Chapter 89
"Hasn't the commune notified us to hand in the public grain?"
We are all in the disaster area now. Why can others not pay the public grain if they can't produce grain? Ping'anzhuang Brigade has to pay the public grain if they have to work hard to fight the drought? If Xia Juhua hadn't remembered the location of the well in her previous life, her brigade wouldn't have been able to produce grain either.
The angry face of the Fifth Master flashed before Li Changshun's eyes again. He gritted his teeth and said, "Okay, you can distribute some wheat to according to previous years. Even if the remaining wheat of the production team is not enough to pay the public grain, it should not be too much for everyone. If they insist on it, they can pay sweet potatoes!"
"I'll listen to the captain." Xia Juhua was extremely supportive of Li Changshun's decision: "We'll divide the wheat when it's dried."
If the wheat is dried before being distributed, the members can get a few more kilograms of wheat after the moisture is removed. Li Changshun pretended not to hear Xia Juhua's selfish intentions - they all agreed to let them share the grain, so this little bit is not a big deal. We have to give the members some hope so that they can continue to take care of the autumn crops that are still in the fields.
Since he agreed to let Ping'an Village share the wheat, Li Changshun had to inform the other four production teams to also share the wheat, so that they would not accuse him of favoring Ping'an Village.
What a bunch of heartless people, who is he siding with?
Without seeing Li Changshun anymore, Chen Qiusheng came over with a smile and asked, "Captain, can we get out the wheat we harvested up front?"
Of course they have to be taken out. The last time the members plowed the fields was to pick off the fully ripe wheat ears at intervals. These past few days they have relied on the women to rub off the grains little by little. If they are not dried in the sun, they will sprout and their work will be in vain.
Baskets of husked wheat were carried from the production team to the yard and mixed into the wheat pile that had just been weighed, expanding the pile by a full circle. This was the real output of wheat in Pingan Village: 409 catties per mu.
With the 10% of wheat that was kept secret, each member of Pingan Village received 30 kilograms of wheat, and naturally everyone was very happy. The impatient families ground flour, steamed buns, and cooked noodles that day, and ate them with the pork fat made from the meat they bought a few days ago.
The fifth master did not eat the thin noodles rolled by his grandson's wife first. He walked back and forth on the street, shouting loudly: "Think about how you can eat this white flour, don't talk nonsense to everyone you meet when your dog's stomach can't hold two ounces of sesame oil. If people know about this, the white flour in the mouths of your children, parents will have to be taken away by others. Will you feel bad?"
Liu Daxi followed his grandfather helplessly, thinking in his heart, how come he is the eldest grandson? If he had an older brother like Erxi and the others, he could avoid offending people with his grandfather.
"Fifth Master, your wife Daxi didn't serve you well, so you come out to swear?" Someone who was not afraid of death joked with the old man. Even when Liu Daxi raised his fist at others, they still kept talking: "If I were you, you should be swearing. If I don't hear you swearing, I won't be able to eat my steamed buns."
"Get lost!" Liu Daxi shouted to the others, "When your wife goes to grind flour again, I will throw a handful of sand at her."
The fifth master didn't care how his grandson quarreled with others, and walked all three streets of Pingan Village. Only then did he go home contentedly to eat the already rolled noodles. Even if they were rolled, they were still made of white flour, and they were cooked in a pot with boiling oil, and they tasted delicious!
After the delicious food, the work of field management became more arduous: the wheat fields had to be dug out and turned over quickly to make new ridges, and buckwheat, a short-growing crop, had to be planted. Sweet potato vines had to be pulled out, and corn and sorghum had to be weeded. The people of Ping'an Village continued to struggle on the land as if they were risking their lives.
People from other production teams had said something sour, thinking that the people of Ping'an Village worked so hard, but only harvested 10% more wheat than their own production team, and that the autumn harvest would probably not be much better.
Since the harvest can be seen at a glance, why bother with yourself?
