Mingbei stayed at the educated youth camp for 20 days. Seeing that the Chinese New Year was still more than half a month away, the educated youth camp gave them more than a month off and asked them to return to the educated youth camp on the 20th day of the first lunar month. Mingbei packed his things, carried his bedding and other things and headed home. Some educated youth families had already inquired about the day of the holiday and came to pick them up early in the morning on bicycles.
Mingbei knew that his family was busy at this time, so he didn't send the letter home, and walked forward with his head down. After walking three miles, he suddenly heard a "ding-ling-ling" bicycle bell. Mingbei thought he was blocking the road, so he moved aside without even raising his head and continued walking forward.
Suddenly, a familiar voice rang in my ears: "Mingbei, why are you walking around like that? Don't you know how to look at people?"
Mingbei suddenly looked up and saw Mingdong, who was pushing a bicycle and smiling beside him. His eyes immediately turned red. He threw the quilt on the snow, rushed over and hugged Mingdong tightly.
Mingdong helplessly patted his little brother who was taller than him, and said in a somewhat amusing tone: "Why are you crying? Are you feeling wronged because no one at home is picking you up?"
"No." Mingbei wiped his tears and smiled at Mingdong, revealing his big white teeth: "It's been too long since I saw big brother excited. I miss you so much."
"Oh my, you're getting cheesy after not seeing each other for a while." Mingdong laughed, "Okay, let's talk when we get home. Hurry up and pick up the bedding, it will get damp soon."
Mingbei groaned, and hurriedly put the bedding on his back, while Mingdong hung the other things on the handlebars. Because there were too many miscellaneous things, Mingdong was afraid that Mingbei would fall when getting on the bike, so he sat on first and waited for Mingbei to sit firmly before riding the bike home.
It was a windy winter day with a little snow. The two covered their faces tightly with scarves and didn't say a word on the way home. When they got home, Mingbei put his bedding on the kang in the west room to warm it. Guihua saw that there was a lot of snow on it and hurriedly called him: "Don't warm it by the fire yet, I'll take it apart and wash it for you later."
Mingbei grinned and said, "It's okay. It's only been built for about 20 days. It's not dirty."
"Forget it. There are so many of you sharing one kang. It will stink even if you smoke it. Okay, go talk to your brother. Just leave the quilt there and don't worry about it." Guihua picked up the quilt and put it at the end of the kang, preparing to wash it after lunch.
This was Mingbei's first time home after going to the youth center. Wang Sufen remembered what Mrs. Li said and was afraid that she would feel uncomfortable listening to Mingbei's hard work, so she simply cooked in the kitchen without asking any questions. Mrs. Li, Mingdong, Mingbei, and Zhenzhen sat on the kang in the east room and talked about what happened in the youth center.
Mingbei scratched his head. "It's not much work, just chopping trees and carrying wood all day long. It's different from the firewood we used to carry back home. The thickness and length of the wood we carry are regulated. And the snowy road down the mountain is hard to walk on. At first I could only carry one wood at a time. I couldn't complete the task for several days in a row, so I carried two at a time. Although I couldn't stand it at the beginning and my arms hurt for several days, I've almost adapted to it in the past few days."
Mingdong frowned slightly: "Do we still have to carry it on our shoulders? Why not make a raft and drag it down?"
Zhenzhen added, "You can just use a hemp rope to tie the wood together and pull it down."
Mingbei was stunned for a moment: "At that time, they told us to carry it, but there was no hemp rope. Besides, the road down the mountain is winding, and this kind of wood must be two or three meters long, which is not easy to pull."
Mingdong looked at him, not knowing whether to laugh or cry: "Then you can just carry it down the mountain to flat ground and pull it. It will be much easier with such thick snow. When the weather warms up and the snow melts, you won't be able to pull it even if you want to."
Mingbei suddenly realized and laughed foolishly: "Brother is really smart, why didn't I think of it." He looked at Zhenzhen who was laughing so hard that she fell backwards, and quickly added: "It's not just me. None of us young people thought of it. I didn't go home during the last holiday, and those who went home brought back sesame cakes, meat sauce, pickles, etc., but no one brought hemp rope."
