Chapter 168
The first educated youth to come out arrived much earlier than the time agreed upon by Liu Zhifu. When they saw the tractor parked where they got off, they climbed onto the tractor without even saying hello to Liu Zhifu.
As soon as Liu Zhifu saw the man's face, he knew that he probably didn't do well in the exam. He didn't care whether he was polite or not, and didn't ask him how he did. He looked at the stream of people coming in and out of the gate of the Education Commission. It was getting darker, and more and more educated youth from Ping'an Village came out. Their faces were in stark contrast to those who were about to leave the courtyard:
The people who were about to enter the courtyard had very nervous expressions on their faces, but their eyes were shining. The educated youth who had already left Pingan Village had dim eyes and lowered their heads a little more than when they first came.
Hu Zhongshan and Li Youguang had not come out yet, and Deng Chunlin shouted at Liu Zhifu in dissatisfaction: "Are you going back to the brigade or not?"
Liu Zhifu looked back at the car fight, carefully took out his watch from his inner pocket, took a look at it and said, "There are still more than ten minutes left." If he really listened to him and drove away, and something happened to the people who didn't turn back, that guy would put the blame on him.
Like all the members of Ping'an Village, Liu Zhifu had no feelings towards the educated youth in general, but he hated Deng Chunlin: This kid even dared to challenge his aunt during the New Year. It's good that he didn't beat her up. He felt painful if he said one more word to him.
Liu Zhifu's attitude made Deng Chunlin grumble again. Liu Zhifu didn't hear what he said, but he didn't even have the interest to ask. He turned his head again and looked at the door of the Education Commission, and saw Hu Zhongshan and Li Youguang walking out with excitement.
"Sorry to have kept you waiting." Hu Zhongshan greeted Liu Zhifu, with a smile on his face. Li Youguang nodded to Liu Zhifu and climbed into the car with Hu Zhongshan.
Liu Zhifu turned around and counted the people in the car fight with some concern. He found that the number was the same as when he came. He asked again, "No one is missing, right?"
Hu Zhongshan also turned his head and counted the people, then smiled and said to Liu Zhifu, "Everyone is here."
No one denied Hu Zhongshan's words. Liu Zhifu got off the tractor and adjusted the direction to take the educated youth back to Ping'an Village. At the moment when the tractor turned around, two suppressed cries were heard from the car fight, and soon someone else joined in, but no one was heard to persuade them.
Liu Zhifu didn't notice when the crying stopped. His stomach was growling with hunger and he just wanted to go home and eat as soon as possible.
The road from the county to Ping'anzhuang was very flat, and the tractor arrived at the intersection of Ping'anzhuang Brigade in a short while. Liu Zhifu stopped the tractor and said to the educated youth without looking back: "I'll just drop you off here. I have to go home too." The Ping'anzhuang production team was still five or six miles away from the brigade.
"The brigade asked you to send us to the county seat, why did you abandon us halfway?" someone shouted in dissatisfaction.
No one agreed with that person. Hu Zhongshan and Li Youguang got off the tractor first, thanked Liu Zhifu, and followed him to the educated youth site. The others also got off the car one after another.
Liu Zhifu secretly counted the people who passed by him and found that there was still one person missing. He turned around and saw that person still sitting in the corner of the car. Some of the educated youth who had walked a distance in front also noticed that there was one person missing. Those who were close to him turned around and shouted, "Get off. Why are you angry with him?"
Liu Zhifu wanted to ask, but he held back and just turned his head to look at the man. Perhaps his companion's call gave the man a chance to stand up, or perhaps it was because the temperature was even lower at night that he was too cold to stand up. After a stalemate of more than ten seconds, the man climbed down from the car by himself.
Ten or so seconds were enough for his companion to run back to find him. Seeing that he had already gotten off the car, he said impatiently, "Aren't you hungry? Why are you still dawdling in the car? You're not the only one who failed the exam. Everyone did poorly. So why don't you just live your life?" Then he pulled the man over, nodded at Liu Zhifu, and walked away.