The people of Pingan Village ignored these sour words, and they also became their excuse to resist those distant relatives who came to borrow food. As for their real family members, the women who married into Pingan Village would secretly give a few yuan to them, but they also dared not send food - their own family members also had relatives, and the rumor that Pingan Village had more food was not a joke.
Time flies when people are busy, and in the blink of an eye it is harvest time. Xia Juhua has not left Pingan Village these days, and has been working hard in the fields.
There is nothing more satisfying than to, through your own efforts, provide food for everyone in a village that was once shrouded in hunger.
It wasn't just her family that didn't go hungry, but all the people in Ping'an Village who had fought with Xia Juhua for a year didn't go hungry. Seventh Grandma didn't die in the summer, but was full of energy every day, and she and Liu Hongling were thinking about how to weave something better:
The baskets and roosters made of reed bark that Ping'an Village sent to the district supply and marketing cooperative were selected for the expo and were quickly sold out. Now, not only the county supply and marketing cooperative, but even the district supply and marketing cooperative has placed orders directly with them.
What is worrying is that the water in the Xihe River is almost non-existent this year due to the drought, causing the reeds that were lush along the river in previous years to grow thin and withered, making it difficult to muster the energy to cut them.
Fortunately, such skinny reed stalks are not enough material for weaving mats, but they are enough for weaving small baskets and big roosters. Xia Juhua plans to organize members to cut large amounts of reeds after the autumn harvest.
Now, of course, the most important thing is to store the food in the warehouse.
This time, without Fifth Master's reminder, Xia Juhua organized the members to go into the cornfield and pick one sorghum corn for every nine corns, and brought the grain to Fifth Master's house early.
These two crops grow tall, so it is easier to hide them quietly than to harvest wheat. In addition, no one was allowed to touch the crops outside, so who could see what was happening deep inside? The members of the neighboring three teams and the small village had long been accustomed to the people of Ping'an Village working in the fields every day. If they didn't show up in the fields one day, it would be like the sun rising from the west.
When the production volume came out, it was apparent that Ping'an Village's production volume was the same as Xiaomi's, only a little more than 10% higher than that of Xiaozhuangtou. The members of Xiaozhuangtou also laughed at the fact that the production volume was a thankless task.
"Don't laugh at them. The sweet potatoes haven't been harvested yet. How do you know that their sweet potatoes grow like this?" Li Daniu did not stand on the side of his own members this time. He just felt that Ping'an Village's output should not be this much.
When the sweet potato farm is mentioned, everyone in the small farm shuts up. Except for those who really can't stand seeing others do well, everyone has to admit that the sweet potato seedlings of their production team were distributed from Ping'an Village, and how to plant them was also taught by the people of Ping'an Village. In fact, this year the production team planted more sweet potatoes than in previous years, which was also learned from Ping'an Village.
Thanks to the large number of sweet potatoes planted and the three wells dug under Xia Juhua's guidance, there is some hope for autumn. Otherwise, they would have to work hard. And yet they still laugh at Ping An Village for working so hard but getting no reward. Are you a human being?
Li Daniu, who felt that the members of his production team were not human, walked to the land where the two production teams met. The sweet potatoes in the adjacent fields did not look any different, but the closer he got to his own production team, the greater the difference in the growth of the sweet potatoes on both sides.
Fortunately, the sweet potato vines have begun to wilt, otherwise the contrast would be more obvious. Li Daniu thought so in his heart, and couldn't help squatting down to dig out the sweet potatoes from his production team.
Under one sweet potato vine, there were four or five sweet potatoes that were larger than an adult's head, which was not much different from previous years.
This thing is really drought-resistant, which was Li Daniu's first thought. Can other fields also grow so many and so big? This was Li Daniu's second thought. When he dug a sweet potato in a field farther away from Ping'an Manor, he found that there were only three big sweet potatoes, and he knew what was going on.
The tree just now clearly grew so large and numerous with the help of the water from Ping An Village!
