"Xiaoduo, can you tell Mom in detail why you want to study abroad?"
As a mother, this is also what she cares about most.
"Mom, I just want to go out and see more of the world, and learn something. It was Sanwa who inspired me."
Zhao Qinglan smiled when her youngest son was mentioned.
"I have no idea what the future holds for your brother."
"Sanwa is smarter than all of us, and his future achievements will definitely be extraordinary." Xiaoduo also has high expectations for her younger brother.
"Mom just wants all of you to be safe and sound," Zhao Qinglan said with emotion.
"Mom, being your daughter is the happiest thing for me." Xiaoduo snuggled up to her mother.
Zhao Qinglan's eyes reddened, because she thought of her daughter's fate in her previous life.
Fortunately, she had a second chance and led her daughter down a completely different path.
Xiao Duo assumed her mother was just touched and didn't ask any further questions.
The mother and daughter stayed together for one night, and then Xiao Duo was sent back to school by her bodyguard Ning Hui.
Seeing that her daughter liked Ning Hui and got along well with them, Zhao Qinglan decided to give them a raise. She wasn't afraid to spend the money; she just wanted the two of them to protect her daughter well.
With the help of Zhang Yu's connections, the new company was quickly established, and the people he had mobilized all arrived.
They rented a new place as an office, and they all sat down together for a meeting to select a person in charge and assign tasks.
Many people were apprehensive about being transferred to a new, unfamiliar company.
However, upon hearing about the hefty rewards promised by the bosses at the meeting, everyone became incredibly excited.
They work for the boss just to earn more money. If they do this job well, they might earn many times their previous salary. Who wouldn't be tempted?
After the company was set up, Zhao Qinglan and her team went off to take care of other things.
Small-time traders usually travel between China and the Soviet Union by carrying goods back and forth by one or a few people. But if they were going to expand their businesses, they wouldn't choose such an extreme method as carrying goods by hand.
They plan to directly contract train cars and use trains to transport the goods.
The task of procuring goods domestically was left to Wei Hong, as that was her area of expertise.
Zhao Qinglan followed Zhang Yu and started running around meeting people and building relationships.
Although Zhang Yu is a native of Beijing and knows many people, he has spent most of his time in Shenzhen, so he has inevitably neglected his connections in Beijing, and some of his relationships are just superficial.
To this end, Zhang Yu recruited a descendant of a high-ranking official with whom he had a good relationship. They shared the profits, and this person helped them make connections and build relationships.
In fact, Zhao Qinglan could have accomplished these things by leveraging her uncle's influence, but she didn't want to burden him with such trivial matters.
My uncle is the one who speaks at crucial moments.
As for Zhang Yu, he could have gradually built relationships by giving gifts, since he still had connections. However, that would have been too slow, so after discussing it, they decided to use an existing, established figurehead.
It may seem like a lot of profits will be given up, but in reality there are many benefits, and the pie can be made bigger and faster.
What they're fighting for now is time.
Because of these events, Zhao Qinglan stayed in the capital and didn't go back home until her eldest child and youngest child were on winter vacation, at which point she returned home with the children.
With Wei Hong and Zhang Yu taking care of things back in Beijing, she could leave for the New Year with peace of mind.
Since he was staying in Beijing for the Chinese New Year, Zhang Yu also asked his wife to take their two children back to Beijing.
As soon as she got home, Zhao Qinglan told her husband about her achievements.
She had already discussed it on the phone, but she still wanted to go over it with her husband from beginning to end.
"The goods are almost ready. Zhang Yu and I discussed it and decided that since everyone has been busy for so long, we should take a break and have a good New Year. After the New Year, we will start working hard again."
"You guys are really something." Planning is easy, but putting it into practice is not so simple.
Unexpectedly, these people actually got to work with great enthusiasm.
“You’re not bad either. I think Uncle is now completely convinced that the eldest brother has disintegrated. You deserve a lot of credit for that,” Zhao Qinglan praised her husband.
Li Huai laughed. "If you hadn't told me the result first, I wouldn't have been so determined to go all the way in this direction."
"Alright, alright, let's stop praising each other. I've been away from home for so long, have you had any unexpected problems?" she said meaningfully.
Li Huai reacted quickly. "No way! After leaving the office, I just go home, eat, and sleep. To make one day's work look like ten days' worth, you have no idea how hard I've been working lately. Haven't you noticed I've lost weight?"
After saying that, he grabbed his wife's hand and started touching her all over his body.
What started as a solemn declaration of loyalty quickly turned into something else entirely.
In the end, Zhao Qinglan stopped herself in time and kicked her husband aside.
"The children are still outside. Let's go out for dinner first, and we can talk about anything else tonight."
"Wife, you said it yourself, tonight."
Zhao Qinglan glanced at her husband. "You're not forty anymore, you should start taking care of yourself."
Feeling slighted, Li Huai grabbed his wife's hand again, saying defiantly, "You'll know once you touch it."
"Aren't you ashamed?" She quickly pulled her hand back.
After she had been gone for a while, the person who had calmed down finally went out.
That evening, someone who held a grudge, in order to prove that he was still as good as ever, really put on a show.
Zhao Qinglan coaxed him by calling him "brother" several times before he finally satisfied her and let her go.
When Da Wa went out to use the restroom at night, he accidentally overheard some noises coming from his parents' room. His face flushed, and he quickly went back inside. After going back to sleep, he had a wonderful erotic dream in which the object of his affection was Ji Rou.
Da Wa and Ji Rou had been maintaining a clandestine, ambiguous relationship for quite some time, but this was the first time he had ever dreamt of her like this.
When Erwa woke up groggily in the morning, he found his older brother squatting by the basin washing things, which he found strange.
"Brother, we have a washing machine at home, why don't you use it?"
"Go watch TV, it's none of your business," the eldest child said in a muffled voice.
Erwa was always afraid of his older brother, so he didn't dare to say anything after hearing this and ran to watch TV, unaware that his brother's ears had turned red from his question.
The children have all returned, and Zhao Qinglan has started preparing delicious New Year's goods every day.
Li Huai was lucky this year; he didn't have to be on duty on New Year's Eve, nor did he have the task of visiting and comforting soldiers at the grassroots level.
Zhao Qinglan thought about how she spent last year with her mother, and knowing that her husband was not on duty this year, she thought about staying with the children and their family to spend the holiday together.
As for her mother, she wasn't worried. Her aunt felt that she and her cousin were a bit lonely spending the Lunar New Year in Hong Kong, so she had already brought people over.
She planned to stay home until the fifth day of the Lunar New Year, and then set off with her children to the provincial capital to spend a few days with her mother and aunt.
Da Wa and Xiao Duo went directly from the provincial capital to school, while she took her youngest son home to stay for a few more days.
Li Huai was happy and content to be able to spend the Spring Festival with his wife and children this year.
The tolling of the midnight bells on New Year's Eve heralded the start of a new year, the year 1990.
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