With Zhenzhen's words, all the melancholy of long-parted relatives and the excitement of mother and son reuniting after a long separation were stirred up by her. After wiping her eyes, Zhenzhen suddenly found that the room was a little quiet. She raised her head and saw that the adults in the family were looking at her in confusion.
Zhen Zhen shook her handkerchief and looked at Old Lady Li standing next to her who hadn't come to her senses yet. She quickly pushed her and said, "Grandma, you should hit my uncle right now and cry while calling me a cruel son..."
Li Muwen couldn't help but burst into laughter. He bent down and picked up Zhenzhen, who was standing beside his thighs and wearing a red cotton jacket and pigtails. He kissed her chubby little face and turned to ask Mrs. Li: "Mom, is this the girl from the Muwu family? She's not very old, but she's quite funny."
Zhenzhen wiped her face with a handkerchief and turned to ask Mrs. Li: "Grandma, is this my grandfather who has been gone for 20 years? He looks quite kind."
Old Mrs. Li wiped the tears from her face with her hands, smiled and gently patted Zhenzhen's butt: "This child loves to act up. Your uncle went to fight the Japanese devils and had no choice. He is different from your fourth uncle, that unfilial guy."
Zhenzhen smiled and put her arms around Li Muwen's neck: "I know, my uncle is an anti-Japanese hero, that's what grandma always said."
Old Mrs. Li laughed out loud, and took Li Muwen's arm to lead him into the house. "Look at me, I'm getting old and confused, and I'm crying just blocking the door. Muwen, please come in quickly, and let's sit on the kang and have a good chat. Muwu, ask your wife to cook a few more dishes for lunch, stew the fish, and kill the pig tomorrow."
Mu Wu responded, went out to talk to Wang Sufen, and quickly asked Mingnan and Mingbei to go to Li Musen's house to pass on a message. Li Muwen took off his military coat and hat and put them on the cabinet in the room. Old lady Li pulled him to sit cross-legged on the kang: "Tell me, how have you been these years?"
When Zhenzhen heard that they were about to start chatting, she immediately took out her small bowl filled with pine nuts and hazelnuts, and brought a large enamel bowl filled with various dried wild fruits. After putting everything on the kang, Zhenzhen took off her shoes and climbed up, sitting behind the two of them, and excitedly grabbed a handful of dried blueberries and stuffed them into her mouth.
It wasn't that she was gossiping, it was mainly because there was no TV to watch at that time, and there was no radio to listen to at home. Besides playing silly with her two silly brothers, she would chat quietly with Li Mingzhong all day long, which was really boring.
"In the early years, I followed the army to fight the Japanese invaders and went to many places..." Li Muwen told Mrs. Li the general idea, but he didn't even mention any injuries or sufferings. Mrs. Li knew that her son had fought for so many years and it was impossible for him not to have been injured. But she didn't ask if her son mentioned it, as long as he was safe and sound.
"Are you still in the army? Why did you come back suddenly this time? Without even informing your family in advance?" Old Mrs. Li held Li Muwen nervously, fearing that something had happened to him.
Li Muwen patted the back of Mrs. Li's hand soothingly. "I took on a mission in the second half of this year and have been in Beijing ever since. In the winter, I carried out a mission in the Ice City Army. After the mission was completed, I reported to my superiors, saying that I hadn't been home for more than 20 years and wanted to apply to go home for a visit. Now that my superiors have granted me three months of home leave, I will come back to see you as soon as possible."
"Three months, that's great." Old Mrs. Li smiled and said, "You can sleep with me tonight, and we can have a good chat."
Li Muwen nodded repeatedly: "Okay."
"Brother!" As the mother and son were talking, Li Musen's voice came from outside. He opened the door with a bang and rushed in. Looking at Li Muwen sitting on the kang, he was a little afraid to recognize him: "Is it my eldest brother?"
"Musen." Li Muwen was happy and waved at him: "Let me take a look. Wow, twenty years have passed in a flash. I remember that when I left home, Musen was only fourteen years old. Now he has become so old. Time is unforgiving."
"Not really. My eldest son is already fourteen." Li Musen came over with a smile. Old Lady Li and Li Muwen moved inward, leaving half of the kang empty. Old Lady Li picked up a fly swatter and knocked on the kang: "Third son, come and sit down. And Muwu, why are you standing at the door like a wooden stake? Can't you come over and talk to your brother?" Li Muwu smiled naively and came over to sit on the kang.
Li Muwen looked at Muwu with eyes full of affection: "Muwu is still the same as when he was little, he hasn't changed much, he is honest and simple." He looked around: "Mulin didn't come? I just heard mother say that he was not filial in these years, and he made mother angry?"
