Chapter 8 Chapter 8 Membership Deed
Kang He followed Fan Jing towards the county.
He knew he was going to the county, so he carried a bag with him when he left.
On the way, he saw Fan Jing looking at his bag, so he untied it and showed him a set of clothes and cloth boots inside.
This set of clothes and boots were the ones he wore when he came here. They were made by the Kang family. The boy he gave birth to and raised will become someone else's son in the future, so they prepared a last decent set for him.
Kang He took out two copper coins and gestured with them.
He wanted to take this set of fine cloth clothes to the cloth shop, either sell it or exchange it, and then give it to the Fan family as a gift.
The new leather suit was comfortable and shiny to wear, but it was not practical in the village. Apart from wearing it once or twice when going out, it could only be kept in a box.
It would be a pity to keep clothes lying around without wearing them.
But if you wear it while doing work, it will easily get dirty and damaged, which is heartbreaking.
It would be better to replace it and use it now.
Fan Jing roughly understood what he meant. The things belonged to the person, and it was up to the person to decide how to deal with them, so he didn't say much.
Seeing that Fan Jing didn't ask any more questions, Kang He just walked away with the backpack on his back.
But he couldn't sit still, so he pointed to the village in the distance and asked Fan Jing what place it was.
"Chuanhe Township."
Hearing this, Kang He tried to repeat it: "...Chuan...Hexiang?"
Listening to Kang He's somewhat clumsy tone, Fan Jing couldn't help but look at him. Seeing that he was speaking seriously with his dark eyes open, he still nodded.
Seeing this, Kang He memorized it silently for a moment, then pointed at the cabbage, soybeans and winter melon in the field and asked.
Fan Jing, who was known for his few words, spoke as much as he could have spoken in three days in just over an hour.
When they arrived at the county, Fan Jing bought a bowl of tea for Kang He from a stall at the street corner.
Then we walked into Wangpo Alley and bought mountain products at Mr. Li’s Mountain Treasure Shop.
I heard that when Mr. Li was young, he loved to go hunting in the mountains. Later, he fell ill and his health was not as good as before, so he could not go into the mountains anymore.
But he loved the taste of the mountains, and always sent his family out to buy chickens, rabbits and deer hunted by hunters.
I cooked so much and collected a lot of recipes, so I simply cleaned up a shop and opened a restaurant.
This restaurant is Fan Jing's regular customer. He usually sends his hunted items here.
The clerk in charge of purchasing in the store also recognized him. He looked at Fan Jing's things familiarly and quoted a price. Fan Jing thought it was suitable, and the deal was done.
A colorful pheasant, a pair of gray-backed pheasants, and a clean suckling pig wrapped in banana leaves were sold for a total of two hundred and fifty coins.
The clerk weighed out two taels of silver and counted out fifty copper coins to him.
After Fan Jingfu confirmed that it was correct, he put the silver into his pocket.
The shopping guy took a look and said nothing.
After Fan Jing had tidied up, he saw that the waiter was still there and said, "Thank you."
The clerk didn't say anything and turned around and went back to the shop.
Fan Jing picked up the empty backpack and turned around to see Kang He still looking up at the signs hanging in the street market.
I don't know why I was so absorbed in watching it that I didn't come back to my senses for a long time. I've been like this since I entered the county town.
He raised his hand and swept it across Kang He's eyes, then he looked away.
".......alright?"
"Um."
Fan Jing responded and walked to the front.
Kang He hurriedly followed, with joy in his eyes that was hard to conceal.
It’s no wonder that he looked at the signs hanging on the shops on the street so carefully.
At a glance, there are shops of all sizes, tall and short.
There are brick and tile shops, perfume shops, Zhongwaqian soap water, Qian's dried fruit shop, Xiuyifang Sanbuqi Pharmacy...all kinds of businesses are running, and it is very lively.
And the most exciting thing is...he can actually understand most of the text!
Not only that, he could understand most of the words spoken by those people who were dressed very smartly in round-necked clothes, gold-patterned boots, and other smart clothes.
Kang He vaguely guessed that what he couldn't understand might be the dialect. Since the county was large and accommodated people from all over the place, why didn't they use the language and writing that he was familiar with?
He suppressed his unexpected joy in his heart and wanted to get to the bottom of it.
During this time, Fan Jing took him to a shop called Qiaotou Hui Niangzi Cloth Shop.
There was a sign hanging at the door that said "Looking for work" and "Those interested please come into the store to discuss details."
The shop is a bit remote and the storefront is not big, you can see the end at a glance.
There were not many people in the shop. As soon as the two men entered, the woman sitting at the counter holding a child of five or six years old noticed them.
"Dajing, are you coming down the mountain?"
Fan Jing responded.
The woman put the pigtailed kid down from her arms and gave him a rattle: "Go play."
The little kid ran out from the counter and called Fan Jing "Brother Dajing".
Fan Jing touched his head, and the little kid ran out the door, shaking his rattle and jumping.
"But do you want to bring some flowered thread for Zhen'er? The store just got some new stuff, it's really nice. Your uncle brought it back from the capital."
The woman smiled and spoke to Fan Jing, her eyes catching sight of the unfamiliar Kang He standing behind him.
"This is?"
The woman looked at Kang He looking around with surprise. It was the first time she saw Fan Jing with a man.
"My family says it's close."
The woman's eyes widened, and she couldn't help but look at Kang He twice more: "Is it settled?"
Fan Jing nodded.
The woman's eyes lit up when she saw this: "That's a great joy!"
"Auntie thinks he's a good boy. Your mother will definitely feel relieved now."
