Chapter 93
He Xiaofang's words made everyone in the dormitory burst into laughter. Lu Xuehua asked He Xiaofang with a smile: "Xiaofang, what did you dream about? And the dormitory head is competing with you for it?"
He Xiaofang shook her head awkwardly. It was hard to say that she asked the dormitory head not to compete with her for the opportunity to help Jiang Xi.
She knew that Jiang Xi was a very independent girl who didn't want to trouble others, so the chance of her helping her was very small. But if she didn't do something for her, she would be very nervous because she knew that she had been absorbing positive energy from Jiang Xi.
She sat up from the bed, walked quickly down, took out a can of pickled vegetables, and handed it to Jiang Xiao like a treasure: "Xingxiao, you are here? This is for you!"
Lu Xuehua shouted: "Hey! What good stuff is it? You gave it to Jiang Xiao and didn't give it to us~"
"That's right!" Liu Ping also followed suit and shouted: "Jiang Xiao, everyone who sees it gets a share, I want to try any good stuff too."
He Xiaofang's slightly dark face showed a slight blush of embarrassment, twisting her hands and saying shyly: "It's just some pickled vegetables I cooked myself." She explained solemnly: "Don't say I didn't bring it for you. It's just my eldest sister and I. I have to carry 100 kilograms of food, my eldest sister has to carry 80 kilograms, and I have to carry a backpack. Where can I get so much vegetables to put in cans? Just this one bottle, It was brought to Lingling. "
Don't eat it! "
Her mother heard that she had a good friend in school who fed her red-roasted pork every day, sometimes one piece, sometimes two pieces. But these pieces of red-roasted pork were the most delicious food she had eaten in high school. Many years later, when she thought of the taste of the red-roasted pork, she still felt happy when she tasted the ups and downs of life. When she recalled this time in her old age, she seemed to still be able to taste the only sweetness in her dark youth. It
was very sweet and fresh, and it made people salivate every time they savored it.
Many years later, she wanted to return to the cafeteria of No. 1 Middle School and eat that delicious braised pork again. Unfortunately, the chef had retired. No matter how similar the food made by the chefs later was, it was not the taste of her youth in her memory.
She looked at Jiang Xi expectantly.
Jiang Xi did not reject her kindness, but asked with interest: "What is it?"
"Open it and take a look!" Her dark eyes were amazingly bright.
Jiang Xi opened the can under her expectant gaze. As soon as the can was opened, the sour and rich smell came out.
"It smells so good! I want to eat it too!" Liu Ping shouted while lying on her bunk.
"It's pickled mustard greens and pig intestines~" He Xiaofang squatted down, holding her chin and looking up at Jiang Xiao who was sitting on her own bed. From this angle, she could see all the expressions on Jiang Xiao's face and eyes. She was afraid that Jiang Xiao would dislike the pickled vegetables she brought.
Almost every household in their place grows pickled mustard greens. After the pickled mustard greens are planted and harvested, they are thrown into a large square cement pond beside the vegetable garden. They don't need to be washed. They are sprinkled with coarse salt and pickled. The pickled mustard greens are golden and crispy, and then they are sold on the market.
He's mother is very good at pickling mustard greens. The pickled mustard greens are golden in color, with an indescribable sour fragrance, and paired with the unique strong flavor of pig intestines, they are particularly fragrant and delicious.
In addition to the pig's large intestine, she also quietly put a piece of pig's tail at the bottom of the bottle.
The pig was killed during the Chinese New Year. Generally, the front leg meat, hind leg meat, and the middle part are easy to sell. The remaining pig's head, pig's internal organs, and pig's tail are all kept for their own consumption. During the Chinese New Year, her second sister came back, and the three sisters sat under the kitchen stove to make fire, roll dumplings, and pound meat to prepare ingredients for the Chinese New Year. In winter, when it was cold, she would nest behind the stove, make fire, warm herself by the fire, and use the wood ash at the bottom of the stove to clean the pig's large intestine.
While pinching the pig intestines mixed with wood ash, she told her eldest and second sisters what happened on campus, saying that her best friend in her dormitory invited her to eat braised pork.
