Preface: Two Drowning Souls
Under the blinding noon sun of Phnom Penh, I scrolled past a video. The man on the screen was calmly sharing his journey of self-teaching English. He said something that sent a shiver through me: “In the beginning, he knew me, but I didn’t know him.”
Those words were like a signal from the deep, piercing through the linguistic barrier I’ve lived in for three years in Cambodia. He was talking about the freedom of having “reached the shore,” while I was staring at the curled, cryptic Khmer scripts on the roadside, feeling a long, breathless sensation of drowning.
Part1. Recognition: The “Old Friend” Who Knew Me for Three Years
On Highway 6, there is a melody that has accompanied me for three years. It clearly knew me. It had seen my exhaustion, heard my sighs, and was familiar with every moment of my disorientation in this “Red Dust(红尘）.”
Facing the string of Khmer characters មួយលានហេតុផល, I felt like an amnesiac staring at a savior whose name I could not utter.
/The melody that haunted my subconscious for three years.
Part2.Regret: The Brutality of Tabs vs. The Soul of the Staff
This awkwardness of “not knowing” reminded me of a memory buried in the dust of time. Years ago, I tried to climb the mountain named Kotaro Oshio. I stared at the fingerstyle Tabs for Canon. I practiced with brute force; I could make sounds, but I couldn’t find the soul.
Because I couldn’t read the Staff. The Staff is an abstract order, the spiritual coordinates of every note on the fingerboard. If you don’t understand the staff, you are just banging on wood. My current relationship with English and Khmer is exactly like my relationship with those complex tabs—I can mimic sounds, but I cannot see the order. I am still drowning, splashing uselessly on the surface with mechanical memory.
/The “order” I could never fully decode.
Part3.Archaeology: Decoding is for Breathing, Not Conquering
To end this absurd state of “He knows me, but I don’t know him,” I began a clumsy “deep-sea archaeology.” I took screenshots, cropped images, and used OCR. I wasn’t doing this to learn the song; I just wanted to carve a small hole in this “unknowable” world so I could breathe.
When the translation popped up: “One Million Reasons” (一百万个理由), it felt like finally finding the absolute position of a note on a chaotic fingerboard. This act of decoding is a declaration of sovereignty over a mediocre life.
Part4. Epilogue: Keep Your Eyes Open Before Being Submerged
This leap of logic—from Khmer scripts to Kotaro Oshio—is an unconscious citation. I admit, I haven’t reached the shore. I am still struggling in that “speechless” state, still gasping for air in a sea of foreign characters.
But I refuse to close my eyes. Finding the name of this song is like lighting a dim lamp on a dark fingerboard. It won’t play a perfect Canon, but it’s enough for me to see my own coordinates. Before being completely formatted by the dust, I choose to be a sober observer—opening my eyes in this eternal drowning.
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Written by Route6_Rider on Highway 6, Cambodia. These jumping thoughts are unique moments of life that cannot be replicated.