Returning Swallows (Part 4)
An opened the bedroom door and saw Ji Qingzhou working at her desk.
She wore a white short-sleeved shirt, gray trousers, and black slippers that she had bought.
She placed two wooden bookshelves and set up a desk on the balcony, where she usually writes.
When the mood strikes, I can write there until midnight.
When the sun is shining, I'll curl up in a chair and read a book.
After Ji Qingzhou returned, she made room for him in half of the space.
He would also sit in front of the computer for long periods of time, the entire screen filled with formulas and symbols, which she couldn't understand at all.
There is a big difference between people. It was normal for her to fail high school physics, but some people can study this subject all the way to a doctorate.
Ji Qingzhou's fingers tapped incessantly on the keyboard, making a soft sound.
She loved listening to that voice, especially when she couldn't continue writing her novel.
The morning light shone through a thin beige curtain onto Ji Qingzhou's face.
Ji Qingzhou heard the door open and turned her head to see An Yi, who had just woken up. An Yi was gathering her hair with one hand and tucking the strands that were obstructing her view behind her ear.
After fiddling with it a couple of times, a few mischievous strands of hair still clung to her forehead.
"You're up?" Ji Qingzhou greeted her.
She nodded in response, then turned and went to the bathroom.
Ji Qingzhou put down her computer and went to the kitchen. When she passed by the bathroom, An was already brushing her teeth.
I just woke up, and my movements are still a bit sluggish.
She slowly finished brushing her teeth and gradually smelled a pungent odor, like something was burnt.
An had followed the smell to the kitchen.
Ji Qingzhou was standing there with her back to her, looking completely lost and helpless.
"What's wrong?" An asked.
Ji Qingzhou turned around, looking slightly embarrassed.
He heated a cup of milk in the microwave, and the cup was deformed; that's where the smell came from.
Ji Qingzhou was slightly embarrassed. "How could this happen?"
An said, "Plastic cups cannot be put in the microwave."
"Isn't this ceramic?"
“It’s made of plastic,” An said.
The microwave oven has already proven her in this way.
Ji Qingzhou pursed his lips slightly. He originally wanted to heat up the milk first, so that An could drink it after she finished washing up.
He naturally knew that plastic cannot be heated at high temperatures.
An had managed to suppress her laughter.
"This cup is very beautiful. I also thought it looked like ceramic, but I only realized it wasn't after I bought it."
Modern plastics are made in very sophisticated ways; some tableware made of plastic is indeed indistinguishable from plastic.
After breakfast, someone came to Ji Qingzhou's house and delivered a large box of things.
Ji Qingzhou opened them one by one and arranged them neatly.
Bamboo, tools, and other odds and ends were piled up, and there wasn't enough room on the desk.
Ji Qingzhou wanted to move to the coffee table in the living room, but An had already made room for him.
She already lacked inspiration, and Ji Qingzhou's antics diverted her attention.
On the table was a half-finished, nearly complete object.
“This is,” she paused, remembering the man from a couple of days ago, “an umbrella?”
With everything packed in the box, Ji Qingzhou picked up the item An Yi had pointed to and said, "Yes, an oil-paper umbrella."
Ji Qingzhou held the umbrella handle with one hand and slid the umbrella frame with the other to open the umbrella.
It is an apricot-colored umbrella that opens and closes, its frame resembling the veins of a flower.
He repeated this action several times.
"You did this?"
"Um."
I made an umbrella halfway before I went abroad last year, and it's still very flexible after a year.
She didn't know that Ji Qingzhou could make such traditional things, and was interested in such traditional things.
The Ji Qingzhou she knew was a meticulous student with exceptional learning abilities, a graduate student who often spent an entire day in the laboratory.
He was also the student that the teacher valued most.
It seems there are still many aspects of him that I don't understand.
An hadn't seen anyone around her who had studied this before. "Could I take a look?"
The umbrella ended up in An's hands.
