The chapter opens with a description of the clothes and jewelry that the family has prepared for the New Year's Eve celebration. The narrator tells us that this is because the family believes that girls should have money so that they won't be deceived by "little favors of boys" . In other words, girls shouldn't have to work hard to get what they want. This is why the family always gives the girls expensive things. But the narrator doesn't think this is a good idea. He's a student, so he's not interested in looking at all of the stuff. He thinks that if he becomes famous, he'll be able to visit his father, but he'd rather die than see his father come back. He also thinks that the New Years Eve celebration is boring, since he and his mother only eat dumplings together. He wonders if he can have a reunion with his family, since the streets are full of happy people. His mother also asks him to go see her grandfather after practice, and he says he can't go too late. He tells his father that he would rather die if he could see his family again. But he also tells his mother that he can only think about it for so long, and that it's time to bring them back. This will never change, he says, because it has been so long since they've seen each other. He asks his mother why she came back all of a sudden, and she tells him that she was "trembling with anxiety" and that she's holding a picture of her grandson in her hand. The boy in the picture looks exactly like him when he was a kid, but not like him anymore. He says that the picture is just a normal picture, but that he has no idea who the boy is. He begs his mother to give him the picture, and