"Auntie, I think that educated youth just wanted to cause trouble." When Liu Zhifu returned the watch to Xia Juhua, he explained why he ignored the educated youth: "He probably wanted to fight with me. Those educated youths might all think so in their hearts. They knew they didn't do well in the exam, so they wanted to find trouble to vent. I saw that there were more than ten of them and I was the only one, so I ignored him. You, don't you think I didn't..."
Xia Juhua took the watch and put it on her wrist, then patted Liu Zhifu: "You handled it very well. Didn't you say that there are many people and you are alone, so you will be the one who suffers in a fight. Those people are furious and will not hold back when they hit you. What if they beat you up?"
Liu Zhifu thought so because of Xia Juhua's angry response to Secretary Tang two days ago. The lady looked so majestic that day, and the young and old in Pingan Village were all encouraged. But he also encountered something that made him, but he didn't say a word. He was afraid that Xia Juhua would think that he was spineless for not immediately fighting back against the educated youth's malicious words. He didn't expect that Xia Juhua was worried about his safety, not whether he was brave for a moment, and was so moved that she couldn't speak.
Xia Juhua was afraid that he would continue to blame himself, so she asked, "Do you think those educated youth didn't do well in the exams?"
"I guess only Hu Zhongshan and Li Youguang did well, the rest are pretty bad." Liu Zhifu shook his head, not very optimistic about the performance of most of the youth educated.
His estimate was correct. Even though the educated youth had little contact with the members of Pingan Village, it was not difficult for Xia Juhua to find out their scores. Soon she found out that the best educated youth in Pingan Village was Hu Zhongshan, who scored 394 points. Li Youguang scored 31 points less than him, with a total score of 363 points. The rest of the educated youth did not score more than 300 points.
Although the scores were known, the cut-off score had not yet come out. In addition, based on their college entrance examination scores, only three or four educated youth could be sent away at most, and the rest would have to continue to stay in the educated youth sites until the large-scale return to the city policy was implemented, at which time the educated youth sites could be vacated.
The construction of instant noodle factories cannot wait for the policy of returning to the cities.
Fortunately, the original plan of the brigade was to use the old building of the educated youth site as a warehouse. Now the factory building has been built and is just waiting for Engineer Xue to bring the production line in. Xia Juhua decided to build a wall between the new factory building and the educated youth site, and open a door on each side to prevent dissatisfied educated youth from doing anything to affect production.
Considering that the wall would be torn down in a short time, they did not waste green bricks and directly used adobe to build the wall. For the Ping An village members who were used to using their strength, the last thing they lacked was strength. Building the wall also counted as work points, so it didn't matter what kind of work they did.
Just when Technician Xue arrived at the instant noodle factory with the production line, the college entrance examination score line for L Province was announced: 325 points for liberal arts and 354 points for science. Both Hu Zhongshan and Li Youguang passed the undergraduate line. Whether they could go to college depended on which school they applied to.
Among the other educated youth, two scored close to 300 points and still had hope of going to college, but the rest could only prepare for next year. However, Xia Juhua was not optimistic about them - soon the policy of returning to the city would be implemented, and the educated youth would return to their hometowns and face the problem of finding a job to make a living. The time they could spend studying would probably be longer than the time they spent in Ping'an Village.
If you don't have time to read and have to worry about work and getting along with your family, your chances of getting into college will be even smaller.
Xia Juhua naturally had no time to sympathize with them. Now she spent every day debugging the production line with Engineer Xue. Engineer Xue was really a talent. Even though Xia Juhua's description of the production line was very vague and the references she mentioned were far from the truth, he managed to piece together the production line and made it infinitely close to fully automatic production from the semi-automatic production line currently used in the vermicelli factory.