It's a bit heavier than a regular parasol, but it's still easy to carry.
Ji Qingzhou said, "This is a water-spreading oil-paper umbrella."
She opened the umbrella just like Ji Qingzhou.
Sunlight falls on the umbrella, revealing its straight and even frame. Fine threads, each a different color, run through the center of the umbrella.
You can tell the person who made the umbrella is very meticulous.
Her eyes darted back and forth across the umbrella, filled with curiosity and admiration, as if she were looking at a rare treasure in a museum.
A ripple appeared in Ji Qingzhou's eyes.
"It's really beautiful," she said, tilting her head to look at Ji Qingzhou.
Ji Qingzhou lowered her eyes.
An's fair feet were on the ground, without slippers.
An had just casually kicked her slippers aside.
Ji Qingzhou got up, picked it up, and placed it at her feet.
"Put your shoes on."
She took a half step back, not wanting to wear it.
The toes on the snow-white ceramic tiles were tinged with pink, like delicate pink pearls placed on a white porcelain plate.
Ji Qingzhou looked away and moved the slippers closer.
"Put them on, but watch out for bamboo splinters on the ground."
An stopped arguing with him and obediently put on her slippers.
She closed the umbrella, then opened it again, closed it again, then opened it again.
It took several attempts before the umbrella was returned to him.
Ji Qingzhou was checking if there was anything wrong with the umbrella; she thought the moment the umbrella was opened was beautiful.
This feeling is something modern sun umbrellas don't provide.
A flower suddenly bloomed in her hand.
An had finished playing with the umbrella and put it away, returning it to him.
She got up and took a few steps, feeling a slight stinging pain in the soles of her feet.
Unsure, I took two more steps.
She turned to Ji Qingzhou and said, "It feels like there are really bamboo splinters in my feet."
He was both amused and exasperated; his casual remark to An Yi had actually come true.
"Don't move."
He put down his umbrella, walked to her side, lifted her up, and placed her on the sofa.
The sudden movement startled An, who gasped in surprise. She was only a few meters away from the sofa.
Ji Qingzhou rummaged through his tools and found some things.
A small blue cloth bag contained tweezers, silver needles, gauze, and bandages.
He sat at An Yi's feet, lifted her legs, and placed them against his lap.
A bamboo splinter got stuck in the middle of her foot.
She felt a little uncomfortable, and her leg trembled uncontrollably.
Ji Qingzhou said, "Bear with it, don't move."
He tried with tweezers, but almost all the bamboo splinter went in and the tweezers couldn't get it out, so he switched to silver needles.
"It might hurt a little."
"It's okay," An Yi said. "Do you often get pricked when you do this?"
They had all the necessary tools and were very skilled at picking out the splinters.
Ji Qingzhou said, "When I first started learning, I often got pricked and scratched."
"Ouch!" An cried out in pain.
He softened his grip: "The bamboo splinter is a bit deep; we need to pry open the outer skin."
He used to get injured a lot, and when he picked at the splinters, he would do whatever he could to remove them quickly, and he would just endure the minor pain.
But I wouldn't dare do that to her.
Ji Qingzhou remembered the method her grandmother used to remove bamboo splinters from her bamboo.
An felt a slight coolness on the soles of her feet, as if a gust of wind had blown by.
Her cheeks felt a little hot.
Ji Qingzhou blew air onto her feet again to reduce the pain.
An looked at the oiled paper umbrella and asked him, "Why do you want to learn how to make oiled paper umbrellas?"
Such a niche hobby.
Ji Qingzhou said, "My grandmother made this her profession. She was the inheritor of the Fenshui oil-paper umbrella making tradition, and I learned it from her."
My grandmother made her fortune with oiled paper umbrellas. When she was in her thirties or forties, she founded "Zheyun". Today, "Zheyun" is a materials manufacturing company with a market value of hundreds of millions.
Oil-paper umbrellas remain an important business for the company.