Is Pingan Village going to lose powder again? Li Daniu had many thoughts in his mind, the most important one was to make sure that the members of his production team would not say anything sarcastic about Pingan Village: even if the harvest of other villages in Pingan Village was only 10% higher than that of Xiaozhuangtou, their sweet potatoes were enough to crush Xiaozhuangtou.
The sweet potatoes in Pingan Village were indeed a good harvest in such a drought year. Xia Juhua and her friends had never thought of hiding the sweet potato production: firstly, sweet potatoes grow in the ground, and a hole is too obvious to hide. Secondly, the people of Pingan Village worked hard for a year, and it was impossible to have no results at all.
They want to get more production materials next year. If the commune or the county finds out that the result of tilting the materials towards them is not much better than the production team that does not tilt the materials, the loss will be huge enough if they just don't allow technicians Xue Lin to come to Ping'an Village next year.
After the grain was stored in the warehouse, the brigade held meetings day after day, not for any other reason but to discuss how to pay the public grain this year.
"Now that the commune hasn't issued a notice, we shouldn't rush to hand over all the grain ourselves." Several production team leaders were unanimous in their opinions.
Li Changshun shook his head and said, "Paying rations is a matter of course. What will you use to distribute dividends to members if you don't pay rations?" The money paid for rations every year is the largest source of income for the production team.
Several team leaders looked at Li Changshun as if he were a fool. In a year like this, having enough to eat is everyone's greatest wish. Is there any need to compare between holding food in hand and having money in hand but not being able to buy food?
Li Changshun was so angry that he slammed the table and said, "If you don't pay the public grain now and distribute it all to the members, what will you pay when the commune issues a notice?" It doesn't matter whether ordinary members pay the public grain or not, but the production team leader has to complete his mission, so how can he run away?
The two sides just can't reach a consensus, so meetings have to be held every day. Then everyone argues for a while, and before they can come up with any new words, it's time for lunch. What else can they do except adjourn the meeting?
Li Changshun left Xia Juhua alone. Xia Juhua wished she could get sick: "Captain, there is nothing I can do." It is impossible that other production teams will not pay the public grain, and Ping'an Zhuangtu will take the lead.
"At least we have some harvest. It's good that other brigades can collect seeds." Li Changshun frowned: "If no one pays the public grain, what will the people in the county eat?"
Why don't you look at the world?
Xia Juhua muttered in her heart, but she was also busy: "Last year we supported the disaster area. Now we are hit by the disaster. It can't be that no one will take care of us, right?"
Li Changshun fell silent. If Xia Juhua had said that Director Zhang of the commune was resisting and had not issued a notice for the grain station to hand over the public grain, Li Changshun should have thought about how to get the production teams to quickly grind the harvested sweet potatoes into powder instead of always thinking about completing the public grain task.
If the Ping'anzhuang Brigade does not ask its superiors for resale grain or relief grain, it will reduce the burden on the collective. Why should it work so hard?
Thinking of leaking powder, Xia Juhua couldn't help but think of the adobe bricks in Pingan Village that had been stripped and dried: "Captain, I have to go back to my parents' home tomorrow and can't come to the meeting. Should I ask Qiu Sheng to come over?"
Li Changshun, who knew that Ping'an Village had lost a lot of bricks, knew exactly why Xia Juhua wanted to go back to her parents' home, so he asked with a little uncertainty: "Can you convince your cousin?"
Xia Juhua is not one to talk without hesitation: "We have to try to see if we can persuade them, right?"
Speaking of Li Changshun, he always has his own account in his heart. He cares about many people and has some patriarchal ideas of robbing the rich to help the poor. Can we deny that he is very partial to promising children? For example, he agreed to Xia Juhua's request more readily than other production team leaders.