"Don't mention it. When our grain store was recruiting workers to carry sacks, our Mu Wu and Mu Sen were both selected. Mu Lin was still young and didn't look strong at that time, so they didn't want him. He ran away to Bingcheng out of spite for ten years. He came back with his wife during the Chinese New Year two years ago. I was so angry that I beat him with my pipe."
"Ice City is not too far away. Why haven't you come back for ten years? Are you angry with your family?" Li Muwen's eyes flashed with a fierce look and his tone was a little unfriendly.
"Who is angry with him? He married a wife who has some little tricks and doesn't want to let him come back. He is also careless. I don't hesitate to say that to him." Old Mrs. Li rolled her eyes: "I have scolded him several times in two consecutive years, and he now knows he is wrong. There is nothing wrong with his wife. She is just smart and self-righteous, but actually very stupid." Li Muwen didn't ask any more questions after hearing this. He planned to talk to him in detail after Li Mulin came back at the end of the year.
After talking for a while, Li Muwen remembered the big bag he had brought back. He got off the kang and carried the bag to the kang. After opening it, he took out the things one by one: "I expected to come back this time, so I bought a lot of things when I was in Beijing. Mom, this is the radio for you, produced by Shanghai People's Broadcasting Equipment Factory."
"Oh, it's a radio made in Shanghai." Old Lady Li quickly wiped the sweat from her palms on her clothes, then carefully took the radio and put it on the kang: "This thing is very expensive, it must require a lot of industrial tickets. It seems that not many families in Beicha have this thing."
Li Muwen turned the buttons while explaining to Mrs. Li how to use the radio. After turning them twice, he finally tuned in a channel that was playing the storytelling "Lin Hai Xue Yuan". Mrs. Li was fascinated after just a few words. She couldn't let go of the radio and said, "This thing is really great. I've heard of it before, but this is the first time I've seen it."
"Mom, when you have nothing to do in the future, just sit on the kang and listen to the radio. There are songs and storytelling on it. The Journey to the West that my father told me when I was a child and the Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio that you told me are all here."
"Okay, okay, I will have fun in the future! When the relatives come to visit during the Chinese New Year, I will open their eyes." Old Mrs. Li hurriedly got off the kang, took a rag and wiped the cabinet, and carefully placed the radio upright on it.
After putting away the radio, Old Lady Li sat back on the kang. Li Muwen took out a gray checkered spring-autumn two-purpose shirt and a pair of dark blue pants from his bag: "These are the clothes I bought for mother."
Old Lady Li quickly took the clothes and put them on her body to show her how old I am. "Isn't it a waste of money? Mu Wen, do you think this dress looks good on me?"
"It looks good. Mom looks ten years younger when she wears it." Li Muwen praised it again and again: "I saw that all the women on the streets of Beijing wear this style, so I quickly went to buy one for Mom."
Old Mrs. Li was satisfied. She folded them up and put them aside with a smile: "Okay, I haven't bought any ready-made clothes yet. I used to buy cloth to make them, and that cost a lot of money and cloth coupons."
Li Muwen took out three bottles of Moutai from his bag and said, "One bottle for each of Muwu and the other two."
Old Lady Li looked at the words on it and didn't recognize them: "What kind of wine is this?"
"Moutai." Li Muwen said, "I bought this last year. I brought it from home when I left. It was only 2.97 yuan when I bought it. In April this year, the government launched a high-price policy, and a bottle is now sold for 16 yuan."
After hearing this, Mrs. Li hurriedly pushed it back: "Take it back quickly, take it back. How can you bear to drink such expensive wine? Just keep it for yourself."
"I brought it specially for them." Li Muwen said, "I've been carrying it on my back for half a year. When I was in the army, those guys were so noisy, but I didn't take it out. I haven't been home for so many years, and this is also a token of my gratitude as a brother."
Old Lady Li heard this and stopped talking. Li Muwen then took out a neatly folded blue woolen coat with white stripes from the bedside: "This is for Zhenzhen. She is the first girl in our family, so she must be dressed up nicely." Zhenzhen, who was sitting on the side watching the fun, didn't expect that there were clothes for her. She threw down the bowl, got off the kang and ran out.
Li Muwen was startled and looked at the door in confusion: "Why did this child run away?"
Old Mrs. Li stroked her clothes and replied without even looking up, "I'm going to wash my hands."
Sure enough, within a minute, Zhenzhen came in with her hands and face washed. She wiped them several times with a towel to make sure there was no dirt on her hands and body. Then she climbed onto the kang and took her woolen coat. She touched the texture and found it was made of pure woolen woolen material, with a circle of rabbit fur on the collar, double-breasted buttons on the front, and a blue bow at the back. The style would never go out of style even after generations.
