Chapter 162
There are many types of mushrooms, so the growth time is different. They don't have so much time to cultivate species with too long growth cycles, such as shiitake mushrooms, which have a growth cycle of more than half a year. If people spend more than half a year taking care of mushrooms without any income, they will starve to death. So Guo Hui led them to cultivate straw mushrooms, a mushroom species with a growth cycle of one to two months.
If they are taken good care of and there is enough water and humidity in the house, the straw mushrooms will develop very quickly and can be harvested in more than a month. Now the straw mushrooms in their mushroom house have all popped up, and after they have popped up, they will grow much faster and can be harvested in about a week. This makes everyone very happy because they can then exchange the mushrooms for rice.
The Cai family had agreed before that this time Guo Hui would teach them how to grow mushrooms, and it would be up to them to divide the grown mushrooms among themselves, as a way of thanking them for taking in such a large family. Although they get along well together, and the Wu Zheng brothers are both easy to get along with and don't care too much, you can't just take advantage of others' generosity. You still have to thank them.
However, it is obvious that the current food problem is not so easy to solve. Not to mention how much food was lost in the earthquake, even due to the climate in recent years, the food is so dry that not a single blade of grass grows and no grain is harvested. The national inventory can no longer hold up.
They don’t know the situation in other provinces and cities as they are too far away, but at least people have already starved to death in the north, so they really need to plan carefully about the rice issue.
Finally, the few families sat together to hold a meeting to discuss the matter. It had been agreed before that the Cai family would not take any of this batch of straw mushrooms and would give them all to them as lodging fees. However, the situation has obviously changed now, and they can no longer do so.
During this period, Song Jia, who had gained at least two kilograms under the care of Aunt Yin's various cooking methods, said, "Special cases should be treated specially. I think we all live in the same courtyard. If someone runs out of ammunition and food, it is impossible for us to just watch them die. I have an idea. Do you think it will work?"
Jian Chu: "You tell us, let's listen."
Song Jia: "After we harvest this batch of mushrooms, we will sell them. We won't sell them for money, but will exchange them for grain. The grain we get will be stored as a public asset. It is also life-saving food in case we run out of ammunition and food. Otherwise, it will be difficult to distribute the mushrooms this time. If we want to plant them next time, we will have to discuss in detail who will be responsible for planting, who will provide the raw materials, and who will spend energy to sell the mushrooms, and what proportion of contribution they will make. After the mushrooms are grown and the grain is sold, we will divide them according to the proportion.
Mu Nan said, "You mean this time the food belongs to everyone, but it won't be divided equally, just put it aside for the bottom line, right?"
Song Jia nodded: "Yes, it's a public asset. If someone is starving to death, they can use the food to save their life first. But I don't want anyone to really starve to death. I'm just preparing for the worst."
Mu Nan said "oh" and looked at Qin Huai. Seeing that Qin Huai had no intention of objecting, he said, "We have no problem. Everything is fine."
Jian Chu also thought that this was a good idea. Although distributing food was not a very troublesome matter, doing so would only bind the relationships in their small courtyard even tighter. In a dangerous situation, it is difficult for an individual to survive on his own, and mutual assistance is the real strength.
The Cai family had no problem with this either. They had not originally planned to take this batch of mushrooms, so it would be better to have an extra way out now.
After Song Jia's proposal was unanimously passed, Qin Huai said, "Then the grain sold will be stored here. I have a vacuum machine at home, and it will be packaged and stored. Jian Chu will do the record. If there is any expenditure in the future, it will be decided by the public."
After discussing whether to keep the grain or not, they have to discuss how to sell it. It is best not to sell the mushrooms under real names, otherwise if a famine really breaks out in the future and they are remembered by someone with ulterior motives, their yard will become too big a target. In the current situation, it is never too careful. If conditions permit, they would have wanted to dig a cellar to store grain.
Finally, it was Xu Ming who suggested that Yu Feng find a way to sell the mushrooms. Yu Feng had many connections and knew many people from all walks of life. It was not difficult for him to sell a batch of goods secretly without being exposed.