Mingdong nodded: "Yeah, they are all the same as you, just more cunning."
Old Lady Li took a cleaned sand apple from the basin and gnawed it bit by bit. Seeing Mingbei talking about bringing food there, she decided to shut him up first: "Mingbei, your mother and I have discussed that when you go back to the youth center, we will bring you some pickled cabbage and soybean paste. As for sesame seed cakes and steamed buns, if you want to take them, you can go to the grain store to buy them. You can earn money now, and you can't always count on the old man to support you. In the future, we will take care of your meals at home, and we won't worry about you outside. This is not only for you, but also for your three brothers."
Mingdong opened his mouth and wanted to say that it was different. After all, there was a huge gap between the work points of the youth center and the wages they earned. However, when he saw the serious expression on Old Lady Li's face, he knew that there was something he didn't know, so he shut his mouth and said nothing.
Mingbei pondered it for a while, and it was true. Besides his three brothers, everyone else paid money home. Mingbei silently calculated the money he earned in a month, and found sadly that there was really nothing left after eating. He even owed money for the meal at the educated youth center because he spent three yuan to buy a fountain pen.
Mingbei lowered his head in shame: "I'm not asking my family for money, it's just..." His face flushed: "It's just that our work points are low, maybe I can't pay money back home now."
When Mrs. Li saw that Mingbei had this idea, she breathed a sigh of relief: "Then I'll give you a break for a few years, but let's make it clear that if you get married and live a good life in the future, you have to give your parents some money for their retirement. As for your lives, the poor have their own way of living and the well-off have their own way of living, and we won't subsidize you."
Speaking of marriage, Mingbei was not as excited as he was before he went to the youth center. He was silent for a while and smiled at Old Lady Li: "I don't know when I can get married."
After hearing what she said, Mrs. Li knew that the girl didn't like Mingbei and she didn't know whether the relationship would work out in the future. So she comforted her by saying, "You are still young now. There is no good in getting married too early. It's not too late to get married when you have the ability to support the family."
Mingbei nodded. Seeing this, Mingdong smiled and said, "I am the one who got the upper hand. When I got married, Guihua and Roubao were taken care of by my family."
Old Lady Li laughed when she heard this: "It's different. Guihua grew up in our family, just like our own children. It doesn't matter whether you get married or not."
"Why does it make no difference? If we don't get married, we can still have meat buns and bean buns." Mingdong said with a cheeky smile.
Mrs. Li burst into laughter: "It's not enough to just have meat buns and bean buns. You two should try harder to give me a great-granddaughter. Then I'll call her Sugar Buns."
Zhenzhen immediately gave a thumbs up and nodded in agreement: "This is a good name. It sounds delicious."
Mingdong couldn't help but burst out laughing and said, "So the reason why my meat buns and bean buns are named like this is because they are delicious."
"It has a good meaning." Zhen Zhen tried to defend herself: "Look at my two nephews, they are white and chubby like buns, so cute."
Mingdong nodded, and just as he was about to speak, he heard Wang Sufen outside saying that Mingnan had brought Meng Xiaoxi over. It was Meng Xiaoxi's first time meeting Guihua, so she was a little reserved. She blushed and called her sister-in-law, looking a little embarrassed.
"This is Xiaoxi, right?" Guihua smiled and held her hand: "You are really pretty. I have been listening to Mingnan talking about you these past two days." Meng Xiaoxi looked back at Mingnan, her expression full of happiness and joy: "I often hear Mingnan talk about my elder brother and his wife."
Wang Sufen was also happy that her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law were getting along well, so she quickly said, "Guihua, accompany Xiaoxi into the house to talk. I'll be done soon, so you don't need to help here."
Seeing that Xiaoxi was shy, Guihua pulled her into the house to sit on the kang and talk, telling her about Mingnan's childhood.
Because Xiaoxi came, the Li family didn't eat on the kang, but set up a big round table. Mingbei had been eating bland kelp soup for twenty days, and his mouth was full of earthy smell. He stared at the pork belly stewed with sauerkraut, potatoes stewed with dried beans, braised crucian carp with sauce, and venison stewed with carrots on the table. He grabbed a pancake and took a bite, then stuffed a piece of venison into his mouth, tears almost falling: "Our food is still delicious."