Zhen Zhen hurriedly put it on, looked down at the clothes at her ankles and felt a little disappointed: "It's too big."
"Not too big!" Old Lady Li said quickly, "It has to be this long so you can still wear it when you are six or seven years old. Such a nice dress needs to be worn for a few more years."
Zhenzhen wondered when she would buy such nice clothes next time, and nodded in agreement: "Grandma is right, please put it away for me. When I go out to visit friends in the spring, I must wear it to show off."
Old Mrs. Li kissed Zhenzhen on the face with satisfaction: "That's it, my granddaughter is so well behaved." Li Muwen, who was already familiar with his mother's temper and personality, looked at the two of them and laughed. No wonder the old lady loved Zhenzhen so much, as they had the same temper.
In addition to the clothes he brought for Zhenzhen, he brought pens for his nephews. He also bought some cloth, as well as the military water bottles, lunch boxes and other things he had received in the army, all of which were unused, and he took them out as gifts.
Clothes and pens can be bought with money, but the things used in the army are hard to buy. If someone can carry a military water bottle, it will be very impressive. When Zhenzhen went up the mountain, she used the one that Li Muwen sent back before. It has been used for more than ten years. This time she got a new one. Mrs. Li said happily: "The new one is for Zhenzhen. She is very careful with things and never breaks anything. The old one is for Mingbei. He is a monkey all day long. He doesn't mind even if the paint is knocked off the old one."
Mingbei didn't mind that the kettle was old. Having such a thing was already quite good. He grinned and went to the cabinet to take down Zhenzhen's old kettle and immediately put it across his shoulder, looking very proud.
Zhenzhen watched Mingbei act cute while eating dried fruits and laughing non-stop. Old Lady Li saw this and introduced Li Muwen, "This cute little girl of ours is here to join in the fun. Last year, your second brother's eldest son Mingdong started dating someone. She was just over a year old at the time and couldn't even walk steadily, but she followed him around all day and listened to what he said, which annoyed Mingdong so much that he came to me to complain every day."
Zhenzhen stuffed another dried blueberry into her mouth, looking innocent and pretending not to remember.
Mrs. Li knew Zhenzhen was playing dumb right away. She smiled and hugged her and said, "If anyone comes to visit, that girl will run faster than me. Before I even get on the bed, she'll have her food and take up a good spot. Mingdong said that she looked like the people in the city watching a movie, eating and watching at the same time, and occasionally interrupting."
As the eldest child, Li Muwen knew that his mother wanted to have a daughter, but her father never fulfilled her wish. Now that he had a granddaughter, he would spoil her as much as possible. He wrote a letter every year, and half of the letter was about Zhenzhen.
After talking for a long time, the food was ready. There were about ten crucian carps at home, which were originally kept for Guihua to produce milk, but now they were no longer needed, so they were killed and stewed with sauce. When Liu Xiulan came, she brought the big rooster that had just been killed at home, and also brought the pork she bought this month.
After chatting for an hour, sisters-in-law Wang Sufen and Liu Xiulan also prepared the meal, including braised crucian carp with soybean sauce, stewed chicken with mushrooms, braised pork with potatoes, stewed sauerkraut with vermicelli, stir-fried cabbage with black fungus, and a pot of rice.
There were many people and many dishes, so Wang Sufen and Liu Xiulan set up the large round table they had just used, put the dishes on it, and brought out the jar of sorghum wine that they had made with ginseng.
The family sat down around the big round table. Lian Zhenzhen also sat obediently in Wang Sufen's arms. Old Mrs. Li raised her small wine cup and looked at her eldest son sitting next to her. Her eyes were red with joy again. "Mu Wen is back. This is the biggest happy event in our family in recent years. Mother won't say anything. Let's have one first."
Li Muwen sighed, raised his cup and drank it all in one gulp: "The wine here is still the best and strong. Mom, you don't know that I am in the south. Drinking that wine is like drinking water. It always feels tasteless."
Old Mrs. Li put a piece of chicken in her son's bowl and said, "This is all puree at home, about 60 degrees. You may not be able to get used to it when you go out."
After eating the chicken in the bowl, Li Muwen took a chopstick of the pickled cabbage and vermicelli stew that he had been dreaming about for years. As he ate, he burst into tears. Mrs. Li asked quickly, "What's wrong, son? Is it because it doesn't taste like what you cook?"
"No, mother!" Li Muwen swallowed the food in his mouth and wiped his face. "As soon as I tasted the pickled cabbage, I knew it was pickled by mother. It reminded me of my childhood. At that time, our family was in a hard time. In the winter, mother pickled a jar of pickled cabbage, which was our winter vegetable. One year, there was no rice at home, and father and mother went out to find a way. I was so hungry at home that I took a pickled cabbage from the jar and ate half of it while chewing and swallowing."