"She eats braised pork every day, sometimes two dishes for one meal, you know? The first time she invited me to eat braised pork, she gave me a lot of braised pork, that was the first time I ate a full meal at night!" Thinking of the taste of the braised pork, she couldn't help but slurp her saliva, the orange-red firelight reflected her dark face warm and bright: "We have three friends together, the two of them often exchange dishes, I have no dishes to exchange with them, but she still often gives me braised pork, I am embarrassed to always eat her braised pork, each time I just pick up a piece."
After her eldest sister was divorced, it was as if all her energy was taken away from her. She sat silently on a small stool and quickly rubbed glutinous rice balls. She had two children, it was difficult for her to get married again, and she could only stay at her parents' home. Unless
she was cruel and didn't want the two children.
He Xiaoqin said, "How can you only eat her food? I tell you, when people interact with each other, there should be give and take."
He Xiaofang's face became redder in the firelight, just like she was squatting in front of Jiang Liu at this moment, holding her face with both hands, her thick eyelashes reflecting her dark eyes, bright as gems: "I washed it many times, I guarantee it will be clean!"
Her hands were very rough, and in this cold winter, they were frozen and cracked one by one, like carrots.
When she was in school, her hands were only frozen and swollen, not cracked like this.
Jiang Xi raised his eyes with a smile of surprise in them: "Wow, I like it so much. Do you have chopsticks? Let me try it first."
"And me! And me! I want to try it too!" Liu Ping is always the one who loves to make trouble and shouts the loudest.
He Xiaofang hurriedly took the chopsticks and handed them to Jiang Xiao. Then Wang Xia, Lu Xuehua, Xu Xiuli, and Liu Ping all came down with chopsticks and surrounded Jiang Xiao. They took one chopstick after another. Liu Ping was particularly careful. When others took one chopstick, they only picked up a little snow vegetable and large intestine to taste it. She really went for the large intestine. When she put it in her mouth, she laughed so hard that He Xiaofang was heartbroken. She quickly helped Jiang Xiao close the bottle cap in her hand.
She knew that it was a good thing that her large intestine was cut thinly.
The pig intestines were already cold, with a layer of lard condensed on them. This might be a shortcoming for others, but for these girls who were short of oil and water, the pig intestines with fine white lard were a rare delicacy.
Everyone else also took out the delicious food they brought, including homemade fried peanuts and melon seeds, homemade dried sweet potatoes and sweet potato chips, and homemade rice candy made from syrup, except Liu Ping.
Because it was after the Chinese New Year, everyone brought good things, and Xu Xiuli's was the best. Not only did she bring a bottle of braised chicken legs with soybeans, but also pecans, pistachios, plums, watermelons, pumpkin seeds, etc.
The pumpkin seeds were homemade fried, and she grabbed the most. She only took out some of the expensive dried fruits such as pecans and pistachios for everyone to taste.
Pecans and pistachios are not produced locally. These country bumpkins in dormitory 610 are eating pecans and pistachios for the first time and don’t know what they are.
“This is pecans, and this is pistachios. My dad said they are good for the brain. I’m in high school now and I need to use my brain every day. My aunt brought all the pecans and pistachios to my house.”
Xu Xiuli's aunt married in a neighboring province. The back hills are full of wild hickory nuts. Every year, her aunt and her family bring back many hickory nuts.
These hickory nuts are all roasted at home. The shells have not been crushed and processed. They are extremely hard. He Xiaofang and her friends have been biting them for a long time. Their teeth are almost broken. They can't chew them. But the hickory nuts Xu Xiuli brought are pepper and salt flavored. When they chew them, they have both the taste of pepper and salt and the burnt aroma of hickory nuts. Even if they can't chew them, they are reluctant to spit them out.
They couldn't bite the walnut meat inside, which made Liu Ping anxious: "What is this thing? Why can't I bite it? How do I eat it?"
It was indeed difficult to eat. Jiang Xiao couldn't bite it either. Seeing that they were anxious and wanted to throw the hickory nuts away, he said: "This hickory nut is expensive, more expensive than meat. It is the best for brain health, but it is a waste of teeth and fingers. It is best to use a walnut cracker specially made for opening hickory nuts to open it."
Hearing that this thing is more expensive than meat, everyone looked at the round black hard nuts in their hands and couldn't believe it: "This thing is more expensive than meat?"
Jiang Xiao nodded: "More than twice as expensive as meat!"
