occasionally when the sky is darker and the glass doesn’t reflect light so strongly, he can see into the messy, unkempt hotel rooms and that always makes him furrow his brow. Clothes and towels hanging in each and every unexpected location, emptied cans and discarded food, beds that look like they’ve exploded. Those messy guests, at least they didn’t defecate on the carpet.

“It’s always these people who can’t keep the outside clean and bright, inside they’re a complete mess.” When he furrows his brow and thinks this way, it always makes others sympathize with him and furrow their brows along with him. However, sympathy is sympathy, but there’s never been a girl who sympathized so much with the window washer that she fell in love with him.

He hasn’t loved anyone else, these nine years.

You often hear people say, “Because of my work environment, it’s really hard to find someone.” They use this to explain why they’re single.

However, if the window washer doesn’t say this, then there’s no one in the world with the right to say this.

Rocking back and forth so many meters in the air, aside from the grimy water drops splashing his face and the roar of the late autumn wind, occasionally his fellow window washer, Old Liu, works along with him, but he’s not much of a companion; there are no regular guys around for him to talk to.

This is how the days dully, monotonously were disposed of, until that one day. His gaze pierced through the dark green glass, and he saw an unbelievable scene in the room. A girl sitting beside a strange man and watching television.

It was her! That unforgettable face, the girl who left without saying a word, that girl with the gravel heart.

The window washer didn’t stop his movements, even though innumerable words suddenly bubbled up in his heart. With extra strength he wiped the window clean, with new hysteria rinsed it with water, as if he wanted to make that gravel-hearted girl see a cleaner sky.

Water drops dripped down and attacked the earth, bursting, exploding, but no one could hear them; it was certainly the world’s most humble lament.