The first courtyard meeting ended in a harmonious atmosphere.
Mu Nan and the others didn't need to get involved in the rest of the things. Uncle Guo and Cai Wenwen were in charge of collecting the mushrooms, and Yu Feng was in charge of selling the mushrooms. After the mushrooms were sold and exchanged for food, they only had to wait for the goods to be received. Mu Nan, feeling free, jumped up the stairs.
Qin Huai, who was walking behind him, said: "You are twenty-five this year."
Mu Nan held onto the handrail of the stairs and looked back: "Hmm?"
Qin Huai: "Don't walk like a three-year-old. If you miss a step, you might fall and get blood all over your face."
Mu Nan rolled his eyes at him for free. As soon as they got upstairs, Qin Huai's phone rang. Mu Nan went to the bathroom to wash his hands first, wondering who would call Qin Huai. He only knew a few friends, and Shi Yuanfei would not come to see them unless there was something big. However, he had given Shi Yuanfei two cabbages last time, so maybe Shi Yuanfei would calculate the time to buy them.
The cabbages upstairs were indeed almost ready to be harvested, but they could still grow a little bigger. Fortunately, they had a well in the yard, otherwise, whether it was the cabbages, the watermelons, or the alfalfa, they wouldn't have had enough water to irrigate them just by buying water every day.
Thinking of this, he came out of the bathroom shaking his wet hands. Seeing Qin Huai standing in the bedroom without moving, his brows slightly furrowed, he thought something had happened, and asked hurriedly, "What's wrong? Who's looking for you? Is there something wrong with someone?"
Qin Huai said: "Do you remember the small courtyard we passed by when we went hunting in winter?"
It had only been a year, so Mu Nan certainly remembered: "Grandpa Tong and Grandma Tong? What happened? Did they move in?"
Qin Huai shook his head: "A soldier contacted our neighborhood committee. The neighborhood committee called me and said that Grandpa Tong was looking for me. If possible, I should go there."
Mu Nan was immediately confused. What did this mean? Why was he looking for Qin Huai?
"So are you going?"
Qin Huai let Mu Nan decide: "What do you think? Do you want to go?"
Mu Nan thought for a while and said, "How about going to take a look? I'll go with you!" If there was something wrong, he had a lot of weapons in his space, so he could ensure some safety. It was just strange what Grandpa Tong could want from them.
Since the decision had been made, the two did not delay. It was only nine o'clock now, and Grandpa Tong's yard was on the other side of Monkey Mountain. A round trip could be completed before dawn.
Mu Nan sent a message to Jian Chu, saying that they had something to do outside, and then drove out after saying hello. Jian Chu watched them leave, then came out of the house and closed the gate to the yard.
Mu Nan guessed many possibilities in the car, but all the possibilities finally led to two points. One was that the two old people needed help in some way, but this possibility did not seem very high. They could contact the soldiers. If they needed help, they could just tell the soldiers directly. Instead of transferring the help to them, they did not have the ability to do anything.
Another point is that the two may not survive, so they are planning to make arrangements for their funeral arrangements.
Mu Nan felt that this was the most likely possibility, although he wondered why they were looking for them when they had only stayed at their house for one night.
Moreover, they did not leave any contact information at that time. It seemed that the base station had not been built at that time, and there was no telephone. However, they did leave their address. I thought that I had received help from others. If the two elderly people were to live in a residential area, they would have more people they knew, which would make it more convenient for them to move or if they needed help on a daily basis.
Mu Nan: "After we came back, didn't we give the address of Grandpa Tong and Grandma Tong's courtyard to the soldiers in Building No. 1? I think they must have visited it, but the old people didn't want to leave. Now, maybe it's just like what I guessed, they have to explain their funeral affairs, so they contacted the soldiers who left the communication first. The soldiers then found the neighborhood committee through the information provided by Grandpa Tong, and then contacted us. But why, just because we stayed overnight?"
Qin Huai: "You'll know when you get there. It's useless to guess now."
