The long queue was filled with not only people but also goods, forming several long strips. Almost everyone in the village came out today, and the shore was now crowded with people and goods.
The surrounding roads were full of muddy puddles, and everyone's trouser legs and shoes were splashed with yellow mud, but their cold hands and feet did not dampen their excitement.
The pier had never been so lively. It was so bustling everywhere that there was almost no place to step. The smiles on everyone's faces were almost as festive as those on Chinese New Year.
This is the joy of making money. Who doesn’t want to get rich
Everyone felt a little regretful that there were too many people and the bags were spread out, and the tide was rising, making it difficult to pick up the bags.
Ye Yaodong moved the last half bag of starfish onto the cart and took a breath. "How many bags are there?"
Lin Xiuqing had been guarding the cart. She had a close eye on all the goods in her family and knew exactly which bags they were.
"Seven and a half bags, there's nothing left at the bottom, right?"
"there is none left."
She smiled and said, "Mom, dad and my little sister picked up almost 7 bags, and my eldest brother and his wife and my second brother and his wife also picked up a little over 4 bags each."
Ye Yaodong nodded. He picked up less in the afternoon. After working for the whole morning, he could hardly straighten his back. He only picked up less than two bags. The rest were basically picked up in the morning.
He looked at other villagers, each of them carrying a sack, and it seemed that they had picked up a lot as well. Most of them were families working together, with several people in a family. They probably picked up the items together and then divided the profits.
The team moved forward slowly. Their goods were all on the carts, which saved them some effort compared to others.
At this time, he heard someone asking his second sister-in-law behind him about his eldest cousin's money-making business. Second sister-in-law Ye excitedly turned around and chattered with others about how much money she had earned, and also encouraged them to invest together.
Seeing how hard she worked, Ye Yaodong couldn't help but wonder if Ye Yaohong gave her some extra pay.
Lin Xiuqing also glanced at him, and he smiled, "I'll be in line here, you can go back and look after the two boys first, they are so energetic, the old lady will probably have a headache."
"It shouldn't take long. Let's go back together later?"
She was also curious about how much other people could sell their products for and could also listen to gossip here.
The whole village is here, it’s so lively, how can she bear to leave
Since moving to the new home, she seldom goes out unless necessary, and most of the new happenings in the village are learned from Mrs. Ye Da and Mrs. Ye Er.
It's a good time to listen to it.
Although they are trivial matters, they are also quite interesting to listen to. For example, someone is getting married, and the man is a cripple who spent a lot of money to marry a beautiful wife from another place...
Whose man was having an affair with a widow outside and was caught by his wife...
For example, a while ago someone gave birth to a child with a cleft lip, and the mother cried to death. The villagers said it was because she was greedy and ate a rabbit during pregnancy...
They also talked about not eating mutton, because the baby would be born with epilepsy...
Then someone’s kid went up the mountain to steal oranges and got chased by the owner, so he broke his hand. The kid’s family came to extort money…
Another example is when an old man passed away and the sons couldn’t even divide the property and were about to fight…
…
There are all kinds of weird things happening here. People in the countryside spread everything.
Lin Xiuqing pricked up her ears, looked around and listened with great interest.
Seeing her looking around, Ye Yaodong couldn't help but shook his head, "Do you want to go around and see all the teams?"
"Ah? Haha, I just think it's quite interesting."
Ye's mother looked back at her and reminded her implicitly, "Don't go out to visit other people when you have nothing to do. It's cold now, and the village is deserted. No one is willing to sit in front of their house to weave webs and chat. They all stay indoors."
She smiled, she understood Ye's mother's worries.
"I know. I've been sewing quilts and making wedding dresses for my little sister lately, so I haven't had time to go out and about."
The person who was also listening to the gossip at the side also asked Ye's mother curiously, when is Ye Huimei getting married
She also said that Ye's mother would find someone without a mother-in-law, and her daughter would be happy in the future...
Ye's mother was also very proud of this. At first, she thought that without a mother-in-law, her daughter would be more tired and would have to take care of more things. Later, when someone reminded her, she immediately slapped her thigh and said, "It's not good to have no mother-in-law..."
The more I look at A Guang, the more satisfied I am...
Several purchasing points were receiving goods at the same time, and the team was moving forward at a fairly fast pace. After a while, they had moved a long way forward. Because Ye's mother and the others had landed earlier, their queue was relatively high up in the queue, so now they only had to wait for two or three more people before it was their turn.
Ye Yaodong looked at his watch, it was already past 4 o'clock. He was still thinking about the goods in his trap, and the tide was rising now, which was just right.
When it was their turn, they weighed their goods separately, without mixing them.
Big Brother Ye and Second Brother Ye had relatively less goods, so they were weighed first. One weighed 420 kilograms and the other weighed 408 kilograms. Big Sister-in-law Ye and Second Sister-in-law Ye were both smiling happily, fortunately they came early.
Ye's mother and her two other companions picked up nearly 7 bags, weighed them for 692 yuan, and sold them for 13.84 yuan.
