Someone in the queue immediately started to make a noise, shouting at the top of their lungs:
"Hey, what's going on? If you want to buy coal, go to the back and queue up. We've been queuing since before dawn, and you're just here to get in?"
"That's right, even if the cadres come, they have to queue up!"
"Yes, get out of the way!"
Shen Guoming was wearing a large blue cotton jacket and cotton trousers, clean and tidy.
Lin Sanqi's cotton-padded jacket has a lot of secrets inside. The outside is made of ordinary fabric, but the filling inside is actually goose down. After all, people in the south are afraid of the cold, so there are two hot packs on the underwear.
The two men came by car, dressed neatly, and had a pen in their breast pocket. They were obviously people of status.
Dean Shen smiled and took out a green notebook from his briefcase:
"Everyone has misunderstood. We are here to buy coal on behalf of our company. We have no conflict with you and we will not cut in line."
The windows where companies buy coal are different from those where ordinary people buy coal, so Dean Shen said this.
Someone in the crowd shouted, "Why isn't there a conflict? You buy up dozens or hundreds of tons at a time. How much will be left for ordinary people like us?"
"That's right, you leaders only care about keeping your office warm, but why don't you think of heating the workshop?"
"It's the same thing at our neighborhood office factory. The workers' hands are covered in sores from the cold, but the factory director is sitting in his office, burning the stove."
The crowd began to talk, expressing their dissatisfaction with the lack of heating. When people in Beijing curse, it is very common to use "mother" in a curse.
Lin Sanqi thought, I was just praising the cadres of this era for having a bottom line, oh, I was being too sentimental, there are always a few rats ruining their reputation.
At this time, a small leader who was maintaining order in the coal yard also came over with a sniffle:
"Which unit are you from?"
"Hello, comrade. We are from the Capital Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine."
"The one on Kuan Street? Oh, sorry, your hospital doesn't have an inpatient department, so the coal quota is limited. I checked, it's only 10 tons. The higher-ups said that this year the priority for coal is to ensure patients, such as at Union Hospital, Railway General Hospital, Coal General Hospital, etc."
Dean Shen frowned:
"What can 10 tons of coal do? Besides, who says our Chinese medicine hospital doesn't have an inpatient department? We still have 200 inpatients at our Changping branch."
The coal yard staff smiled and shook their heads:
"You said it's the Changping branch, so the land belongs to Changping. We don't want to worry about it. I'm sorry!"
Dean Shen didn't argue. This was the rule at the time. It was territorial management. You were in charge of where you were.
The key point is that the Changping branch is a freak, a self-financing farm. The state does not even supply food and various bills, let alone coal.
Seeing the dean so worried, Lin Sanqi felt relieved. It's just a little coal, no problem!
"Uncle Shen, it's okay. The country doesn't give us coal because we have practical difficulties. I'll take care of it."
Lin Sanqi thought that he could go and get coal in 2014. As long as the money was in place, he could have as much as he wanted.
The young leader of the coal mine was delighted when he heard this:
"Oh, I didn't realize you were such a capable person, but with the coal supply situation this year, I guess you'll have to find a big, big leader to get approval. Wanting hundreds or thousands of tons, I'm not being mean, but I'm afraid it's as difficult as climbing to the sky."
Lin Sanqi knew that people in Beijing spoke directly, so he didn't get angry, but he was a little curious:
"Comrade, what is your name?"
"Minggui, surnamed Zhou, Zhou Caizhi."
"Comrade Zhou, right? Then I'm a little curious. The newspapers say that before the founding of the People's Republic of China, annual coal production was only 40 million tons, but by last year it had reached 300 million tons. With such a huge increase in production, even if some of it was exported, there wouldn't be such a shortage of coal, right?"
Everyone in the surrounding coal yard started laughing.
Zhou Caidi laughed for a while before shaking his head helplessly:
"Comrade, how can you hospital staff understand the national energy supply situation? Let me tell you, based on the current national demand, we would need at least 800 million tons of coal to meet the demand.
Because of the coal shortage, not only can people's heating problems not be solved, but even locomotives can't start. Our capital is relatively well off, but in some remote areas, factories have had to shut down due to coal shortages.
Think about it, the national annual production is 300 million tons, and more than half of that is exported. Faced with this huge gap, can we avoid a coal shortage in the country? So it's not that our coal yard is making things difficult for your Chinese medicine hospital; we simply can't squeeze out the coal."