Meng Xiaoxi couldn't help but smile as she watched Mingbei wolfing down his food. "All those who have come back from the youth center recently are like this. The second brother from the family next door to my house stayed in the youth center for ten days last time. When he came home, his appetite doubled. He said that he wanted to take a bite of pickled vegetables when he saw them."
Mingbei stuffed meat into his mouth while nodding his head in agreement: "The dishes made by the youth restaurant are not only oily but also watery and tasteless. And the big pancakes have more sweet potato flour than corn flour. You have to drink water to swallow a bite, but it can still keep you full."
Old Mrs. Li smiled and said, "You don't remember. This is what we ate when you were a kid. There wasn't much land back then, so we basically planted cabbage and potatoes. We only had one acre of soybeans, and we had to keep the soybeans to make tofu after harvesting them, so we couldn't exchange them for much oil. We usually bought oil according to the supply, and we also hoped to buy some fat pork to make oil. But even so, we only put a little in every dish, and we didn't dare to put so much oil as we do now."
Wang Sufen nodded as she recalled the past days. "Although we had plain soup back then, at least we were full. The natural disasters were really hard. We couldn't even buy coarse grains, let alone oil. We had to pick wild vegetables and add some sweet potato flour every day for our meals. Mingbei even said at that time that his face turned green from eating so much."
Mingbei didn't have a deep impression of that time. He seemed to vaguely remember that he was hungry for a while, but later he was able to catch a lot of fish, and occasionally caught wild rabbits and pheasants. After that, it seemed that eating white flour and white rice was not uncommon. Mingbei just thought that the family had reclaimed more and more wasteland, and immediately said with expectation: "Next spring, our youth center will also reclaim wasteland and plant crops. When the grain is harvested in autumn, I guess we will be able to eat good food next autumn and winter."
Mingdong looked at him with pity: "Do you think you will plant rice, wheat and the like when you open up wasteland? You are here to receive re-education from the poor and lower-middle peasants, not to enjoy a good life. By then, you will still grow corn and sweet potatoes, which have a high yield and can help you stay healthy. As for fine grains, I guess you will have to rely on supplies, right?"
Mingbei was full of complaints when talking about this: "We get steamed buns twice a month, and they cost five cents each, which is enough for four big buns, but I couldn't bear to buy them."
"Don't you have enough work points to spend?" Mingdong asked, "Should be enough to have enough food?"
Mingbei thought of the three dollars he had spent in vain, and suddenly felt bitter. Damn, sixty steamed buns were gone just like that. Am I stupid
Seeing Mingbei stuffing the pancake into his mouth with an expression of grief and indignation, Mingnan couldn't help but frown: "Eat slowly, no one is trying to snatch it from you. This is not a steamed bun, do you need to eat it so quickly?"
Mingbei swallowed the pancake with a sad face: "Luckily it's a pancake, if it was a steamed bun I definitely wouldn't eat it."
"Why?" The family looked at him curiously. Mingbei rubbed his face and lowered his head in frustration: "No reason, I just want to teach myself a lesson."
Seeing that Mingbei, who was always simple-minded, also had his own little secret, everyone smiled and changed the subject. After dinner, Mingbei took the wooden box containing the fountain pen to Old Lady Li's room to admit his mistake: "Grandma, I bought back the fountain pen my brother gave me. I used the work points I earned by helping the youth team build a house."
Mrs. Li didn't even raise her eyelids: "Oh, how many steamed buns did you spend?"
Mingbei felt a sharp pain in his heart, and he replied dejectedly, "It's not buns, it's money."
"Oh." Mrs. Li's eyelids twitched: "How many steamed buns can I get in exchange?"
Mingbei glanced at Old Lady Li guiltily, then quickly lowered his head and whispered, "Sixty...sixty..."
Old Lady Li's hand subconsciously touched the pipe, and Mingbei immediately lowered his head. However, after waiting for a long time and seeing that Old Lady Li didn't hit him, he carefully raised his head and secretly looked at Old Lady Li.
