树洞贴

shù dòng tiē

Literally “tree-hole post. ” The Wong Kar Wai movie In the Mood for Love closes with the protagonist traveling to the remains of an ancient temple in Cambodia, finding a small hole among the ruins, and whispering into it. The scene is based on a (perhaps made-up) saying that in the past, people would find a small hole in a tree, hide a secret in it, and then seal the hole with mud, to be kept hidden forever. In online parlance, shù dòng tiē refers to a popular trend of posting secrets anonymously on the Internet-anything ranging from one’s salary to marital problems and beyond. People who do this are called 晒密族 shaìmì zú (shy me dzoo), literally “secret revealers, ” or 晒客族 shaìkè zú, literally “information exhibitionists. ”