Because the production line is almost fully automatic, the requirements for operators are much higher than those of vermicelli factories. Thanks to the literacy classes started by the Pinganzhuang production team, which have never stopped in recent years, the team can easily select a few young men who want to learn to read to participate in the training.
With the backbone, it is not difficult to ask people to memorize the operating procedures. Engineer Xue's training task this time is actually much easier than that at the vermicelli factory.
"Auntie, what do you think of this dehydrator?" Technician Xue focused on the dehydrator - Xia Juhua said that whether the instant noodles can have a richer taste depends on this machine. For this reason, he asked the researchers in the institute for advice and promised that the researcher who helped him the most would be listed as the inventor together with him when applying for a patent in the future.
That's right, when Technician Xue was researching the instant noodle factory production line, the semi-automatic production line of the vermicelli factory passed the patent acceptance, and the inventor was Engineer Xue. Because of this, Engineer Xue is now more valued in the institute, and what he promised is so attractive.
Xia Juhua looked at the outlet where the ingredients kept coming out, grabbed a handful, twisted it and said, "I think it can work. But you still have to soak it in water to see how it recovers." It's impossible for the dough to be soaked until it becomes soft. If you still can't chew the vegetable buns, it's better not to add them.
As long as you have a heart and the right direction, you will succeed one day. Soon, the first batch of instant noodles was successfully produced, and the taste was just like seafood. Engineer Xue gave a very honest evaluation: "Auntie, don't give me work points this time, just pack two boxes of instant noodles for me to take home."
Xia Juhua was amused by him and remembered the last time she gave him work points separately, so she asked, "Did you buy a house with the money I gave you last time?"
Engineer Xue burped and said, "I bought it. You told me several times. I was afraid that if I didn't buy it, you wouldn't let me come to Ping'an Village next time. But now I see, I'm glad I listened to you. Although my small yard is not big and has only three rooms, I can live alone and do whatever I want. I feel very comfortable."
Although the house was returned after his parents were rehabilitated, he was not the only child in the family. His two brothers had each started a family and had children, so it was very inconvenient for them to live together. In fact, both brothers were allocated houses by their units, but for some reason they said that the children needed their mother's help to take care of them, so they did not move into the houses they were allocated.
Engineer Xue was not married, so the institute only gave him a two-person dormitory, which was inconvenient for storing valuables or washing. It was not until he received 3,000 yuan in "work points" from Ping An Zhuang, plus his own savings, that he bought a small yard and finally had his own private space.
It was a great honor to be able to buy a house in Beijing at this time, and it was an independent small courtyard. No matter how good the location was, it was not a loss. Xia Juhua was also happy for him and said, "I can bring you two boxes of instant noodles, but these are fried, and it's not good to eat them for a long time. Don't eat them every day."
Engineer Xue was not happy: "Those fried in oil are not good, what good is that? Auntie, are you worried about the instant noodles and afraid that I will buy too much?"
Only then did Xia Juhua realize that the memories of her previous life had become detached from the reality of this life: everyone is starving now, and being able to eat fried food is a blessing, and it is not the time to regard convenience as junk food.
However, this also reminded Xia Juhua that since she was the first person to produce instant noodles, she could completely avoid preservatives from appearing in the instant noodles.
Although it is difficult to measure from the perspective of shelf life and it may also cause some waste, Xia Juhua thinks it is worth it. As for whether fried foods are healthy, let's wait until everyone is worried about losing weight before discussing it.
Once you have a new idea, you have to implement it. Anyway, there are no preservatives in the hot and sour noodles. After more than a year of trials, except for the seasoning packet, the dough has not deteriorated, which gave Xia Juhua great confidence.
After Xia Juhua adjusted the formula of instant noodle seasoning, the problem of insufficient manpower to make the seasoning appeared again. Fortunately, when the instant noodle factory was recruiting, half of the workers were female workers, who were mainly engaged in the processes that did not require much physical strength, such as packaging and sealing.