Old Mrs. Li didn't look happy. She didn't smoke Mingbei with her pipe, but filled it with tobacco and started smoking: "Mingbei, you're grown up now, so you should be more careful with your words and actions in the future. We won't talk about how much you spent this time, but it's not bad to know that you bought the pen with the money you earned from working. Otherwise, what will you say when your brother comes back this time and sees you using an old pen he's never seen before?"
Mingbei blushed with shame, his lips moved slightly, and he looked at Old Lady Li with a pleading face: "Grandma, now I have bought the pen back, the one my brother gave me. Please talk to my mom and my third brother about this, and don't tell my eldest brother about this. I don't want him to be disappointed."
Old Lady Li nodded slowly. "Not bad, you finally understand some human affairs. By the way, I heard from Xiaoxi that your work points are paid at the end of the month. Is the money left enough for food?"
Mingbei shook his head: "I'll owe the young man some money first, and I'll pay it back when I get paid."
Old Mrs. Li looked at him with a sneer: "Then borrow it again next month?"
Mingbei lowered his head again. "Actually, I don't owe much. I earned three dollars from building a house last time, except for buying a pen. Many people owe a month's worth of food. When I am on break, I can come back less often and make up the difference."
Mrs. Li then realized that Mingbei was carrying wood to earn money for food when he didn't go home last time. She was immediately relieved: "You are thoughtful. When you go back after the New Year, I will ask your mother to pack some more pickled cabbage for you. You can come back home when you have made up the money. Do you understand?"
Seeing that Old Lady Li didn't hit him and even said she would bring him some pickled cabbage, Mingbei nodded happily and went to talk to Wang Sufen about it. Old Lady Li couldn't help but shook her head and said, "This child is still a little stupid. He's too easy to appease."
Meng Xiaoxi stayed at Old Li's house until 2pm when she was ready to go home. Old Mrs. Li called her and Guihua into the house, opened the box and took out two identical pieces of woolen cloth: "This is the cloth that my family asked someone to buy from another place. I'll give you one piece each to make clothes for the New Year."
When Meng Xiaoxi saw such valuable material, she quickly waved her hands and said, "Grandma, I can't take this. If I take it home, my mother will definitely scold me."
Old Mrs. Li smiled and patted her hands: "You will be our daughter-in-law sooner or later. What's the harm if grandma gives you a piece of clothing material?" Meng Xiaoxi blushed and lowered her head, revealing her white neck.
Old Mrs. Li smiled, looking at Meng Xiaoxi and Guihua with eyes full of love: "Although we can't hold a wedding this year, you will be a member of our family when the New Year comes next year. What difference does it make if I give you this material earlier or later? You can't have it while your sister-in-law doesn't, right? If people hear it, they will say I'm biased."
Guihua took the cloth and measured it on Meng Xiaoxi, then praised with a smile: "Xiaoxi has fair skin, the clothes will look good when they are made." She took Xiaoxi's hand, looked at her with a smile: "Then we will make the same one, and we will look like sisters when we go out." Meng Xiaoxi looked at Guihua and nodded with a bit of shyness on her face.
There were still ten days before the Chinese New Year, and the family started to get busy again. Guihua found a day with good weather and took apart all the quilts and mattresses at home and washed them. After they were dried, she sewed the cotton cover on the back of the quilts again. Wang Sufen took a rag and wiped everywhere, but fortunately the house was cleaned every day, so there was no dust. Now she just wiped some dead corners.
Zhenzhen followed Wang Sufen and helped her wash the rag and bring water. After a while, Wang Sufen sent her back to the house to rest: "I will be done in a moment, you go back to the house for a while."
Zhen Zhen looked at her helplessly: "I'm already such a grown-up girl, I can't just do nothing."
Wang Sufen looked around and finally found a job for her: "Then you can thaw a basin of frozen pears and eat them after we finish the work." Zhenzhen picked up a dozen frozen hard pears and put them in the basin, scooping up a full bucket of water. As long as she waited for ten minutes, the original clear water would freeze. The thicker the ice, the softer the frozen pears would become. When the frozen pears felt soft inside and out, they were ready to eat.
After soaking the frozen pears, Zhenzhen came over again. Wang Sufen pointed to the east room and said, "Go listen to the radio with your grandma. Tell me what's on the radio later."
