Buttressed between two milestone events within their personal sphere, the lives of the Jians – husband and wife N.J. and Min-Min, teenage daughter Ting-Ting, and eight year old son Yang-Yang – and to a lesser extent that of their broader grouping of extended family and friends, are presented. The Jians live in an upscale apartment complex in Taipei along with Min-Min’s mother, who has fallen into a coma, each family member who takes turns by her bedside to relay life’s goings-on to her regardless of if she can hear them. While Min-Min has troubles with this on-going task, the other three use her as an unofficial sounding board for their issues, primarily in the realm of finding their place in current life and their role in her predicament. Yang-Yang still has a child’s simple perspective of the world, such as the reason he has a penchant for taking photographs of the back of people’s heads, that naiveté exactly the reason he is the target of bullying especially among a group of older girls, and by one of his teachers. Ting-Ting is acting as the unofficial intermediary in the complicated relationship between her best friend and next door neighbor Lili, and her boyfriend Fatty. It is made all the more difficult as Ting-Ting has feelings for Fatty herself. And N.J., a computer electronics engineer, is seen as the honest one among him and his partners, which is why he is chosen to deal with Japanese Mr. Ota in assessing if it worth the expensive but potentially lucrative risk of going into business with him. Concurrently, N.J., who uses Mr. Ota as a confidante of sorts in their emerging friendship, reunites and becomes reacquainted with childhood friend Sherry, married and now living in Chicago, she who could have been the one in his life if he ended up keeping their appointment thirty years ago. Min-Min’s younger brother A-Di may face that same conundrum thirty years down the road as he just married Xiao-Yan partly for a very specific reason, while his old girlfriend Yunyun fumes on the sidelines.
参考翻译：
在他们个人领域的两个里程碑事件之间，展示了简一家的生活——夫妻N.J.和敏敏敏、十几岁的女儿婷和八岁的儿子杨洋——以及他们更广泛的大家庭和朋友群体的生活。简家和陷入昏迷的敏敏的母亲一起住在台北的一栋高档公寓楼里，每个家庭成员轮流在她的床边向她讲述生活的经过，不管她是否能听到。虽然敏敏在这项持续的任务中遇到了麻烦，但其他三人将她作为他们问题的非正式发声板，主要是在寻找他们在当前生活中的位置以及他们在她的困境中的角色的领域。杨洋仍然有一个孩子对世界的简单看法，比如他喜欢拍别人后脑勺的照片，天真，这正是他成为欺凌目标的原因，尤其是在一群年龄较大的女孩中，以及他的一位老师。婷婷在她最好的朋友、隔壁邻居莉莉和她的男友胖子之间的复杂关系中扮演着非官方中介角色。由于婷婷对胖子本人有感情，这让事情变得更加困难。而身为计算机电子工程师的N.J.在他和他的合作伙伴中被视为诚实的人，这就是为什么他被选中与日本的大田先生打交道，评估与他开展业务是否值得付出昂贵但可能有利可图的风险。与此同时，新泽西州将大田先生视为他们正在形成的友谊中的某种知己，与儿时的朋友雪莉重聚并重新认识，雪莉已婚，现在住在芝加哥，如果他30年前结束了与他们的约会，她本可以成为他生命中的那个人。30年后，闵敏的弟弟阿迪可能会面临同样的难题，因为他刚刚与小燕结婚，部分原因非常明确，而他的老女友云云则在一旁怒气冲冲。
重点词汇释义
husband and wife夫妇
extended family大家庭
apartment complex公寓大楼
along with随着; 除某物以外; 随同…一起，跟…一起
family member家属；家庭成员
regardless of不管; 不顾; 不理会
sounding board决策咨询人