In order to manage these female workers, Xia Juhua had to transfer An Baoling to the instant noodle factory to coordinate management when she was away. Now that she was too busy to handle it alone, why not just ask An Baoling to help her deal with the seasoning ratio? It was a blessing in disguise.
As the production line was put into formal production, the two of them were still a little overwhelmed and urgently needed more people to join in. However, the people in the Ping'anzhuang weaving team could not be moved anymore - the weaving team was all women, and there were more family matters. Zhang Cuiping and others were divided into three groups, and Hong Cui had to help from time to time.
"Captain, I have something to ask you." Accountant Chang, who was always tactful, seemed not to see that Xia Juhua was anxious this time, and suddenly ran to the instant noodle factory to find her.
Xia Juhua had always gotten along well with him over the years, and Accountant Chang had never asked her for help with his personal matters. When she heard that he had something to do, she hurriedly asked, "What's the matter? Did something happen at home?"
I often sighed: "Oh, I feel so hateful when I talk about it."
It turned out that his daughter Chang Chunya had been living like this since she got married. Because they hadn't had a child for two years, her mother-in-law had already started to make a fuss at home. She complained to the man about her grievances, but the man didn't say a word to her, and even complained about her not being able to give in to her mother-in-law and even gossiping about the elders behind her back.
Chang Chunya was also a person with a bad temper. She felt that if she stayed in her husband's family any longer, she would be angry to death sooner or later, so she packed her bags and went back to her parents' home, declaring that she could no longer live in her husband's family and would live in her parents' home for a long time.
The couple often thought that since their daughter was married, even if she was angry with her husband's family, she could go back to her parents' home for two days. When her aunt came to pick her up, she and her son would scare her and let it go. She was already married, so how could she stay there forever? Not only would she feel bad, but people at home would also talk about her.
Unexpectedly, after more than half a month, the aunt did not show up, as if she really didn't have this daughter-in-law. Chang Ji was still furious, but still felt that the daughter-in-law had not considered this matter, so she asked her eldest son to go to the daughter-in-law's in-laws' farm. Unexpectedly, the news he brought back was that the family had already spread the word that Chang Chunya could come back or not, and living with her parents could save food for their family.
Chang Chunya's mother-in-law also told people that Chang Chunya, the daughter-in-law, relied on her family's wealth to look down on not only their family but also their production team. She always complained that the production team's work points were low, the roads were difficult to travel, and there was no electricity...
Maybe Chang Chunya did complain about these things, but she must have said them only in front of her closest people - although her daughter is strong-willed, she is not the kind of person who doesn't know the difference between the important and the unimportant - she didn't expect that her mother-in-law would say them to the people on the production team.
Never mind how her mother-in-law knew about it. Just think that once she tells others this, how will the entire production team view Chang Chunya? How will she face the people in that production team in the future?
When Accountant Chang heard what his son had said, he was furious. He immediately rushed to the production team of his in-laws to ask his aunt and mother-in-law how much they despised his daughter and why they didn't even want to leave her a job. If they really didn't want their daughter to be the daughter-in-law of the Tang family, they should just say it directly.
His eldest son understood clearly, and he grabbed Accountant Chang and said, "Dad, I think they just want to take advantage of our family and force you to arrange for Tang Qijin to work in the vermicelli factory. If you go there and they ask you to either let Qijin work or not let them live, what will you do?"
Although Accountant Chang doesn't talk much, he has a sharp mind. He was so angry at his mother-in-law for mistreating his daughter that he lost his mind. But he came to his senses when his eldest son reminded him:
Maybe my aunt's family is waiting for one of our family members to come over - since the news of working and earning money in the vermicelli factory spread throughout the area, Qi Jin forced Chang Chunya to go home and beg for mercy once, but was rejected by Accountant Chang because all the people working there were members of Ping'anzhuang Brigade.
