Several people noticed that the old lady's behavior tonight was a little strange, but after all, they were just acquaintances, so it was not easy to ask about such private matters. However, everyone knew that the old lady's behavior should be related to her gentle and virtuous daughter-in-law Xiuxiu.
It is only 1972 now, and the big explosion of educated youth returning to the city was in 1979.
This Up to the Mountains and Down to the Countryside Movement that swept across China affected the lives of more than 20 million educated young people and had a huge impact on the entire society.
Most of the educated youth at that time had received junior high school or high school education, and a very small number had received college or above education. Some of them went to the countryside voluntarily with the genuine desire to better build the country, while some were forced to go to the countryside, similar to the city dwellers who were criticized during the Cultural Revolution. Their children basically had no choice but to go to the countryside.
Whether voluntarily or forced, leaving familiar elders and familiar living environment to struggle in a hard and barren land, after the passion, there is endless panic and regret. Almost all the educated youth who went to the countryside, their rest of their lives were spent racking their brains on the way back to the city.
After a few years, the hope of returning to the city seemed increasingly slim. The educated youth had reached the age of getting married and having children. In 1979, when the authorities agreed to allow the educated youth to return home, many of the children who had left their parents at that time had already married and had children, and had established new families in a foreign land.
As soon as the decree to return to the city was issued, the educated youth who had given up the idea of returning to the city rekindled their hope. On one side was the wealthy metropolis and their parents, and on the other side was the wife they had married and the children they had after losing hope of returning to the city. More people chose the former and abandoned the latter.
How many families were torn apart, how many children lost their mother or father just after they were born, and how many educated youth paid an unspeakable price in order to pass the review and get a pass to return to the city.
The impact of the educated youth returning to the city continued for several years. It can be said that the educated youth going to the countryside movement was like a scar, leaving a deep mark on the course of history, and how much blood and tears were drowned in the land of China.
"She's a college student now, and she doesn't like my son anymore. I can understand that. I'm not a shameless person. If she doesn't want to go back, I won't force her to leave."
In the pitch-dark private room, only the old lady's slightly vicissitudes of life voice echoed in the room, and the sadness in her words made people's hearts tighten.
"But we are both mothers, how could she be so cruel that she wouldn't even let Chouchou see him? She only nursed Chouchou for a month, and then hurried off to register at the university after the confinement. I raised this child with goat milk and rice porridge from the farm. Chouchou will be three after the Chinese New Year this year, and I've only seen his mother's appearance in photos."
The old lady sobbed as she spoke. She hugged her little grandson tightly in her arms, feeling both pity and confusion.
The child lost his mother at such a young age. What will happen to him in the future?
No one knew how to comfort the old lady. What Old Lady Weng needed now was not comfort from others. She just wanted to speak out the anger in her heart. Now, all she needed was a listener.
Jiang Yilu didn't know whether the woman named Xiuxiu was as virtuous and kind as the old lady described. From her perspective, leaving her hometown, the land where she grew up, and her parents and family, it seemed understandable that she now had the opportunity to return to her hometown, or to the developed metropolis of Haicheng.
But it is unforgivable.
At the beginning, marriage was a matter between two people. Grandma Weng and her son did not force her. They even arranged a job for her and supported her to go back to Haicheng to attend university. After she returned to Haicheng to attend university, she had countless opportunities to write letters or send telegrams to tell the old lady that she did not want to go back, instead of waiting for two whole years and telling her her decision after the old lady came to Haicheng, which wasted the old lady's family for so many years.
If the old lady hadn't come to Haicheng, would she still want to keep it a secret?
In this matter, the most innocent people are the old lady who loves Xiuxiu as her own daughter, the old lady's son who is still unaware of the situation, and the ignorant Chouchou.
The sending of educated youth to the countryside was a force majeure of the times. In the 1960s, successive famines and the single economic system exposed employment problems for educated youth. The deterioration of Sino-Soviet relations and the failure of Soviet aid projects caused large-scale layoffs, which led to increasing employment pressure in cities.
Moreover, the population grew rapidly after the war, with urban and rural populations doubling exponentially. In the 1960s, more and more educated young people were unable to find jobs.
The plan of sending educated youth to the countryside reduced the urban population and supported agricultural production and frontier construction. It can be said that in the context of that era, the implementation of this movement was necessary and correct.
Xiuxiu is like a microcosm of the majority of educated youth of that era. They are victims of the times and the creators of tragedy.
In that era, many educated youth brought their wives and children from the countryside back to the city after returning home, instead of treating the years they spent in the countryside as a stain on their lives, abandoning their wives and children who stayed behind in the countryside, and starting new families.
No one slept well that night. They were thinking about the old lady's daughter-in-law Xiuxiu and Ruanruan who should have already boarded the train to Shenzhen.
******
Ruan Ruan was awakened by the clanging sound of the train after it had left the station for some distance. When she woke up, she saw her uncle sitting beside the bed and several of his assistants. She looked around the room but did not see her grandfather, Uncle Da Wu, Brother Xiao Bao, and Uncle Dahai.
"Ruan Ruan, uncle will take good care of you in the future." Ruan Yuanqing was afraid that Ruan Ruan would cry. His son was strong and he didn't feel sorry for him no matter how he was beaten. But if the delicate little girl cried, he would be helpless.
To his surprise, after realizing her situation, Ruan Ruan didn't cry or make a fuss. She just sat quietly on the bed, looking at the scenery outside the window.