Ye Yaodong picked up 7 and a half bags by himself, weighing 736 kilograms, and sold them for 14.72 yuan.
Fortunately, he picked up more things in the morning than others, otherwise he would have lost a lot if he had to fight alone while others had to work together with their entire family.
They didn't keep much of the stock, just a few for eating, because the weather has been bad recently and they couldn't dry the starfish.
After handing the documents to Lin Xiuqing, he asked her to go back first. "The traps have not been collected yet. It's high tide now and the waves are not big. I will go to the sea to collect them. I will be back in a little over two hours."
"Can't we collect it tomorrow?"
"It's been cloudy this day, and I don't know if it will rain tomorrow or if there will be wind at night. I'd better go out now and collect them quickly."
It doesn’t matter if he misses the literacy class for one or two days. He is already halfway through his studies, so he can just study for a few more days.
He guessed that the ground traps were also full of starfish!
Ground traps have always been the best tool for catching starfish, but he had too few of them.
Turning around, he saw Zheng and Xiaoxiao. Thinking that they also had ground traps, he reminded them, "Your ground traps are still on the sea, right? We can collect them later. There should be a lot of starfish!"
The two's eyes lit up again when they heard this, "Are you going out now?"
"Get ready to collect another wave."
"Together!"
The two of them are now very convinced of Ye Yaodong. Following him, they have made a lot of money in the past few months.
After leaving the task of queuing up to sell goods to their wives at home, they also went out to sea to collect traps.
The other villagers also became excited after hearing this. After saying hello to their families, they also wanted to go out to sea to catch some fish before it got dark.
They were more active, thinking that they would collect and put down the catch today, and continue collecting tomorrow when the weather was good. This would be much faster and less troublesome than competing with a bunch of people at the dock.
Some people who didn't put up traps felt regretful.
Ye Yaodong called Xiaoxiao and Azheng to get on his boat as well. By the time they reached the point where the traps were set, it would probably be dark.
It's already past 4 o'clock, and it gets dark early in autumn and winter.
He started the boat, running at full power, the sound of the diesel engine rang out, and he heard them talking about when they would switch to a powered boat to save time and effort...
The waves don't look big from the shore, but once the boat is out to sea, you can truly feel the waves.
He first drove the boat to the approximate sea area where he was going to place the traps. After searching for the buoys around for a long time, he found that they had been displaced by the waves.
After collecting the buoy and pulling up the ground trap, he found that the fish collecting bag under the ground trap was indeed filled with starfish, and the fish were surrounded by them.
"Damn... they really are all starfish. Where do so many starfish come from? Are they in the entire sea?" Xiaoxiao helped to pull up the trap.
"Looking at how crowded the dock was this afternoon, it must have been washed in from outside. There must be a lot of seabed along this coast."
Ah Zheng also said cheerfully: "Today, the whole village has made a fortune. Fortunately, we came early and got one more bag than others."
"These things are known as locusts on the sea floor. Wherever they pass, all shellfish will be wiped out. Let's pour them out and have a look."
The fish-collecting bag below was filled with starfish. Ye Yaodong untied the rope and poured everything onto the deck. He saw that apart from the starfish, there were only fish inside. The stone crabs and shrimps had been eaten until only a layer of shells were left.
Ye Yaodong flipped it casually and threw the shrimps and crabs with only shells left back into the sea. At this time, he saw a relatively large starfish holding a yellow, irregularly shaped soft object in its arms.
"SpongeBob?"
He found it quite interesting and squeezed the sponge in his hand.
The animations are all lies. There is no friendship between SpongeBob and Patrick. Sponges are also food for starfish.
Ah Zheng looked at him speechlessly, "Sponge is just a sponge, but SpongeBob? Are you stupid for being a father?"
"You know nothing! I'll just take it back to wash the dishes for my wife."
Nowadays, the sponges used for washing dishes at home are all synthetic. In the past, people used sponges from the sea.
"Hurry up and pull out the rest of the traps. It's getting dark. I didn't realize you were so slow."
"Why are you in such a hurry? I won't let you swim back."
Having said that, Ye Yaodong still quickened his pace and quickly pulled the net. Without a doubt, the next few nets pulled out only fish except for starfish, but no shellfish, but there were several sponges.
This surprised Ye Yaodong, but he also felt a little regretful.
It is a natural sponge, also called sponge silk. It is not a dead object, but a multicellular marine animal, a living thing.
Sponge silk becomes soft and elastic when it comes into contact with water. It has always been used as a bathroom product, as well as a tool for pottery, painting, and surgery. In ancient Greece, it was called soft gold and is still valuable today.
But if they put it here at the beach, it would be useless and they could only take it back to let their children play with it or use it to wash dishes.
After collecting several nets, the boat was full of starfish, fish or shells. He asked two people to help pick them out and put the starfish into a sack so that it would be convenient to carry them off the boat later.
When there were only two rows left, the sky had already gone completely dark. He turned on the flashlight on the boat and sped up, but found that there were no starfish in the net, and the fish bag was filled with a huge white jellyfish.