Thinking of the past, Mrs. Li also sighed: "The past days were indeed hard. If you hadn't driven away the Japanese devils, we wouldn't have such a good life now."
"Fortunately, life is better now. We can buy food rations every month. We have also reclaimed land at home, so we don't have to go hungry anymore." Old Lady Li took a piece of braised pork and put it in Li Muwen's bowl: "Are you full in the army? Can you have meals?"
"Yes, we eat well, don't worry, mom." Li Muwen ate all the dishes in the bowl, and saw Zhenzhen holding a bowl of rice with braised pork sauce on it. She took a bite of rice and meat and even took a bite of the chicken leg in her hand. He couldn't help laughing: "This girl is not very old, but she can eat a lot. Hey, mom, do we have rice to eat?"
"Aren't those the seeds that you, brother, asked someone to send back? Highland rice or something?" Li Musen picked up a piece of sauerkraut with chopsticks and shoveled it into half a bowl of rice.
Old Lady Li stepped on her eldest son's foot under the table, and Li Muwen immediately laughed and said, "Yes, but I didn't expect that we could really grow it at home."
"It can be grown, but it grows better in the mountains. My land is by the river and the crops don't grow as well as in the mountains." Li Musen took another bite of rice: "Rice is delicious and fragrant, but it doesn't produce as much as sorghum, and it's not as good for hunger. I think it's okay to grow some to try, but sorghum is more reliable as a serious food."
Old Lady Li glared at him and said, "You're the only one who talks too much. I think this rice is good. I'm old and I like to eat something soft. My daughter Zhenzhen can't eat sorghum rice either. She only likes this rice and flour."
"Yes, yes, mother is right." Li Musen quickly coaxed his mother: "I didn't say anything. Come on, brother finally came back, let's do another one."
Zhenzhen was so busy eating that she didn't even have time to listen to gossip. The chickens and pigs at that time were all raised according to traditional methods, and when they were stewed in a large iron pot, they were so delicious. In her previous life, even if she had spent money to buy organic pork, it would not be as delicious as this.
After eating half a chicken leg, a few pieces of braised pork and a small bowl of rice, her stomach was finally full. She pushed the leftovers in front of Mingbei and burped, "Mom, I'm full."
Touching Zhenzhen's bulging belly, Wang Sufen smiled and said, "You eat all day long."
“Being able to eat is a blessing... burp... gas... well... burp..." After burping several times in a row, Zhenzhen covered her mouth and stopped talking. It was no wonder that she was greedy. Although the family had harvested a lot of rice, they couldn't eat it every day, let alone go with hard dishes like stewed chicken with mushrooms and braised pork.
After dinner, Mrs. Li and her family talked in the west room. Zhenzhen resisted the sleepiness firmly and refused to take a nap. Wang Sufen had no choice but to pick her up and coax her, saying, "Be good, wait until you have a nap and ask your dad to kill a pig tomorrow."
"Killing a pig?" Zhen Zhen's eyes widened: "Our braised pork?"
"Yes." Wang Sufen put Zhenzhen on the kang, wiped the kang mat and spread the mattress, took off Zhenzhen's cotton jacket and trousers and let her lie in the bed: "Go to bed quickly, and when you wake up, ask your grandma to play the radio for you to listen to."
Zhenzhen had never encountered anything to worry about since she was born. Although the harvest was bad at the beginning, her special ability still kept the whole family from going hungry. So Zhenzhen ate and played all the time except when she went out to explore as usual during her sleep time. She was a good example of what it meant to be carefree. However, life without culture and entertainment was still too boring.
After glancing at the radio on the cabinet, Zhenzhen closed her eyes and decided to go take a look at the braised pork that was about to be slaughtered.
In fact, ever since Zhenzhen went to plow the soil with Old Lady Li in the early spring, Zhenzhen began her life of treasure hunting in the mountains. At home, she talked more with Li Mingzhong. As the braised pork grew fatter and fatter, the smell in the pigpen became more and more unpleasant. Zhenzhen hadn't been to the backyard for several months.
Her consciousness left her body and floated to the pigpen. Zhenzhen looked at the thick fat on the braised pork and sighed: "Braised pork! You are really fat!"
“Hmph…” Hong Shao Rou snorted twice and continued to dig the soil on the ground with his head down, looking indifferent.
The author has something to say: I have updated and am getting ready to go out. I looked at the comments for the previous chapter and there are already more than 500 of them. I covered my face and smiled. I will try my best to give more red envelopes to everyone.
My husband and I are going to drive back to my mother-in-law's house tomorrow. It's a relatively remote place and it will take most of the day to drive. I will try my best to find a signal and update you in the evening. Muah~~~