One day, the three siblings were catching insects when Li Mingxi saw his great-grandfather Li Tiezhu walking towards his home from a distance.
Li Mingxi hurriedly shouted, "Hello, Great Grandpa!" Hearing her sister's shout, the two brothers also hurriedly shouted in unison, "Hello, Great Grandpa!"
Li Tiezhu smiled and patted the twins' heads. "Okay, okay, Xiaoxi, go play with your little brother. Grandpa will lend you your bicycle to go to the commune. Don't forget to tell your family later!"
After saying that, Li Tiezhu hurried into the yard and came out pushing his bicycle.
Li Mingxi looked at Li Tiezhu who was hurriedly getting on his bicycle and said, "Oh, okay, I understand!"
Looking at Li Tiezhu's hurried back, Li Mingxi was puzzled. Could something have happened? That was impossible. What had she heard her grandma gossiping about these days? Never mind. She would know when the time came. After all, her grandma, Niu Cuihua, was the village know-it-all. Nothing could be hidden from her.
Li Tiezhu anxiously rode his bike all the way to the commune compound, locked his bike, and hurried to the commune secretary's office.
Li Tiezhu was sweating profusely. "Secretary, what's the matter? What's the urgent matter that requires me to come here? Is there someone in our village who has committed a crime? That can't be right. Everyone has been very well behaved lately."
Zhang Xingmin felt a little guilty. He glanced at Li Tiezhu and said casually, "It's okay. Don't worry. Wipe the sweat off your head!"
After hearing this, Li Tiezhu began to wipe the sweat off his face with the towel around his neck, and then he heard Zhang Xingmin speaking in an orderly manner.
"Look, isn't it being promoted now that educated youth are going to the countryside? The county has also allocated a number of places for our township. I thought your brigade had better conditions, so I assigned everyone to your brigade!"
Li Tiezhu was shocked. "That won't work! How can we give it all to us? Our brigade can't afford it! Besides, the villagers will definitely not agree to it! This won't work, Secretary!"
Zhang Xingmin looked helpless. "I also know that those educated youths can't be assigned to anyone, and I have no other choice. How about this? I won't give them to you, but I can give the remaining ones to the third team.
Li Tiezhu knew that it was difficult to disobey the leader's order, otherwise if something good happened in the future, it would probably have nothing to do with their village. He could only say insincerely, "Okay then!"
Seeing that Li Tiezhu agreed, Secretary Zhang made arrangements directly, "Then go back and make arrangements. Go to the county to pick him up tomorrow afternoon."
After Li Tiezhu agreed, he rode his bicycle to the village.
After lunch, Li Mingxi heard Niu Tiezhu shouting at everyone to go to the brigade headquarters for a meeting. When Li Mingxi and his family arrived, they saw that the entrance of the brigade headquarters was full of people, and Li Tiezhu was standing right in front with a dark face.
The villagers didn't dare to speak when they saw the captain's gloomy face, and stood still obediently.
After counting the people, Li Tiezhu said directly, "I went to the commune for a meeting this morning. The commune secretary said that a group of educated youth will be coming to our brigade tomorrow. They will arrive, and I will arrange for a few people to pick them up. This meeting is just to inform everyone."
A man named Er Laizi in the crowd asked, "Captain, what are educated youth? Are they children from the city? I've never seen a city person before!"
"Yeah, I haven't seen city people yet. What do you think they look like?" Discussions arose one after another in the crowd.
As soon as Li Tiezhu saw everyone start discussing, he shouted, "Stop, stop talking! When the educated youth arrive, everyone, behave yourself and don't let our team down! That's all! Disband!"
When Li Mingxi heard about the educated youth coming down, he was shocked. He thought, "Didn't the educated youth come down in 1968? Why are some of them coming down now?"
Did I remember it wrong? No, that couldn't be right. Back in high school, my teacher specifically talked about the educated youth going to the countryside. What was going on? And judging by the team leader's expression, he was clearly unhappy.
No matter how dissatisfied Li Tiezhu was, he still had to accept the arrangement of his superiors, so just after lunch the next day, he took his son Li Jianye and drove a donkey cart to pick up people.
When they arrived at the county party committee compound, they saw a group of team leaders standing there waiting. Li Tiezhu also led his son to join them. They waited until mid-afternoon before they saw a bus slowly approaching.
As soon as the car stopped, a girl in a green military uniform got out and said, "What a lousy car! I'm about to vomit from driving it!"
The driver's expression suddenly changed upon hearing this, but he still asked everyone to get off the bus. A group of educated youth, carrying their luggage, were led by a man towards the county party committee compound. After the leader finished his words of thanks, he began to call on the various teams to pick up their people.
"...Wang Hongxia, Lin Jianwei, Zhao Xiuer, Zhang Guowei, Li Qiang, Yang Qiangjun, and Shen Mengli, you guys go to the Dongfeng Brigade."
"Come over here, Dongfeng Brigade, and take your people away."
Li Tiezhu hurriedly shouted: "Here they come, here they come."
As he got closer, he saw that these educated youth were all fair and tender, with baby-like faces. The girls looked delicate and weak, and the boys didn't look much stronger. They looked not even as strong as his eldest grandson. Li Tiezhu immediately felt dissatisfied and his face turned dark.
Li Tiezhu: "Come, follow me, the car is over there."
A group of educated youth saw the old man coming to lead them with a serious face. They were dissatisfied in their hearts, but as they were new here, they didn't dare to say anything and could only follow behind him with a nod.
When the group arrived at the destination and saw that it was a donkey cart, a group of educated youth became dissatisfied.
"What kind of car is this? How can you let us ride in it? We are here to support you. I will report you!" Lin Jianwei shouted.
Chen Mengli also frowned, "What is this? How can I sit here when it's so dirty?"
Li Jianye looked at the educated youth with disgust on their faces, feeling indignant. They were dissatisfied, and he was not satisfied either. Who could he complain to? He immediately said, "Go ahead and report it. These are the conditions. You can sit here or not. These are our conditions. If you don't want to sit here, just walk back!"
Li Qiang glanced at the two angry men and said quickly, "I'm sorry, uncle, he can't speak. I'm sorry, please don't be angry!"
He tugged at Lin Jianwei's sleeve again and said, "Stop talking. Don't you see where we are?"
Lin Jianwei thought that this was not Beijing, and a good man would not suffer a loss in front of him, so he could only say: "I'm sorry, uncle, I just said the wrong thing!"
Li Tiezhu glanced at the apologizing boy and said nothing. He asked everyone to get on the bus. After the group of educated youth were seated, he arranged for his son to drive the bus.
Glancing at everyone in the car, Li Tiezhu looked directly at Li Qiang and said, "Young man, why don't you stay in the city? Why do you have to come to the countryside?"
Upon hearing this, Lin Jianwei interrupted, "We are here to help you develop the countryside. Comrade Chairman has said that there is great potential for development in the countryside!"
Li Qiang looked at Lin Jianwei who was very excited and said, "No, uncle, we are here to learn. We will have to learn a lot from you when the time comes."
Li Tiezhu looked at Li Qiang who was unwilling to say more, and said nothing. He just thought in his heart, what the hell is construction? How can a group of children who are probably not weaned yet build a rural area? They probably haven't even seen wheat seedlings.
I don't know what the higher-ups are thinking. They let these babies come here and it would be good if they don't cause any trouble. With the way these kids look, the girls and boys in the village will have no trouble. Thinking of this, Li Tiezhu sighed.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