If you talk about other things, Lin Sanqi may not understand, but if you list the data like this, Lin Sanqi will be dumbfounded instantly.
"Is the gap so huge? I remember our country has quite abundant coal reserves..."
Lin Sanqi had checked the information. Although he didn't remember it completely, he vaguely remembered that coal production reached 4.5 billion tons in 2022, and this was under the premise that oil and natural gas accounted for half of the energy supply.
Zhou Caizhi laughed:
"Our country has abundant coal reserves. They are so abundant that our coal department will dig them up for the use of the people of the country even if it costs us our lives.
It's not just coal, let's talk about oil. I heard an oil field was discovered in Daqing, Northeast China last year, but we don't know how much the reserves are. Foreigners say our country is poor in oil and coal, right?
We are a country poor in oil and coal...
On the way back to the hospital, Lin Sanqi was in deep thought, thinking about what Zhou Caizhi had just said.
Zhou Caizhi, who works in the coal industry, believes this statement. Obviously, in the minds of the people of the whole country, and even the top leaders, we are a country with very poor energy resources.
But is this really the case?
He Lin Sanqi didn't know about other provinces, but he was sure that the coal reserves in Shanxi Province alone reached 50 billion tons, and there was still more that had not been discovered.
Later, those coal bosses from western Shanxi would go to the capital with bags of money to buy houses, cars, and gold. They were so generous. They would spend money on female celebrities without even batting an eyelid.
If we calculate based on the current annual output of 300 million tons, the coal reserves in Shanxi Province alone can be mined for more than 100 years. Looking at the whole country, there is even more coal.
The key is that many coal reserves have not yet been discovered, and perhaps there will be more in the future.
Therefore, our country is not short of coal at all, at least it was impossible to lack coal in 1960. It’s just that the country now does not know how much coal is hidden under our country.
Thinking of this, Lin Sanqi's eyes suddenly lit up:
"Uncle Shen, I have an idea!"
Dean Shen didn't care: "I know you can get coal for our hospital, even for the X-ray production line. A little coal is nothing to you."
Lin Sanqi braked and shouted excitedly:
"No, Uncle Shen, I mean, if I knew how much coal our country has, or even where there's a lot of coal underground, and told the country, then we wouldn't be short of coal anymore."
"You know?"
Dean Shen's expression became serious at this time:
"Xiao Qi, this is no joke. If you truly knew the distribution of our country's underground coal reserves, a situation that even the country doesn't know, and you, or the organization behind you, knew it, do you know what that would mean?"
Lin Sanqi blinked, not understanding why the old man was so serious: "What does it mean?"
"This means that the organization behind you has infiltrated every aspect of the country and even knows our country's most core energy distribution map. This has touched upon the core interests of the country and it is easy for higher-ups to misunderstand that you are plotting something illicit.
The higher-ups can tolerate your smuggling activities because everything you do now is beneficial to the country. However, if the organization behind you can easily control the domestic energy distribution, there will probably be a strict investigation, and if it is discovered, a lot of people will be executed. It's very scary."
"Oh my god, why is it so scary? I just want to make some contribution to the country."
Lin Sanqi is essentially just an intern doctor, at most a smuggler between the two worlds. He lacks a broad vision and knows too little about politics.
Dean Shen thought for a while and asked seriously:
"Xiao Qi, are you sure you can get a true map of the national coal reserves?"
Lin Sanqi hesitated. He didn't want to be locked up in the prison and interrogated. He might even be whipped with a whip soaked in salt water. "Will you tell me or not? Will you tell me or not?"
He came here to make a fortune, not to be arrested as a criminal.
If the consequence is that he suffers losses, then he certainly doesn't want to be a saint. He can't even protect himself, so how can he care whether the country has enough coal or whether the people will freeze to death.
"I...should I say I know...or don't know?"
"If you knew that this distribution map really existed, it would be extremely important to our country. As Communist Party members and state cadres, we must always keep the country and the people in our hearts, so we must submit it.
Then, you can say that your distribution map was drawn before the founding of the People's Republic of China, and the data you provide should preferably be marked with the Republic of China period. At that time, we had not yet established the country, so there would be no risk in providing such data.
Lin Sanqi thought to himself, wow, the old man is really experienced. The details that he himself didn't notice were noticed by the old man at a glance.
"Okay, Uncle Shen, I'm going to take a few days off to try to get information about our country's coal reserves from the organization!"
"Ah, you need to ask for leave again?" (End of this chapter)
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