Chuntao was an anxious young girl, short and dumpy, who for money spent her mornings delivering leaflets advertising pizza to households in her part of Beijing. (For no money she spent her evenings playing the trombone.) It was a tedious and tiring job, and time would drag. One rainy day she reached the doorway of a house which perched at the top of an enormous stairway. Breathless and sweaty, she tripped on the doorstep and dropped her leaflets. As she bent down to gather them up, the door opened.
"Who are you and what do you want?" asked a man in trainers and flared jeans.
"I am giving out pizza leaflets," said Chuntao.
"Don't bother doing that here," the man said, before smirking and shutting the door.