This silence made Ruan Yuanqing even more helpless, and he wished Ruan Ruan would cry and make a fuss.
"This is what Brother Xiaobao gave you before you left. He asked me to give it to you." Ruan Yuanqing handed Ruan Ruan a small package, which was heavy and contained a lot of things.
This was something given to Ruan Ruan by another child, and Ruan Yuanqing had never opened it.
When Ruan Ruan heard what her uncle said, she turned her head away and didn't want to see what he had in his hand. Brother Xiaobao was a liar. He said he would not let Ruan Ruan be taken away.
Grandpa is a bad guy, and brother Xiaobao is also a bad guy. They don’t want her anymore, just like mom and dad, they don’t want Ruan Ruan anymore.
Ruan Ruan held the little rag doll that had been washed to a pale color in her clothes pocket. It was the last rag doll her mother made for her before she went to the battlefield. It was also the one that had kept with her all these years. The doll had long been worn out and had many signs of mending, but this little doll was still Ruan Ruan's most precious thing.
"Since Ruan Ruan doesn't want it, then uncle will throw away the package." Ruan Yuanqing walked to the car window, opened it, and made a gesture as if to throw the package out, but his eyes were always on Ruan Ruan's movements. When he saw the struggle in her eyes, he felt relieved.
"No, this is something Brother Xiaobao gave to Ruan Ruan, we can't throw it away."
The little girl couldn't bear to leave after all, so she crawled out of bed nimbly and snatched the package from Ruan Yuanqing's hand with one hand.
Ruan Ruan opened the package nervously, and what immediately caught her eye was the envelope that Ruan Yuanqing had given to Jiang Yilu on the day they met, which was used as a red envelope.
Ruan Yuanqing's eyes flickered. There was a full thousand yuan in the envelope. No matter where it was placed, it was a considerable sum of money, especially since the Jiang family was just an ordinary farmer. According to his understanding, this thousand yuan was enough for their family to work for five or six years without eating or drinking.
He is giving the money to Ruan Ruan now. Is it because he doesn't know the value of the money, or is it because he really cares about Ruan Ruan and wants to give her some protection?
Ruan Yuanqing felt a little interested and truly remembered this little boy whom he had only met a few times.
Ruan Ruan opened the envelope and saw the big stack of banknotes inside. She threw it aside in disappointment. At her age, she could not fully understand the role of money.
Under the envelope is a thick dictionary. This dictionary is the first edition of Xinhua Dictionary printed in June 1953. The binding of this first edition of Xinhua Dictionary is the old-fashioned thread-bound book style, which exudes a strong ancient book atmosphere. Most of the fonts in it are traditional Chinese characters and rare characters. In the early 1950s, China had not yet announced the modern Chinese pinyin, and the dictionary's search method still used the phonetic symbols created during the Republic of China. Almost every page of the dictionary has illustrations, and each picture is drawn vividly, with animals, plants... everything. In that era, it is equivalent to a small encyclopedia.
Ruan Yuanqing was a little curious. What was the point of Jiang Yi leaving this dictionary in the package? Back in the port city, all kinds of dictionaries could be found. Moreover, dictionaries that mostly used traditional Chinese characters and rare characters should have been eliminated long ago and had no edible value.
Ruan Ruan's reaction was beyond Ruan Yuanqing's expectations. She treated the dictionary as a treasure and happily flipped through it as soon as she got it in her hands.
When Ruan Ruan was in Qingshan Village, a group of children were bored and often played detective games in which the police caught murderers. One child played the role of the "victim" and one child played the role of the "murderer". The victim needed to leave clues for the other children who played the role of the police to help the police solve the case.
On one occasion, the clue to solving the case was found in a dictionary. The "victim" left a note with a number on it. The words found in the rows and columns of the numbers on the page corresponding to the number, when connected together, were the clue to finding the "murderer."
On that occasion, Ruan Ruan played the role of a public security officer and Jiang Yilu played the role of the victim. She had been unable to figure out the clues left by Brother Xiaobao, and Jiang Yilu saw that she was getting anxious, so he secretly opened a back door for her and carefully hinted her. Finally, Ruan Ruan caught the murderer Guang Piao, so she was deeply impressed by this incident.
Brother Xiaobao must have told her something that he didn't want others to know.
There are several dolls in the package, and a lot of things are stuffed inside the dolls' bodies. I have already written down the specific uses of those things. You must take good care of yourself in Gangcheng. We will definitely meet again in a few years.
The message Jiang Yilu conveyed was very simple, but it still made Ruan Ruan burst into tears.
"Brother Xiaobao is a big liar. Ruan Ruan doesn't want to see him."
In Ruan Yuanqing's eyes, Ruan Ruan was looking at a small dictionary and then started crying for no apparent reason.
But it’s okay to cry. Although Ruan Yuanqing was puzzled, he still breathed a sigh of relief.
"Ruan Ruan, grandpa has important things to do, so he gave his most precious Ruan Ruan to uncle. From today on, uncle will take good care of Ruan Ruan. There is also a kind grandmother, aunt and three brothers in uncle's family. They will love you as much as uncle does."
Ruan Yuanqing hugged the little girl in his arms and comforted her softly.
Ruan Ruan sobbed, and wrapped up all the things Jiang Yi left for her, as well as the little doll she had always carried with her, and hugged it tightly in her arms.
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