Since then, Chang Chunya always came back alone when she went back to her parents' home, without even a trace of her aunt. Even though Accountant Chang knew that her aunt had opinions about her, for the sake of their smooth life, she never asked her daughter a single question, and even secretly gave her money to let her buy some delicious food for her aunt to ease his opinion of her father-in-law's family. Unexpectedly, all the money was fed to the dog!
But it is not a good idea for a daughter to stay at home all the time. First of all, after she gets married, her household registration will be transferred to her husband's family, and food will become a problem. With the income of a normal accountant, there is no shortage of money to buy food, but it is not just about buying food!
Accountant Chang not only has Chang Chunya as his daughter, but also two married sons. Because of Accountant Chang, his two sons and daughter-in-law work in the vermicelli factory, instant noodle factory and weaving team respectively. At first, they don't say anything, but after a long time, it's not the case anymore.
Chang Chunya had been at home for more than a month, and her two daughters-in-law showed some emotions from time to time. Chang Ji could see it, and Chang Chunya could see it too. She hadn't eaten or slept well for several days, and she had thought about going back to her husband's house.
But when she told her mother, she was suppressed - the couple quarreled to the point that the daughter-in-law had to go back to her parents' home. If the husband did not come to pick her up, she would never be able to raise her head in her husband's family in the future. Moreover, her mother-in-law had ruined Chunya so much in the production team. If the Tang family did not send someone to pick her up, how could she put forward conditions to make her mother-in-law take back her words?
In order to let his daughter feel at ease living in her parents' home, Accountant Chang had to put aside his old face and ask Xia Juhua today if it was possible to let his daughter work in one of the factories.
Xia Juhua was furious after hearing what Accountant Chang said. "Chun Ya has only been married for two years, and her mother-in-law already dislikes her for not having children? In our brigade, there are people who get married four or five years before having their first child. How can they live like that?"
Accountant Chang sighed again and said nothing. Xia Juhua then asked, "What if Chunya comes to work in the factory and her in-laws come to pick her up?"
Accountant Chang gritted his teeth and said, "They are so stubborn that they won't let Chunya go back even if they come to pick me up."
An Baoling was shocked: "You want them to divorce?"
"I don't want them to get divorced, but this Tang family thing is disgusting - what kind of couple is angry about the wife going back to her parents' home, and the husband doesn't come to pick her up after a few days? It's been more than a month, and not a single person from the Tang family has shown up. If they have any requests, I would look up to them if they said it openly, but this behavior of wanting things and wanting others to beg for them, is this something a decent family would do?"
"If I give in this time, I don't know what tricks I'll use next time. I don't just have Chunya as my daughter, I also have to think about my two sons. I've made up my mind. Even if the Tang family comes to pick them up, I have to explain everything clearly. When they go back, I'll let Chunya and her family live separately. Even if Chunya has to travel every day, she has to come back to work."
Chang Hui had calculated the accounts of these years and his own family's accounts very clearly, and the idea he came up with for his daughter was not ruthless. Xia Juhua and An Baoling did not think there was anything wrong with what Chang Hui did, but nodded in agreement.
An Baoling nudged her sister-in-law with her arm and said, "Sister-in-law, we are short of manpower. Let Chunya come. She is young and smart. She can replace you when she comes. You don't have to take leave every time there is a commune meeting."
"Accountant Chang, it's okay for Chunya to come to work, but her household registration is no longer in Ping'anzhuang. Her salary cannot be the same as that of Ping'anzhuang members, at least not in the first year. Otherwise, I won't be able to explain to the members." Xia Juhua thought about it and made a request to Accountant Chang.
Accountant Chang now only hopes that his daughter can have a place to relax and that he can save up some food money and hand it over to the old couple in front of their two daughters-in-law, so that the daughters-in-law do not choose the gifts first.
Accountant Chang had no objection to Xia Juhua's request, and immediately arranged for Chang Chunya to come to work at the instant noodle factory the next day. After he left, An Baoling said angrily, "I never thought that Chunya would marry such a man. If I had known earlier, I would have found a husband for her in our production team."
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