So Xia Juhua, who hadn't been back to her parents' home for more than a year, appeared on the streets of Xiajiazhuang. Mantun saw her aunt first, but didn't dare to recognize her. When someone came closer, she jumped up and said, "Aunt? It's really you, aunt. How come you're back? You didn't even send me a message. It would be great if I could pick you up?"
Silly boy, you still think it's the past. When a girl goes out to her parents' home, her family has to send a donkey to pick her up? Xia Juhua shoved the bicycle into Mantun's hand and said, "Why didn't you go to work today? Why are you standing here?"
"I'm waiting for my Third Master." Mantun pushed his bicycle crookedly, unable to hide the smile on his face: "My mother asked me to make some dumplings today and asked my Third Master to come home for dinner."
What a coincidence, the person Xia Juhua was looking for was the third master in Mantunzui, and also Xia Juhua's third uncle. But this uncle was not lucky. When he was young, he worked as a foreman in a landlord's brick kiln. He bought a few acres of land with the money he earned, and was classified as a middle peasant as soon as the weather cleared.
In the northern plains where everyone works hard, the middle peasant class is already quite high. So the awakened wife divorced him and married another man with her children. This was a great blow to the uncle, who always felt that he earned money from his skills in the brick kiln and bought the land to give his wife and children a good life.
Over the years, my daughter-in-law has often boasted to others about how well her family lives. Why does she no longer want to live with me just because of her background?
The woman next to him and his own flesh and blood all ran away, which made my cousin lose his trust in people all of a sudden. Every day, he didn't say a word to anyone except going to work and coming home. It was not until the disaster years that he recovered.
In my uncle's own words: Compared with human life, everything else is empty, not as real as the imported grain. There is nothing wrong with the runaway daughter-in-law wanting to live and live well.
The reason why he expressed such emotion was because of the piece of cake that Xia Long broke for his uncle when he was almost starving to death. That is why his uncle, who was not close to anyone, became very close to Xia Long's family. The old man of the Xia family passed away early, and Xia Long and his wife were both capable. The children could help them, and they would ask their uncle to eat together when they made some seasonings.
"Why did your mother think of making dumplings today?" Xia Juhua felt that her brother's wife was very good at making a living, and she would not make dumplings for festivals. Even if it was vegetarian, the dumpling skin had to be half white flour to make it into a roll - if it was only corn flour, it would be hard to lift after steaming.
Mantun smiled and told his aunt that today was the third master's birthday, so his mother took a special leave to buy a pound of meat and ground flour with the newly divided wheat to celebrate the third master's birthday.
Xia Juhua looked at the two barrels of malted milk in the net bag hanging on the handlebars and thought that this gift was not too shabby for an old man as a birthday present.
Not only was it not shabby, but when my uncle took the malted milk, his eyes were a little wet: "Xia Long's wife is the same. Why would she send you a letter from such a long distance? It's just a birthday, isn't it?"
Xia Juhua smiled sincerely: "Uncle San, please don't wrongly accuse Hongcui." When she heard this name, Xia Juhua was startled. How could it be the same name as Hongcui from Liu Erzhuang's family? The farmers were too careless in naming their daughters. "I didn't remember that today was your birthday. I came back to Xiajiazhuang because I had something to ask of you."
The third uncle thought that Xia Juhua was just trying to save him from any burden, and said with a smile: "Okay, whether you caught up or came back specially to celebrate your birthday, I'm happy. If you have anything to ask, tell me, and I'll do my best to help you."
Of course, Xia Juhua couldn't ask for help right now, so she asked Xu Hongcui to divide the things she brought to Xia Long and Xia Hu's families, giving each family five pounds of peanuts without any preference.
Zhang Fengling asked in surprise: "Sister, did your production team plant peanuts this year? Our production team did, but unfortunately they didn't grow more than half a foot tall, and they were all rotten."
Xu Hongcui nudged her with her elbow and said, "Why do you care whether it was grown by my elder sister's production team? Wouldn't it be nice to fry it for the children to eat during the New Year?"