The entire road has been repaired, and there are even continuous street lights in the direction of Monkey Mountain. It is no longer a dark road. However, Grandpa Tong and his family's yard is not at the foot of Monkey Mountain, so when you almost reach the territory of Monkey Mountain, you have to rely on your only memory of winter to find it.
Mu Nan thought about the flood and locusts before, and was a little curious: "Grandpa Tong and the others won't stay in the small courtyard all the time, right? The flood is so severe, and there are locusts. That broken house can't withstand a wave of locust attacks, right?"
Mu Nan analyzed curiously all the way and came up with various conspiracy theories. Qin Huai finally found the light of the courtyard in the night.
The yard was more damaged than the last time they came. Without the snow covering it, the original appearance of the house after being destroyed by so many disasters was revealed. However, the soft lighting in the house still brought a sense of peaceful warmth. Perhaps hearing the noise of a vehicle outside, the people in the house seemed to move slowly and lifted the curtain.
Qin Huai and Mu Nan got out of the car and walked over a pile of collapsed brick walls into the yard. Grandpa Tong had already opened the door to the house. He looked much older than the last time they met, but he looked at them with a smile, just as hospitable and charitable as before.
Mr. Tong was still holding the pipe that had long been devoid of tobacco in his hand, and he narrowed his eyes in a smile: "I knew you would definitely come."
Mu Nan followed behind Qin Huai, thinking that he would see an old man lying in bed unable to move, but the situation seemed to be okay: "Grandpa Tong."
Old Master Tong responded several times: "Come in quickly, it's hot outside."
In fact, the house was not much cooler than the outside. There was no electricity connected to the yard for this kind of person living alone. But there might be a well behind the yard, and there were several basins of water in the house, so the temperature was a little lower than outside. When they entered the house, they saw a person lying on the kang bed.
Qin Huai frowned slightly: "What's wrong with Grandma Tong?"
Old Master Tong smiled, without any sadness in his eyes, and said calmly: "I am old and confused. It's only been two days. I was wondering if you can come in time. Fortunately."
Qin Huai said: "I'll take grandma to the hospital."
Old Master Tong waved his hand and said, "If I want to send him to the hospital, there's no need to contact you. In the past, this old disease couldn't be cured. Now it's just a hassle. It's enough for him to die peacefully in this house where he has lived all his life."
Mu Nan grabbed Qin Huai's clothes and looked at the bed. Grandma Tong was indeed dying. She was breathing in more than out. Suddenly, her nose felt sore: "Then, is there anything we can do to help?"
Grandpa Tong was already walking unsteadily, and he fumbled for the drawer tremblingly, and pulled out a photo that was obviously often viewed and touched: "My eldest grandson, Tong Cheng, you can recognize his face. If you are destined to meet him in the future, please tell him for me that we are fine, and there is also."
Mr. Tong waved at them and said, "Come here."
Old Man Tong led them to the entrance of the cellar, but Qin Huai did not let Old Man Tong go down. He could not walk steadily and was climbing up and down. Old Man Tong did not force him. He just smiled and sighed: "People, you have to accept your age. When the time comes, remember to take everything in the cellar away. It's a waste to leave it there."
As for other things, Grandpa Tong did not say anything. He did not say that if he could really see his grandson in the future, he would give him something to eat if his grandson was not living well. He believed that even if he did not say it, these children would do it. At the beginning, he took in so many passers-by who went hunting, but only they came back.
Mu Nan couldn't help but ask curiously, "Grandpa Tong, wasn't this place flooded during the previous flood?"
Old Man Tong: "It's flooded. How could it not be flooded with such a big flood? A lot of food has been spoiled. What a pity. There's not much left. It would be a waste to leave it there. You can take it all away when the time comes."
After showing them the way to the cellar, Old Man Tong asked them to go back into the house and handed Mu Nan a wooden box. "If you meet Tong Cheng in the future, please help me give this to him. This was originally passed down from the old Tong family to his daughter-in-law. If you don't meet him, forget it. It means that our fate has ended. I won't force it. If you have a hard time in the future, you can sell this for some food."
