After lunch, Zhu Ping'an paid the bill. The shopkeeper came over with a smile and said, "Haha, I wanted to give you a discount, but it's exactly 200 coins, so I can't give you a discount."
Hearing this, the little Loli Niuniu rolled her eyes.
"Hypocrisy!" The naughty kid shook his fat face and looked down on the shopkeeper.
"That's easy. I'm not full yet. Give me two more buns, and you can cancel out the meal."
Zhu Ping'an rubbed the naughty kid's head, looked up at the shopkeeper, slightly curled the corners of his lips and smiled brightly, showing the innocent smile of a sunny boy.
Ahem...
The shopkeeper seemed to be choked when he heard this, and with a sullen face he ordered the waiter to go to the kitchen and get two meat buns.
After a while, Zhu Ping'an led the two children out of the restaurant, carrying two meat buns wrapped in mulberry leaf paper.
In the restaurant at the back, the shopkeeper had a very gloomy face.
After leaving the restaurant, the naughty kids admired Zhu Ping'an very much, and the little Loli Niuniu's eyes were also shining when she looked at Zhu Ping'an.
"They were the ones who first used chicken racks to impersonate chicken. They took advantage of their size to bully customers, so I taught them a small lesson. We can't learn from them in doing things. We must be honest. A man cannot stand without honesty, and a store cannot prosper without honesty. Sooner or later, their store will fail because of their dishonesty." Zhu Ping'an touched the two little ones' heads and instilled in them the importance of honesty.
I don't know why it's so impressive.
The two little ones nodded ignorantly.
After walking for a while, Zhu Ping'an gave two meat buns to a child held by a porter and started chatting with the porter.
I learned that the porter was from a village ten miles outside the capital, named Zhang Dazhu. When Altan Khan surrounded the capital in August last year, his crops were destroyed, causing them to have nothing to harvest in the autumn. In order to make a living, the strong laborers in their village came to the Qihuamen wharf to work as porters and move goods.
It was a bit tiring, but on weekdays, they could earn about a hundred coins a day. When transporting grain, they could earn dozens more coins, which was more than what they earned when they were farming before.
So since last year, the strong laborers in their village have come to Qihuamen Wharf to earn some extra money during the slack season.
When talking about diet, Zhang Dazhui felt a little distressed.
They all eat at home early in the morning before coming to work at the dock, and only eat lunch here. But even if they only eat lunch, they feel a little distressed. The prices of restaurants here are not cheap, and in order to have more time to work, they don't have time to eat far away, so they can only eat here.
Since they were doing manual labor, they had to eat enough. But if they wanted to eat enough, they had to eat at least four or five pancakes. They couldn't eat it without anything else. A simple dish and a bowl of soup would cost them more than twenty cents for a meal.
As for meat dishes, they are usually reluctant to order them. They only order meat dishes when they are in a very bad condition or when they are overworked and need to replenish their nutrition.
When Zhang Dazhu mentioned the restaurant, he complained a lot, such as everything in the restaurant costs money, tea and water also cost money, even garlic costs money, and the pancakes are short of weight... ... It's expensive, the food is not very delicious, and they look down on people, and it's like you have to beg them for food... ... The tables are not cleaned well, and the floor is not clean... ...
After saying goodbye to Zhang Dazhu, Zhu Ping'an observed other restaurants nearby and listened to other people's comments on the restaurants.
In general, the restaurants here don’t seem to be very popular, and there are more or less some problems: high prices, bad taste, questionable service attitude, bad environment, and so on.
There are a lot of problems.
Zhu Ping'an glanced at the rows of restaurants and sighed.
Near the Qihuamen city gate, there was a small stall selling candy figures, and quite a few people gathered around it. When the naughty kid saw it, his eyes lit up, and the little girl's eyes also lit up.
"Let's go and take a look."
Zhu Ping'an picked up the little girl with one hand and led the naughty child to the candy figurine stall.
The man who blows the candy figures is an old man with a white beard. His stall is a rectangular cabinet with shelves. The cabinet has several drawers, which contain maltose blocks and reed stalks. There is a half-meter round hole under the cabinet, and a small charcoal stove is placed in the hole. There is a shelf on the cabinet, and on the shelf are various candy figures blown by the old man, including chickens, piglets, rabbits, etc. They are very cute and pleasing to the eye.
There were many little kids gathered in front of the stall, some of them were led by adults.
The children passing by are basically the same as naughty kids. They can't walk when they see them.
Even if they didn't have money to buy them, they would still hang around the candy-blowing stall, and every time they saw the old man blow a candy figure, the children would cheer in surprise. When the children who paid to buy the candy figure received it from the old man, they looked proud and proud, as if they had received a certificate of honor, and were envied by the children around them.
Zhu Ping'an gave the money to the naughty kid, who squeezed through the onlookers with the money and dragged himself in. In the envious eyes of the children, he shouted, "Give me two of the most expensive sugar figures, one for a boy and one for a girl."
The old man took the money with a smile, and took a piece of warm maltose from the charcoal stove. He kneaded it skillfully with his hands, and the maltose turned into a ball. Then the old man pressed a small hole in the ball, and pulled out a long airway with his hands. Then he put it to his lips and blew air, and the warm maltose swelled up. While blowing air, he kneaded it skillfully with his hands, and soon a Nezha riding a dragon to make trouble in the sea appeared vividly... ...
"Sister, here you go."
The naughty kid took Nezha the Third Prince and Magu's longevity offering from the old man, and walked out proudly amid the envious gazes of many other children. He put the Magu's longevity offering into the hands of the little Loli Niuniu like offering treasures.
"Thank you, brother-in-law."
After taking the candy man, little Loli Niuniu squinted her big round eyes and thanked Zhu Pingan sweetly. The money for the candy man was paid by her brother-in-law...
The naughty kid looked at Zhu Pingan with resentment...
"Thank you, Brother Rui."
However, the next second, after hearing the little Loli Niuniu's thank you, the naughty child's fat face suddenly brightened up, he laughed so hard that his eyes could hardly be seen, and then he played happily.
The world of children is so simple... Zhu Ping'an couldn't help but smile.
“Boom…”
When the two children were enjoying the candy men, they suddenly heard a dull thunder in the distance. The sound seemed to come from the west, which scared the two children.
Zhu Ping'an also subconsciously looked up to the west.
However, the people around seemed to be used to it. Someone explained, "The emperor is training his eunuchs in the training ground in the Western Garden. He has been firing cannons for several days. Last year, Altan Khan invaded the capital, which irritated the emperor. The Japanese pirates in the south are also making trouble. The emperor is training his eunuchs to guard the capital when there are not enough soldiers in the capital..."
Zhu Ping'an remembered that Zhang Siwei had mentioned this matter when he first arrived in the capital.
But training eunuchs... ... Emperor Jiajing really lacks a sense of security, Zhu Pingan shook his head slightly. Even if these eunuchs are well trained, how can they guard the capital? They can only give Emperor Jiajing a sense of security, oh, and can also intimidate the ministers. But training eunuchs will bring troubles in the future...