Chapter 76 Drilling a Well
Because of the problem of improper excrement disposal, the users on the lower floors and the newly moved in neighbors are at loggerheads with each other, and the two groups always fight and curse at each other when they meet.
But soon, they no longer had the energy to argue.
The weather is too hot. If you go out without any sunscreen, you will be sunburned in five minutes. If the soles of the shoes you wear are thin, you dare not walk in the hot sun for fear of burning your feet.
It is no exaggeration to say that as soon as the people upstairs threw their excrement downstairs, the flies didn't even have a chance to eat the hot food before it was dried up.
There is no thermometer, but looking at the rolling heat waves outside, I can tell that the temperature has reached at least 40 degrees Celsius.
In hot weather, you will sweat profusely even if you stay indoors. How can you have the energy to argue with others?
At 4:30 in the morning, Su Ran rang 1504, "Sister Xiaoman, are you done? Let's go downstairs to catch locusts!"
In hot weather, the sun comes out early, and the sky is already pale at 4:30. Go out to catch locusts in the morning when it is not so hot, so you won't get heatstroke easily.
Xia Xiaoman picked up the cup and gulped down a large glass of water. After replenishing her water, she took the snakeskin bag and went out.
All the staff have been catching locusts for seven or eight days in a row. There are fewer and fewer locusts outside. At the beginning, we could catch a large quilt of locusts, but now we should be thankful if we can fill a snakeskin bag.
Although there are few locusts, many people still come to catch them in the hot weather.
Now no one wants to catch locusts to exchange for food, they all exchange them for water.
On the third day of the locust plague, people were sent to guard the mountain springs and streams, and no one was allowed to fill water privately.
Because of this incident, the first protest by the people of Fucheng since the founding of the country took place. Some citizens could not accept Fucheng's tyrannical and overbearing style of behavior and demanded that the springs and streams be opened to allow the people to use water freely.
The parade lasted less than half a day before it ended, and Fucheng did not send anyone to stop the parade.
The parade ended because many people fainted or suffered from heat stroke during the process.
Freedom of water use is important, but life is more important than freedom of water use.
Seeing so many people fall, there was no need for Fucheng to make any arrangements. The remaining parade teams automatically disbanded and went back to their homes.
Unable to fetch water themselves, they could only spend their supplies to exchange for water at trading points, or catch locusts to exchange for water.
So even though the weather is so bad that it can kill people with heat, there are still many people coming out to catch locusts.
Xia Xiaoman went downstairs wearing a thin, sweat-absorbent sportswear. After strolling for half a day, she finally caught more than twenty skinny locusts.
Suddenly, there were several screams from a distance. Xia Xiaoman turned her head and saw that another person had fainted. The person was twitching all over and it was estimated that he would not survive.
In the past, if you suffered from heat stroke, you still had a chance of survival as long as you received timely rescue.
But there are no ambulances now. If you faint from heatstroke, you may be lucky enough to meet a kind person who will carry you to a medical station for rescue and you may be able to save your life.
Bad luck, just like now. After the people in the community screamed, their first reaction was to grab the bag of locusts that the man dropped on the ground.
Seeing the bag being snatched away by someone else, the onlookers cursed and secretly hated themselves for being so slow and letting others get there first.
As for the heat stroke patient on the ground, no one cares whether he lives or dies.
When Su Ran saw this scene, he suddenly felt a little scary. It wasn't that he felt scary about others, but that he felt scary about himself.
If it were in the past, he would have stepped forward to help without hesitation. Even if he couldn't save the patient with heatstroke, he would have tried his best to make the other person more comfortable in the last moments.
But now, he had no intention of going forward to help. Moreover, when he saw the man fall, he subconsciously wanted to grab the bag of locusts like everyone else.
It had only been half a year since the natural disaster, and he had already become so selfish. If the natural disaster lasted longer, what kind of monster would he become?
"Hey! There's a car coming, it's a well-drilling car!"
I don't know who howled, but everyone around was attracted and followed him out of the community.
Su Ran came back to his senses and heard a rumbling sound coming from outside. He followed the crowd out and saw two cars driving slowly in the distance, one in front of the other, one of which was carrying a huge machine.
Perhaps because the machine they were carrying was too heavy, the two cars drove very slowly. It took them almost ten minutes to enter the community, a distance of just a few hundred meters.
All the residents in the community were walking around the two cars. It was only because the staff on the cars got off and drove away the crowd for fear of hitting people that they made way for the two cars to enter the center of the community.
When a well-drilling truck appeared in the community, many people were no longer interested in catching locusts and all ran to watch the workers digging the well.
Xia Xiaoman also gave up catching locusts and went home, standing on the balcony with a telescope watching others digging wells.
The staff used instruments to detect a suitable location for drilling a well, selected a place, installed the machine and prepared to drill a well.
There are high-rise buildings all around. If we dig a deep well, it may affect the foundations of several nearby buildings, so we can only dig wells within a hundred meters.
But in order to provide convenient water supply for nearby residents, after digging the well inside the community, the staff found a place outside the community to dig a deep well.
With a well, everyone thought they could achieve water freedom.
Unexpectedly, as soon as the well was dug, a thick iron cover was installed and locked with an iron chain thicker than a wrist.
After the staff left, someone tried to pick the lock, but failed after trying for a long time.
Su Ran looked puzzled, "Why do you want to lock the well? If you don't allow us to use the well, then why do we need to draw water?"
Zhou Qiuyang had already understood Fu Cheng's tactics and said, "Is there any need to think about this? They must want us to exchange our supplies for the number of times we use the well water, or for the amount of well water we use."
Su Ran's mouth twitched, "This is too absurd! The higher-ups are trying every possible way to steal our supplies!"
"It shouldn't be the case. Maybe they want to control water consumption and limit how much water we use every day." Wen Jianfeng guessed.
Xia Xiaoman nodded. "If we have to use supplies to buy water draw times or water usage, many people will die of thirst."
Not everyone has abundant supplies at home. For example, the residents of Building 7 whose homes were burned down were extremely poor. If they had to be given supplies in order to use water, they would die of thirst after all the locusts were caught.
The higher-ups won’t be so cruel. They asked us to exchange water with supplies before, probably because they wanted to save water and avoid waste.
As if to confirm Wen Jianfeng and Xia Xiaoman's conjecture, Fucheng issued rules for the use of the well the next day.
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