Mu Nan didn't dare to accept it. He endured it again and again, but still couldn't help asking: "Why us?"
Any soldier would be more reliable than them in handling this kind of thing. And looking at the young man in the photo, he seems to be a soldier as well. That soldier is obviously more suitable to find someone than them.
Old Master Tong still had a smile on his face, but when he lowered his eyes to wipe his pipe, the corners of his eyes seemed to be red: "Because it's you, maybe the child won't hate you so much."
Mu Nan didn't quite understand what this meant, so he turned to look at Qin Huai. Seeing that Mr. Tong had no intention of saying more, Qin Huai didn't ask any more questions, but promised Mr. Tong that if they had the chance to meet him in the future, he would definitely pass it on to him.
While they were talking, the groggy Grandma Tong woke up and called out "old man" incoherently. Old Man Tong sat down on the kang, holding Grandma Tong's hand and responding to her calls without any impatience, and gently combing her hair.
Grandma Tong's condition was a bit like a last-ditch effort, but she was not completely awake. She just recognized her husband who was cutting her hair. When asked if she was hungry or wanted to eat something, she said she wanted to eat pea yellow.
Old Master Tong held his wife's hand with a smile: "You always give me problems. On our first date, you said you wanted to eat pea yellow. I searched for half of Kangyun before I found it in a Beijing cake shop. Where can I find it now? You always bothered me when you were young, and you still bother me now that you are old."
Mu Nan had the space, but he hesitated when he opened his mouth. Even though he knew that the other person was an old man whose life was about to come to an end, his self-preservation instinct still made him dare not expose the space casually.
Qin Huai knew what he was thinking from the look on his face, so he said, "I can do it. We just happen to have soybeans in the car. Let's do some with the existing conditions. But we may have to wait a while."
Old Master Tong didn't hold out hope of letting his wife finally eat pea yellow, so he just let them do whatever they wanted. There was no electricity in this old house, and they still used firewood to make fire. The temperature was extremely hot for cooking. Mu Nan was afraid that Qin Huai would get heatstroke, so he took turns with him.
Pea yellow is not difficult to make, you just need to soak the soybeans in advance, but they didn’t have the soaked soybeans in advance, so they could only boil it in boiling water until it became a paste.
After waiting for a long time, the sweet smell of soybeans gradually filled the house. Grandma Tong seemed to be confused again. She grabbed Grandpa Tong's hand and asked if Chengcheng had come back.
Old Man Tong helped Grandma Tong up and pointed at the two people in the kitchen: "Look, they are back and are cooking for you."
Grandma Tong's vision was so blurry that she couldn't make out the people, but she could vaguely see two people over there. When she heard that it was Chengcheng who came back, she smiled and said with tears in her eyes, "You're back, it's good that you're back, are you all back?"
Old Master Tong whispered in her ear: "They are back, both of them are back, both of them are back together."
In the end, the pea yellow was made successfully, but there was not enough time to cool it down in the refrigerator and remove it from the mold. But this was just right. Grandma Tong probably didn’t have the strength to bite anything at the moment, so it was just right for her to eat something soft and mushy, as long as it tasted the same.
Grandpa Tong fed Grandma Tong little by little, and said to Qin Huai: "You go back and move everything in the cellar. Come back tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. We will trouble you to help us deal with the funeral affairs. You can come again for the ashes and bury them in this yard."
Mu Nan turned to look at Qin Huai. Qin Huai said nothing, but just hummed. Old Master Tong smiled and wiped his wife's mouth.
There wasn't much left in the cellar, just a few bags of rice and sealed dry goods, like vermicelli, Qin Huai moved them all into the car and asked Mu Nan to wait in the car. He went into the house and seemed to say goodbye to the two old people, and soon came out. After getting in the car, Qin Huai didn't rush to drive. He sat in the car for a while, and Mu Nan wiped her tears with a tissue: "Will Grandpa Tong commit suicide?"
Qin Huai shook his head: "No."
