Chapter 16 Marrying up and down, all are incomparable to Naye Gong Naba
In the hall, Zhang Jiefang and his son are working together to build a bunk bed for a family in the village. As famous carpenters in the village, Zhang Jiefang and his son basically help build furniture for any family in the village.
The canopy bed is a traditional bedding of the Han nationality. It originated in ancient times and officially appeared in the Ming Dynasty. It is a typical example of the convergence of Chinese furniture and traditional architecture. It has extremely similarities in structure, craftsmanship and decoration methods.
In the world of classical furniture, the canopy bed has always been highly praised by researchers and collectors and is known as the most scientific bed.
It has many styles, exquisite structure and gorgeous decoration.
The decorations are mostly based on historical stories, folk legends, flowers, horses, mountains and rivers, etc., and contain the meanings of harmony, peace, auspiciousness, good fortune and many children.
The styles are either simple and elegant, or grand and gorgeous.
What Zhang Jiefang and his son are working together to create now is naturally the simplest kind of bunk bed.
Just as the father and son were working seriously, a voice suddenly came from the door: "Excuse me, is this Zhang Jiefang's house?"
Zhang Jiefang stopped what he was doing and looked at the strange middle-aged man holding a bicycle at the door. He went out and asked, "I'm Zhang Jiefang. Who are you, cousin? What can I do for you?"
Deng Shirong parked his bike, took out a bag of candy biscuits from his pocket, handed it over and said, "I'm Uncle Jiu from Naye Village, Bangjie Brigade. I heard that your eldest son Zhang Kangmei is already 22 years old and still hasn't started a family, so I want to help find a matchmaker. I wonder if your family is interested in this?"
It turned out to be a matchmaker who came to visit, and Zhang Jiefang immediately greeted him warmly.
Zhang Kangmei was indeed a quick-witted man. Without his father's instructions, he immediately brought a stool and a chimney for the matchmaker.
Deng Shirong lit two cigarettes, and after some polite exchanges between the two sides, they started talking about business.
"Young man, the girl I want to introduce to you is from our village. Her name is Deng Changmei. She is one year younger than you and has a high school education, which is rare among girls."
Deng Shirong briefly introduced her: "She is about 1.6 meters tall, good-looking, cheerful, and always smiling..."
Zhang Jiefang and his son listened attentively the whole time. They didn’t know whether it was because the girl’s conditions were good or because the matchmaker Deng Shirong was so eloquent, but the more they listened, the more satisfied they felt.
"Uncle Jiu, the girl you mentioned is really good." Zhang Jiefang first praised her, then looked at his eldest son and said, "This is your lifelong event. What do you think of this girl? If she is suitable, let Uncle Jiu arrange for you to meet her."
Zhang Kangmei was naturally satisfied.
Apart from anything else, the fact that the woman has a high school diploma alone adds a lot of points to his mind, and everything else also fits his fantasy of what a partner should be.
Of course, this is just the matchmaker's opinion. We need to find out whether it is really that good or not, and then we need to meet each other to know.
Thinking this in his heart, Zhang Kangmei nodded and said, "No problem for me. Then please arrange for us to meet, Uncle Jiu."
Deng Shirong smiled and said, "No problem. Let me arrange a specific time for you to meet. I need to ask your production team when they will harvest the crops first."
Zhang Jiefang said: "The captain didn't say which day, but it will probably be in the next two or three days!"
"Originally, the day after tomorrow is a market day, so it would be the most appropriate to arrange a meeting, but the day after tomorrow I have to arrange for someone else to look after my house, so there is a time conflict."
Deng Shirong pondered and said, "How about this? It's not good to rush. I will arrange for you to meet after we finish harvesting the rice. During this time, you can also arrange someone to go to our village to inquire about the reputation of the girl I introduced to you and see if she is as I said."
Zhang Jiefang said, "Uncle Jiu, you are really thoughtful. It is rare to find a matchmaker as honest as you. I will follow your arrangements, Uncle Jiu."
Deng Shirong smiled and said, "After all, this girl is my niece's granddaughter. As an elder, I definitely hope that they will live happily. So I will tell you everything. I will definitely not hide anything maliciously just to help them get married."
Zhang Jiefang and his son felt more relieved after hearing this.
After finishing the business, the two sides chatted for a while and then Deng Shirong got up and said goodbye.
It was almost noon at this time, so Zhang Jiefang and his son naturally tried their best to keep him, insisting that he eat two bowls of porridge before leaving.
Deng Shirong couldn't refuse, so he stayed and ate two bowls of porridge and a piece of fried cassava cake before riding back contentedly.
…
In the afternoon, Deng Shirong had just returned home when his neighbor Aunt Wu came over with a pen and paper in her left hand and a rice bag in her right hand. She said, "Uncle Jiu, the Baigong (the god of the land) will perform a ritual tomorrow. Will your family participate?"
Deng Shirong nodded without hesitation and said, "Of course, I'll make two copies."
Working as a community is a local traditional custom, and can be large or small.
Sometimes it is small and consists of several families, mostly farmers with the same surname, the same neighborhood, or farmers who cultivate the same farmland voluntarily unite; sometimes it is large and consists of farmers from one village or several villages working together.
The scale of the cooperative run by Deng Shirong and his people is relatively large. It is jointly run by several natural villages with the surname Deng, centered on Naye Village.
In an era when people could not eat meat for a month or two, the day of the festival could be said to be the happiest day for the villagers, because it meant they could eat meat that day.
In later generations, people would collect money first and then set up a society.
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But now, the collective only collects rice in advance, not money. In other words, you can buy on credit now, which is why the villagers like it. Even a family that can't afford a penny can sign up to be a collective and get some collective meat to take home to offer sacrifices to their stomachs.
As for the money owed to the community, they would just pay it back when they had the money. This also led to many families who sold community pigs not being able to collect the money for the pigs for several years.
The custom of holding a community festival is common in the entire Bobai County, but the regulations for holding a community festival are different in each village. In some places, there are only two community festivals a year, which are divided into spring festival and autumn festival.
In most places, there are four community activities a year, namely spring, summer, autumn and winter.
However, Naye Village is different from other places. It holds community ceremonies twelve times a year, an average of once a month. This frequency makes people in other villages envious.
Therefore, some people with good intentions even made up a rhyme: "No matter whether you are married or not, they are all incomparable to Naye Gong Naba. Even if you don't have pork, you can still have a bowl of rice."
What this means is that no matter where you marry, it is not as good as marrying into Naye Village or Naba Village, where even if you don’t have pork to eat, you will have a bowl of rice to eat.
Both Naye Village and Naba Village hold festivals twelve times a year.
When Aunt Five heard Uncle Jiu say that they wanted to make two portions of the community, she couldn't believe her ears. In this era, a family that could make one portion on its own was already a family with a good standard of living in the village. Most people would partner with others to make one portion, just to satisfy their cravings.
Uncle Jiu can be said to be the first person in the village who can speak up and do two jobs.
Aunt Wu widened her eyes and asked, "Uncle Jiu, did I hear you correctly? You want to do two jobs?"
Deng Shirong smiled and nodded, "Well, there are many children in the family, and one portion of the community is not enough to eat, so it is more appropriate to make two portions."
Aunt Wu couldn't help but twitch her lips when she heard this. Who doesn't have many children in this era? Everyone does it just to satisfy their cravings. Who has the conditions to eat meat to their heart's content? After a while, Aunt Wu said with envy, "Uncle Jiu, you are really willing to give it up!"
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(End of this chapter)