Seeing that Wang Sufen really didn't want her to help her, and there was really nothing else to do in the house, Zhenzhen went back to the east room and turned on the radio.
The radio was playing news and newspaper excerpts. Zhenzhen had just gotten up from the kang and wanted to turn to another channel to listen to some storytelling when she heard the radio say, "Our country's famous writer and people's artist Mr. Wangwo has won this year's Nobel Prize in Literature. The Nobel Prize is the world's..."
Zhenzhen jumped up from the kang excitedly, hugged Old Lady Li and shouted and jumped excitedly. Old Lady Li was startled by Zhenzhen and couldn't help but pull down her arm and asked, "What's wrong?"
"Mr. Forget-me-not won the Nobel Prize in Literature, the first time in Chinese history." Zhen Zhenle's mouth was wide open, and she wanted to listen to what the radio was saying. Unfortunately, the radio didn't even introduce Mr. Forget-me-not's works and started broadcasting the next piece of news.
"What's the purpose of that award? Will there be a certificate?" Seeing Zhenzhen so excited, Old Lady Li couldn't help but become curious as well.
"It's more than just a certificate." Zhen Zhen smiled and hugged Mrs. Li's neck. "This is mainly a very important honor and a recognition of Mr. Wangwo's literary works. Of course, there is also a certificate, a gold medal and a check."
"What is a check?" Mrs. Li thought about it and realized that she had never seen this kind of bill before: "What is it used for?"
Zhenzhen was immediately happy: "It's used to withdraw money, just like a passbook. You give the check to the savings bank, and the savings bank will give you the amount on it."
When Old Lady Li saw Zhenzhen talking about money, her eyes were all smiles, and she quickly asked, "Are you going to get money for your old age? Do you have a hundred dollars?"
Although the money that Old Lady Li hid in the box was more than one hundred yuan, she still considered it a huge sum. After all, in this era, when you get an honor, you usually get a jar or a thermos or something like that. It is rare to get a bonus.
"Grandma, you are so cute. You still want a hundred yuan." She hugged Mrs. Li's neck and said with a smile: "You have to add several zeros at the end." Seeing that Mrs. Li didn't understand, she said bluntly: "It will cost hundreds of thousands."
"Several hundred... tens of thousands..." Old Lady Li was confused: "How many hundred yuan would that be?"
Zhenzhen did some calculations and roughly estimated the amount based on the prize money for this year's Nobel Prize in Literature: "About three or four thousand one hundred yuan."
Old Mrs. Li was so frightened that she didn't even dare to swallow her saliva: "My goodness, this much money can't be spent even if I have thousands of children and grandchildren."
Zhenzhen smiled and got off the bed, put on her cotton-padded jacket and was about to run out. Old Lady Li quickly handed her a hat and gloves and asked, "Where are you going now?"
Zhenzhen took the hat and put it on her head, then ran out saying, "Go buy some newspapers! I want to buy ten!"
Zhenzhen didn't go to the post office on the street to buy newspapers, but went directly to the capital to buy all the newspapers for that day. As expected, she saw the news about Wangwo's winning the award. She quickly teleported to the mountain, and as soon as she got out of the cave, she shouted: "Teachers, the news that Mr. Wangwo won the award is in the newspaper!"
The author has something to say: The second update will be on Saturday. There will be no double update tomorrow because I have to go to work on Monday and my hands and neck hurt a little haha
Some readers say that my uncle is as bad as Mingbei. To be honest, Mingbei is far worse than my uncle. My grandma used to live in the staff family building of the hydrolysis plant. When they bought firecrackers during the Chinese New Year, my uncle was too lazy to go downstairs, so he sat on the windowsill to set them off, burning half of the bedding on the bed. Also, my grandpa was an eighth-level worker at that time, and his apprentices gave him canned food and other things during the Chinese New Year, but he was reluctant to eat them at that time and wanted to save them for gifts before giving them away. But my uncle was greedy and bold, so he used a nail to poke holes in all the can lids, poured out the sugar water inside and drank it all. When my grandpa took them out to give as gifts, there was a pile of cans without soup. So my uncle is the kind of person who would not think it was enough to beat him eight times a day, haha.