My brother, a master’s graduate, is 30 years old, and has been back in China for two years.

He applied to over 400 jobs, and in the end he got into a small consulting firm, earning 15,000 yuan a month.
He hasn’t cried.
Until last month, the company sent him on a business trip to Dali.
With nothing to do at night, he drank with the guesthouse owner.
The owner didn’t finish middle school. In 2015, he spent 280,000 yuan to buy this courtyard; after tinkering and renovating it here and there, now in peak season he earns 30,000 yuan per month, and even in the off-season he can reliably bring in 20,000 yuan.
My brother’s hand holding the glass trembled slightly.
He asked the owner: “What do you do on a day-to-day basis?”
The owner said: “Drink tea, walk the dog, and help guests take photos. Every now and then I drive over to Cangshan to have a look around.”
The brother asked again: “How did you come up with the idea to buy the courtyard back then?”
The owner scratched his head: “At the time, I’d just gone through a breakup. I wanted to change where I lived. I happened to have a demolition compensation payment in hand, so I just bought it.”
“Bought it on a whim.”
That night, my brother couldn’t sleep.
He told me he had worked out the math: if he saved money by not eating or drinking until he was 40, he could just buy a toilet in Dali.
And that owner—didn’t graduate from middle school—turned his life into a thing that can’t be written into his resume, relying on one breakup and a demolition compensation payment.
I asked him what he was going to do now.
He said he didn’t know.
But he said something that I want you to remember:
“Seven years of schooling, and I lost to someone’s breakup in 2015.”
After I heard it, I also didn’t know what to say.
Later, I looked it up—
How many times has the courtyard in Dali from 2015 increased by now?
Forget it. I won’t check.