The chapter opens in the canteen at the guota snooker club, where the three young men are dining after their trip to the U.K. The young men, shatang, haiyan, and qiuning, are all members of the club, and they all eat in the same canteen. One of the young men tells the other two that his birthday is only a few days away, and that he will make a cake for the three of them in the kitchen of the house on January 19, the day of shatang's birthday. The other two boys are born in the winter, and their personalities are very different from each other's. One is dull, the other is "flamboyance," and the young man is "different from theirs, too." The young man asks the other boys to help him cut the strawberries for the birthday cake, and the two of them make a snowman out of the strawberries. He tells the boys that he is very good at snooker, and if he becomes a professional player in the future, he will be able to come to his hometown and give them a big party. He also tells them that he hopes his family will stay healthy so that he can become financially independent, and his dumb brother can fulfill his dream of becoming a pro player.