The girls in dormitory 610 who had never seen the world had all seen it. Even if Liu Ping couldn't chew it, she was reluctant to spit out the hickory nuts in her mouth, especially after hearing that this thing could nourish the brain. She even asked Jiang Gui: "How much of this do I have to eat to nourish my brain? I feel like my brain is not enough every day. English, math, physics, chemistry, Chinese, politics, history, and geography have made my brain dizzy. I can't take it anymore. I need more nourishment. Xiuli, give me another handful of hickory nuts to nourish my brain!"
"Bah, you wish!" Seeing that Liu Ping was eating and drinking for free in the dormitory again, but she herself was not willing to spend a penny, Xu Xiuli took the walnuts, snorted and laughed, and stopped giving them to Liu Ping.
Liu Ping didn't mind and continued, "Do you have any walnut crackers? Oh my, this thing almost broke my teeth."
Xu Xiuli took out a handful of walnut crackers and gave them to Jiang Xiu, wrinkled her nose proudly and snorted, "No."
Liu Ping kicked her legs on the bed and yelled, "You are biased! Xiuli, you are biased!"
Lu Xuehua, who was being served by her, kicked her up unhappily, "Be normal! There was an earthquake in my bed!"
There was another burst of laughter in the dormitory, and then they used walnut crackers to pick walnuts from each other. He Xiaofang watched Xu Xiuli sitting on her own bed, sitting close to Jiang Xiu, using a walnut cracker to peel walnuts for Jiang Xiu to eat one by one, and occasionally feeding him a pistachio.
He Xiaofang looked left and right, wondering whether to feed Jiang Xi pig intestines.
After eating, she heard Liu Ping shouting, "Jiang Xi, have you finished your winter vacation homework? Copy it for me!"
Liu Ping made candied haws and sold them at the market during the winter vacation. She had only finished a few winter vacation homeworks and planned to come back to ask Jiang Xi to copy them. Jiang Xi's grades were the best in the county, so it was right to copy her.
Unexpectedly, Jiang Xi said to Xu Xiuli: "Have you finished your winter vacation homework? Lend it to me to copy."
Xu Xiuli's eyes curved slightly with a smile, and handed her the homework: "You are rare, but you haven't finished your homework."
Yes, Jiang Xi's winter vacation homework was not finished. After all, every day she was either rushing to finish her manuscript or running between Wucheng and Shanghai, and she also had to do her winter vacation homework. She really had no time to do it.
The teachers of No. 1 Middle School did not really treat the winter vacation as a vacation for them. In addition to the seven winter vacation homeworks that the school issued every semester, the seven main subject teachers also printed a large number of test papers for them to do, and asked them to do one every day.
In other words, in addition to the seven test papers they had to do every day, there were also seven winter vacation homeworks waiting for them to complete.
Boys are fine. In winter, there is no farm work for them to help with. They just need to concentrate on doing their homework. Girls are different. They have to do all kinds of housework during the New Year, leaving them with very little time to do their winter vacation homework.
But some girls didn’t finish their homework, such as Xu Xiuli.
When Liu Ping heard that Jiang Xi hadn’t finished his winter vacation homework, she was almost crying because of Jiang Xi’s homework and didn’t believe it at all: "I don’t believe it. You definitely don’t want to lend me the test paper! Then do you have a finished one? A finished one is fine too!"
Others in the dormitory also gathered around, all shouting: "Copy it for me too!"
"Copy it for me too!"
"Dormitory head, why haven’t you finished your homework?"
"I had a lot of things to do when I went home for the Chinese New Year. I was busy until New Year's Eve. I finally wrote for a whole day on the first day, and then went to my uncle's house on the second day, my aunt's house on the third day, and my godfather and stepmother's house on the fourth day."
Wang Xia has a chubby face, with rosy cheeks and single eyelids, but her eyes are not small. She has uneven little canine teeth, and when she smiles, two pointed canine teeth are exposed, which is very cute. She had such a cute look when she was a child, and was noticed by her godfather and godmother who had no daughter, and they arranged a godmarriage for her.
In their place, godparents are not arranged casually. On the day of the godparents’ marriage, the goddaughter will be given a pair of gold earrings. The goddaughter will be filial to the godparents on the three festivals and six gifts of the year. The godparents will also invite the goddaughter to stay for a few days during the New Year and other festivals, give red envelopes and buy new clothes, just like they treat their biological daughters.
If it is a godson, an earring will be given to wear on the right ear.
