My grandma raised chickens, always about ten, in a corner of the backyard. The chicken place was simply formed by curtains around it. She fed them with vegetable leaf waste. I watched her feeding and sometimes mimicked her, throwing the leaf through a small hole in the curtains. Chicken moved slowly, but suddenly pulled down their head quickly to attack the leaf.

Sometimes naughty chickens would fly up to the branch of the tree beside them. Grandma would become angry and shout at them, asking them to come back to their place. My grandpa’s yellow dog was sometimes tied in the backyard near the chicken place. It seemed to be hostile to the chicken, barking.

Around the backyard, there’s a sparse circle of flowers. Some abandoned woods and an abandoned bike. A wall basketball hoop on the other side. My cousins would shoot a basket when they came to visit my grandparents. I was running pointlessly in the backyard while my grandma was doing chores, and as if the sunshine was also playing in the backyard, so bright to be white.

Then the backyard was replaced by a fourth-floor building. With the back door closed, it turned dark, black, and so did my memory. Except for the yellow dogs then tied in the front yard, everything disappeared.