For the next few days, Xu Lin would come over at eight o'clock every day to have breakfast and practice with Zhou Pin. In the afternoon, they would make ginger soup or plum juice together, switching freely between hot and cold drinks. Sometimes they would cook a few dishes that didn't have much flavor and store them.
Before they knew it, it was New Year's Eve. The temperature outside was -59°C. Xu Lin and Zhou Pin finished their practice and washed up, then took noodles and cabbage to room 701. Everyone else had already arrived.
As rumored, 701 wasn't that cold, but that was relative; the room temperature was around 0°C. Xu Lin and Zhou Pin took off their military overcoats and put them aside, wearing only their down jackets underneath.
There was a marble coffee table in the middle of the living room. The top panel had been removed, and a fire had been lit inside. Xu Lin gave a thumbs up, saying it was a really good idea. Except for one window in the living room for natural light, the curtains on all the other windows were drawn.
Everyone brought their own things. Room 701 provided the venue, pots and pans, water, and condiments. Room 702 brought two hot pot bases and a handful of vermicelli. Ms. Dai from Room 601 brought a can of luncheon meat and a ham. The Zeiss family of four brought a pound of kimchi, bean sprouts that Grandma Ji had grown herself, and a handful of dried wood ear mushrooms. Mr. and Mrs. Liu from Room 602, along with Xiao Zhi, brought dried daylily, dried green beans, and dried bean curd sticks that Zhang Min had learned to make from a video.
"We have everything we need here, meat, vegetables, staple foods, and even hot pot base," Old Liu said happily.
"I haven't eaten vegetables in ages. I used to hate cabbage, but now I can eat it every day." Zheng Ming stared at the cabbage, drooling.
"Look at you, watch your manners. We haven't had any vegetables in ages." Zheng Ming's girlfriend, Wang Jing, slapped him on the head.
"Don't you know who I am?"
"Excuse me, the pot is here." Sun Wei from 701 brought over a pot filled with snow water. "Don't worry, although the water is snow water, I've filtered it all out, so it's safe to drink."
"You can filter snow water?" Zeiss asked.
"It's nothing. First, filter out the large particles of mud and sand with gauze, then let it stand with sand and activated carbon, and finally boil it."
“I filtered the water I brought back with gauze and boiled it again, but my son still got diarrhea after drinking it. We are so worried,” said Liang Ping, Zeiss’s wife.
"Take some activated charcoal with you when you leave, it'll be fine."
"Is your family's needs enough?"
“We don’t have much else at home, but we have plenty of physics experiment stuff. My husband is a physics researcher and he loves tinkering with these things,” said Li Jingjing, Sun Wei’s wife.
"Okay, we'll trade bean sprouts for it later." Liang Ping refused to take the activated charcoal for free.
"If I have any extra, I'll trade some luncheon meat for it," Ms. Dai said.
Once, while searching for supplies, she found two boxes of luncheon meat, indicating that her family was relatively "well-off." As a doctor, she knew that drinking too much unclean water could easily cause various diseases, so she preferred to drink clean water whenever possible.
"I'll change mine too, I'll use hot pot base." Zheng Ming quickly raised his hand as well.
Watching everyone chat back and forth, Xu Lin felt that these people were decent people and that she could keep in touch with them often in the future.
"Miss Xu, aren't you going to switch with Mr. Zhou?" Old Liu asked with concern.
"I previously installed a water purifier at home, which has an activated carbon filter. Zhou Pin, would you like one?"
"I don't need it either."
"Don't you two live together?" Zheng Ming suddenly asked.
"Why are we living together?" Xu Lin asked, puzzled.
"Aren't you two a couple?" Zheng Ming asked, equally puzzled.
"Which eye of yours saw that we're a couple?"
“You two are inseparable, and you even wear matching outfits. I’ve seen it with both eyes,” Zheng Ming said, pointing at Xu Lin and Zhou Pin’s clothes.
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