Because of these complicated rules, it is generally not necessary for families to arrange godparents. Unless they are really close brothers and sisters who are not blood relatives, they will arrange a godparent in order to deepen the closer relationship between the older generation.
If you see a boy wearing a gold earring on his right ear, it means he has been married off.
Wang Xia also has a pair of gold earrings, but she is reluctant to wear them and leaves them at home. She only has a pair of tea stems in her ears.
Jiang Xi has no pierced ears. When she was a child, all the girls in the village would get their ears pierced. There would be an old lady who would repeatedly grind the two sides of the earlobes with two rice beads, until the earlobes became red and thin. Then she would use a fine needle rolled in sesame oil to pierce the earlobes in a flash. The end of the fine needle was threaded with a thick white thread soaked in sesame oil. It is said that if you use cotton thread soaked in sesame oil to pierce the ears, the ears will not be blocked again even after ten or eight years.
Jiang Xi didn't know if she missed this while running in the mountains, or what, but her earlobes have always been like pearls, transparent and rosy.
The whole 610 dormitory was immersed in the tense atmosphere of copying winter vacation homework. They did not fail to do all of it. They finished all seven winter vacation homework books handed out by the teachers. What they did not finish were the papers. There were too many papers.
The students in the next dormitory also came to borrow the test papers from Jiang Xi to copy. As a result, they found that Jiang Xi was also copying other people's test papers. They were satisfied all of a sudden. It turned out that the god of learning would also copy homework.
Jiang Xi was not a person who would blindly copy homework. Xu Xiuli's homework was just a reference for her. Most of the time, she would read the test questions by herself and write them based on her own understanding. So sometimes, even if she had the same answer as Xu Xiuli, the solution method in the middle was slightly different.
Sometimes when she encountered a question that Xu Xiuli wrote incorrectly or a wrong step, she would also draw a small circle on the side.
As a result, her writing speed would certainly not be as fast as He Xiaofang and Liu Ping.
But Wang Xia and He Xiaofang were different. They copied the homework word for word, and rushed to finish the homework without thinking.
That night, they were going to have evening self-study. When evening self-study started, Teacher Wang came to the class holding a teacup and a stack of papers in his hand. He asked the monitor to distribute them. No one expected that the head teacher would be so cruel. The first night of evening self-study after entering the school was actually an exam. Everyone was in disbelief and wailed. Teacher
Wang wiped the podium with the rag on the podium, lowered his head and looked up at them and said, "What are you yelling about? Isn't it normal to have an exam at the beginning of the semester? Why don't you have an exam at the beginning of the semester?" If I don't give you a tight spell on the first day of school and don't get you back to your state, how can you have classes later? "You will take math in this class, and English in the next class."
Teacher Wang supervised the exams.
After each class, there was only a ten-minute break. Teacher Wang told several class leaders, "Collect the winter vacation homework and winter vacation test papers and give them to the class representatives." He then told the class representatives, "Collect them and send them to the office of each teacher."
Many students who had not finished their winter vacation homework were sweating anxiously. They originally wanted to use the three evening self-study classes tonight, plus use flashlights in the dormitory at night, to finish the rest of the homework overnight. What are they doing now? They can't finish it tomorrow, so they are crying and howling.
This is also the result that Teacher Wang wants, which is to create a sense of urgency and pressure on them. Don't think that you can relax after the New Year.
After collecting the papers, Teacher Wang flipped through them casually. As expected, most of the papers of many people were blank.
Teacher Wang was not surprised. There were indeed too many winter vacation homeworks. They left so many on purpose because they didn't want students to slack off. Even if they couldn't finish all of them, at least half of them were finished. Then the knowledge learned before would not be considered forgotten. If they could finish all of them, they would also encourage such students.
Of course, on the surface, seeing these unfinished papers, the teachers of various subjects would still lose their temper and give them a warning, and use the students who had finished the papers as examples.
These teachers have already thought about who to use as the typical example.
Who else in Class 3 is more suitable to be used as an example than Jiang Gui?
Jiang Xi was a famous test-taker last semester. After the evening self-study class, he would study in the dormitory until one or two o'clock every morning, and get up at five in the morning to run and memorize. Others might not have done their winter vacation homework, but Jiang Xi? Hum, he must have finished all of it!
The teachers of various subjects thought happily.