"Grandma said, if we don't make money, we don't make money. We can't cut down oil-paper umbrellas no matter what."
An Yi said, "That's quite impressive."
Ji Qingzhou smiled and said, "It is impressive, but not mysterious. Fenshui oil-paper umbrella is a national intangible cultural heritage."
“Conditions were tough back then. My grandfather passed away very early, and my grandmother was uneducated. She supported the family by making oiled paper umbrellas.”
She remembered Ji Qingzhou mentioning once that he didn't have a grandfather.
"That grandma's life must have been legendary!"
Ji Qingzhou said, "So what Grandma can't let go of now is her oil-paper umbrella business, which she has worked hard for most of her life."
"So you're learning from your grandmother because you also want to be a successor?"
"My family runs an oil-paper umbrella business."
Ji Qingzhou's subordinates did not stop their actions.
Learning to make umbrellas from his grandmother was a natural thing for him when he was a child.
Ji Qingzhou's parents divorced when he was young, and both were busy with their own careers, so he grew up with his grandmother.
But he probably would have preferred to stay abroad and teach.
An lowered her eyes.
He seemed to know what An was thinking.
"I will come back." Ji Qingzhou said, raising his head and gazing into An Yi's eyes.
An had already looked away.
He then looked intently at the soles of his feet. "Does it hurt?"
She shook her head; apart from the sudden pain just now, she felt nothing at all.
She also suspected that Ji Qingzhou had manipulated things.
"Okay, we're out."
He sprayed some alcohol, blew on it gently twice, and put An Yi's leg down. "Try walking a few steps and see if it still hurts."
An's face flushed slightly.
She was afraid Ji Qingzhou would see her, so she left quickly.
"It doesn't hurt anymore."
He looked at the pair of feet he had just been holding, and they were indeed fine.
An quickly went into the bathroom and washed her face.
Ji Qingzhou tidied up the things on the table and put them into a cloth bag one by one.
When An came out, she saw that half of Ji Qingzhou's back was wet.
Ji Qingzhou stood up and patted her head, "Wear your shoes properly from now on."
Both of them were stunned for a moment.
They never engaged in such intimate gestures before.
We'd never even held hands before.
An managed to squeeze out a small sound, "I understand."
Ji Qingzhou looked away.
He frowned, looking at the ground, and said, "I think I'd better not bring those things back in the future."
"It's okay."
She added, "I will wear my shoes properly."
Ji Qingzhou smiled slightly.
An has opened the document page, but hasn't typed a single word.
I might as well search for oil-paper umbrellas.
That unfamiliar territory to her.
He opened the umbrella, took out a jar, dipped a brush in oil, and brushed the oil onto the umbrella surface.
"This is a brush..."
An couldn't think of the word for a moment, so Ji Qingzhou said, "Tung oil."
She knew this step: once the umbrella surface was made, tung oil could be applied.
Applying tung oil is the most crucial step in umbrella making. Tung oil can separate rain from paper and reinforce the umbrella surface.
It can also make the umbrella surface shine, increasing the beauty of the oiled paper umbrella.
An oiled paper umbrella is only complete if it contains both oil and paper.
Only an umbrella coated with tung oil can truly protect you from wind and rain.
"Um."
Ji Qingzhou brushed very carefully, leaving no corner untouched.
A faint fragrance gradually filled the air, like the scent of flowers, though it was hard to identify the exact flower.
"Is tung oil fragrant?" An asked.
"No, the original tung oil has a pungent smell: some people find it unpleasant, and high-quality tung oil will retain its smell for a year."
"Then what is this?"
This flavor isn't pungent at all; on the contrary, it's very fragrant, definitely different from others.
"Specially formulated tung oil can both retain the properties of tung oil and suppress its odor."
This is a new product developed by the company, and he's just trying it out today.
An said, "The effect is quite good."
The new tung oil has indeed achieved the expected results, but it still needs time to prove its effectiveness.
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