The woman's name was Liang Hui. She had been good friends with Fan Jing's mother, Gu, since she was a girl.
After Gu passed away, she still cared about Fan Jing and his sister, and often gave them silk threads and cloth.
Fan Jing would occasionally send her some mountain products.
When she learned what the two men came for, she was about to look at the clothes and boots in Kanghe's bag.
Suddenly a young lady came outside.
Madam Liang thought he was a guest and greeted him quickly.
"I heard they're hiring here. I wonder if you've hired enough people?"
Hearing that she was looking for work, Madam Liang said, "Not yet. Are you looking for a job yourself?"
"Ai."
Seeing this, Madam Liang said to Fan Jing, "Da Jing, are you two in a hurry to leave?"
Seeing that the other person was busy, Fan Jing said, "Don't worry, Auntie will be busy first."
Mrs. Liang came out from the counter and called the two of them to sit at one end. Kang He then discovered that the woman's belly was bulging, and she was about five or six months pregnant.
Madam Liang poured tea for the two of them, brought a stool for the young lady who came to ask for work, and then asked about her situation.
"I used to work in Granny Li's cloth shop. Last month, her niece came to help out, and the shop couldn't use so many people, so I resigned."
"I can tell all kinds of cloth and fabrics apart, and I can recognize a few big characters."
The young lady introduced it like this.
Liang nodded and asked, "Can you speak Mandarin?"
"I can listen and speak. My family lives in the county, and they taught me to speak Mandarin from a young age."
"Let me invite you to come and listen to my two sentences."
After saying this, the young lady was not afraid of being embarrassed. She stood up and walked to the door, shouting outside:
"Come and have a look at the shop, dear sister. We have a lot of new materials in the shop. The price is cheap and the leather is good. If you don't want to buy anything, come in and take a rest~"
Kang He, who was at the other end, only then understood what the people were here for after hearing these words.
Seeing that the young lady was not afraid of embarrassment and was obviously someone who had really worked in this business, Liang was quite satisfied as she also looked very pleasant.
Then he asked, "Did you bring your deed of residence?"
The young lady joyfully took out her deed of residence and showed it to Liang: "I am an honest resident of the county. The shopkeeper only needs to look at my deed and go to inquire."
When Kang He heard this, his brows furrowed.
He couldn't help but move closer. Madam Liang didn't understand why, but she said kindly, "Each job in the county requires a physical deed."
After saying this, he was afraid that Kang He might not understand the Mandarin, so he repeated it in the local dialect.
Kang He frowned, as he remembered that there was no such document in his bag or box, so he pointed to the young lady's deed of residence and then to himself, pointing to Fan Jing.
Fan Jing's eyebrows moved slightly, and he looked at Kang He deeply.
Said: "Home."
Kang He had just learned this sentence on the way, but he was not sure whether it was at the Kang family or the Fan family, so he said: "Fan Jing, home?"
Fan Jing nodded.
Kang He felt a little complicated for a moment, but when he thought about it carefully, it was understandable.
The Fan family gave money to the Kang family, and he went to visit them. Why didn't the Fan family worry that he would run away? It turned out that they had already got something important.
Kang He had learned a very important thing, but at the moment he was more concerned about another thing.
So while he had nothing to do, he pulled at the corner of Fan Jing's clothes, holding his stomach with an embarrassed look on his face.
Seeing this, Fan Jing led him to the outhouse outside the alley.
Kang He glanced at the public toilet, then at the cloth shop, and pointed to Fan Jing the way they came, meaning that he didn't need to wait, as he had memorized the way.
Fan Jing went back to the shop as he was told.
Kang He hid in the toilet and saw Fan Jing enter the shop and then ran to the market.
I found a gossipmonger and gave him two copper coins.
He tried to ask in Mandarin, and the idler understood him and did not doubt that he knew Mandarin, so he answered his questions.
After a while, Kang He understood everything.
There are indeed two commonly used languages here. One is the official language used by the Unified World Mission Society, and the other is the local dialect.
The local people all speak the local dialect, and only outsiders who don't know the dialect speak Mandarin for communication.
However, the local people of status thought the dialect was too rustic and wanted to distinguish themselves from the common people, so they spoke Mandarin every day to show their difference.
All educated people know Mandarin. Even those uneducated people in the county, who make a living by doing business in the county and have been educated since childhood, can understand and speak Mandarin, but with a heavy accent.
Over time, for convenience, merchants in the county almost all speak Mandarin, but if you speak the local dialect, people will also speak to you in normal language for the sake of business.
In short, in the city, people will speak to you in the same way as you speak.
It is only because the farmers in the countryside are illiterate and rarely travel outside that many of them cannot speak Mandarin, and even worse, some cannot understand it at all.
Kang He stayed in the village and had never come into contact with people who spoke Mandarin, so naturally he didn't know these things.
He was cautious at first, and since he knew that no one could understand the local dialect, he did not speak Mandarin.
If I had said it earlier, maybe someone in the village would have understood it, but even if they did, it would still cause trouble.
He was originally a fool. Not only did he get better for a while, he could not speak the local dialect, but he could speak Mandarin.
The villagers were the most superstitious. Even if the Kang family didn't take him away to exorcise evil spirits out of suspicion, they were afraid that the other people in the village would also make trouble for him.
But even if he couldn't show off his ability to speak Mandarin in the countryside, this would still be a pleasant surprise.
But joy was followed by worry. Although knowing Mandarin would make things much easier, his household registration deed was at the Fan family, and he didn't know how to get it out.
Bao Da Ting told him that without this thing in his hand, he would not be able to find a proper job, buy a house, or rent land, and would be a complete illegal resident.
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