Zhang Fengling reacted immediately, smiled shyly at Xia Juhua, and returned to her room with the peanuts. Uncle San saw everything, but seemed to see nothing, and asked about the harvest of Pingan Village.
After Xia Juhua finished talking about Ping'an Village, she also asked Uncle San about the harvest in Xiajia Village. Thanks to several wells, Xiajia Village's harvest this year was only less than 20% lower than in normal years. Even Uncle San, who had experienced several droughts, found it incredible:
"Thanks to you for helping the production team dig a well, and for sending a message asking the production team not to be stingy in watering the land, otherwise there would be people fleeing famine this year." Uncle San looked at Xia Juhua with gratitude in his eyes. He felt that this gratitude should not only be felt by himself, but also by all the members of Xiajiazhuang.
"How do you, the production team, pay the public grain?" Feeling grateful to Xia Juhua's uncle, he began to care about the issue that the farmers were most concerned about.
Xia Juhua did not rush to answer, but asked: "Has Xiajiazhuang prepared to pay the public grain?"
Uncle San shook his head: "Not yet. I heard from the team leader that other production teams didn't have much harvest, so they have no food to hand over. But the team thinks Xiajiazhuang still has a harvest, so we should hand it over." He sighed:
"The harvest of Xiajiazhuang was not given by God. It was obtained by everyone working hard to irrigate the land. Why do we have to pay the public grain to Xiajiazhuang? If we pay the public grain for the little harvest we get, why don't we just hide under the shade of the trees and watch ants climb trees like other production teams?"
That's exactly what happened. Xia Juhua nodded and said, "Our team is in even more trouble. Every production team has to harvest, so I'm afraid we can't avoid it."
Worrying alone cannot solve the problem of paying public grain. Xia Juhua thought that today was Uncle San's birthday, so she didn't want to talk about this unhappy topic anymore and started to care about Uncle San's daily life. According to Uncle San, Xu Hongcui and Zhang Fengling were really good daughters-in-law. They took good care of him, who was not his biological cousin, and he often felt guilty.
"You are the elder, and it is their responsibility to take care of you." Xia Juhua advised her uncle not to think too much.
Uncle San wiped his eyes and said, "How can there be so many things I should do? There are so many people in Xiajiazhuang who call me Uncle San. I even have four or five nephews, but who cares if I have cotton clothes to wear in winter or if I have enough food to eat in summer?"
"Alas, I am old and useless. I can't earn many work points a year, and the dividends are small. They won't accept my share of food even if I bring it to them. Am I going to be a freeloader?"
"You are not here for nothing." Seeing that Third Uncle was getting more and more upset, Xia Juhua tried to say something nice: "You are the only one in this area who has the skill to make bricks. If any production team wants to make bricks, they will have to ask you for help."
"It's not just this little skill..." Uncle San couldn't continue, and looked up at Mantun who came out of the kitchen: "I was thinking of taking Mantun with me to make some kiln bricks, and then I won't make them anymore after they learn. But in this year's weather, which production team is willing to make bricks?"
"Our production team is on fire." Xia Juhua patted her chest and said to her uncle.
The third uncle was so scared that he hurriedly stopped her: "Don't dare to think like that. Even if you are the production team leader now, you can't do that. What if people say you abuse your power for personal gain?"
Hearing Uncle San say the words "abuse of power for personal gain", Xia Juhua really laughed: "Uncle San, I came back today to ask you for help just for this matter. In the summer, I had the members take off a lot of adobe bricks from the kilns, and I'm just waiting for the autumn when the work is not so busy, so I want you to help me make bricks."
"What do you want to do by making those bricks so early?" Uncle San did not say whether he would help or not. Instead, he wanted to find out whether Xia Juhua really wanted him to help or whether she wanted her nephews to learn his craft.
Although he was willing to teach Man Dun a few tricks of brick-making, he would not feel comfortable if Xia Juhua wanted her nephew to learn the craft but had to ask for it herself.
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