He looked at the things in the back seat and said, "Then he asked us to take all the food away."
Qin Huai wiped his tears and said, "They just went to another better world together, so there is nothing to be sad about. Look, Grandpa Tong is smiling all the time."
Mu Nan sniffed: "They haven't waited for their grandson to come back yet."
Qin Huai stepped on the accelerator: "Not being able to wait may be a good thing. Not being able to wait will lead to more possibilities."
Mu Nan didn't understand, just like what Grandpa Tong said, he didn't understand either. For the first time, he felt that his IQ was really low: "What exactly did Grandpa Tong mean by that? Why us? Is there any difference between us handing it over and others handing it over?"
Qin Huai said: "Maybe it's because we are a couple."
"so what?"
Qin Huai: "So don't think about it. Are you hungry? Get something to eat."
It was really frustrating to see that half of the information was kept secret, but although he was hungry, he had no appetite at all. When he thought of those two old people, Mu Nan's tears welled up again, especially when Grandpa Tong was feeding Grandma Tong the pea yellow little by little at the end. For some reason, that scene made people feel particularly sad.
In order to divert Mu Nan's attention, Qin Huai said, "Let's see what we can get out of the space."
Mu Nan: “???”
Qin Huai: "Isn't this the perfect time to help our neighbors? Only we know what Grandpa Tong gave us. If you take this opportunity to add something to it, it will be considered a legitimate source."
As expected, Mu Nan's attention was diverted instantly. He leaned on the seat and looked back, then took out a few bags of rice with a similar texture to the one Grandpa Tong gave them from the space. There were also some dry goods, such as vacuum-packed seaweed and mushrooms. These could be stored for a long time, and vacuum-packing them would only make them last longer.
He also took some soybeans, mung beans, and cornmeal. Originally, the things in the cellar only occupied part of the back seat of the car, but after Mu Nan filled it up, it was almost full.
"That's enough. We are really little angels. We do good things without leaving our names. You are so lucky to be our friend."
Qin Huai smiled and quickened his pace to go home.
Mu Nan tagged them in the small group, just to see if they were asleep. They had been busy for most of the night and it was almost dawn. Normally, he would be asleep at this time.
Unexpectedly, Jian Chu and Song Jia responded immediately after he tagged them. They probably saw that they were out all night. Although they didn't know what they did, they were worried that something might have happened. So when he appeared in the group, Song Jia quickly asked, "What's going on with you? Are you back?"
Mu Nan: "We went to Grandpa Tong's place. Grandma Tong is dying, and Grandpa Tong doesn't plan to live alone, so he asked us to help deal with the funeral arrangements."
Song Jia and Jian Chu were immediately shocked: "???!!!"
Mu Nan took a photo of the back seat of the car filled with supplies: "Grandpa Tong gave them to us. When we get home, you can come and share them."
Although there were suddenly a lot more things, this was not something to be happy about. Jian Chu had never met the two old people from the Tong family, but from what Song Jia and Mu Nan had said before, he could feel that they were two very good people even if he had never met them.
Not long ago, when they were chatting, they mentioned that after the flood, the yard might be uninhabitable. They didn't know whether the two old people had moved to the residential area to settle down. Unexpectedly, such a short time later, they passed away.
Song Jia still remembers that Grandma Tong was in good health at that time, and her eyesight was good enough to help him mend his clothes. It has only been a short time since then.
When they arrived at the yard, it was already daybreak, but there was a sunshade installed at the door of their house, so it was not too bad when they came and went, as they were not exposed to the sun.
Yu Zibai got off work early. When their car entered the garage, he came over to help them unload the goods. Mu Nan said, "Let's split it in half. Give Xu Ming a share as well."
As for the Cai family, Mu Nan didn't mention it, and neither did anyone else. They had been in a cooperative relationship before, and now because they lived close, they had more contact, but the relationship was not that close. It was not like them, who had been helping each other for so long and even saved each other's lives. After all, the relationship was a little lacking, so it was impossible for them to be so generous in sharing the food.
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