Chapter 75 Great Harvest
"Xiaohua, what about you? How did you do in the exam?" Deng Shirong looked at the fourth child and asked.
Deng Yunhua didn't even dare to raise his head, looking at his toes and said, "Dad, I may not have done well in the exam."
Deng Shirong did not scold him, but encouraged him: "You are only in the fourth grade. It doesn't matter if your grades are a little worse now. As long as you are willing to work hard, you will naturally improve slowly. Anyway, if you can't bear the hardship of studying now, you will have to bear the hardship of life in the future. For example, your eldest brother has to go to the tile factory to work at dawn and doesn't come back until the sun sets. This is the result of not studying hard back then. You brothers should learn from this."
Deng Yunhua nodded and said, "I understand, Dad!"
Deng Shirong didn’t know whether he had listened to it or not, but he was neither a psychologist nor an educator. The fact that he could say such things was the result of reading a lot of inspirational stories on the Internet in his previous life.
Anyway, it would be ideal if his sons could get into college. If they fail, it doesn't matter. With him as their father, their sons' lives in this life will definitely not be bad. The only difference is how high they can go.
…
Two days later, the midterm exam results came out.
As expected, the average scores of Deng Yunsong and Deng Yunhua were less than 90 points, and only Deng Yunheng's score met the standard, with an average score of 92 points.
Deng Shirong also fulfilled his previous promise, took out seven yuan and handed it to his youngest son, saying: "Xiaoheng, this is your reward. You must continue to work hard and strive to get more rewards from me in the final exam."
"Dad, I get it. I will keep working hard." Deng Yunheng held the huge sum of seven dollars and smiled so hard that his two big front teeth were exposed. This was the largest sum of money he had ever received in his life. Even the red envelopes he received during the Chinese New Year were far less than this amount. He really made a fortune!
Deng Yunhua, who was standing next to him, was so envious. Fortunately, he was smart and used his slingshot to reach an agreement with his younger brother in advance. Otherwise, he would have to watch his younger brother running to the brigade supply and marketing department every day and buy whatever food he wanted.
Not to mention Deng Yunhua, even Deng Yunsong, who was already 12 years old, was envious of the huge sum of seven dollars in his younger brother's hand.
Even though Deng Shirong now has more than 5,000 yuan in cash, he has already made an agreement with his sons that he will not give them pocket money for no reason. If they want money, they can exchange it for grades. As long as they work hard to get good grades, they will naturally have endless pocket money.
…
After the mid-term exam, the entire Bangjie Brigade began to harvest rice one after another, and the students also welcomed their busy farming season holiday.
Students in this era did not have as many holidays as in later generations. For example, there were no holidays for the traditional Qingming Festival and Dragon Boat Festival. Even the March 3rd festival in Guangxi, which was envied by people all over the country in later generations, did not have a holiday. However, students in rural areas did have a special holiday, which was the busy farming season holiday.
As the name suggests, this busy farming season holiday is given to students during the summer and autumn harvest seasons every year so that they can come back and help with the work.
Therefore, the busy farming season holiday is not on a fixed date, but is determined according to the local harvesting situation. For example, this year due to the impact of the production team's distribution of land to households, harvesting of rice will be later than in previous years, so the busy farming season holiday will naturally be postponed.
Seeing that everyone was busy harvesting rice, Deng Shirong gave holiday to the seven laborers who were cultivating the orchard and their relatives in the village.
As for Zhang Jiefang and other carpenters, since the date for the fire-burning of Deng Shirong's new house had already been set, in order to complete the task within the specified time, they could not take a holiday to go back and help harvest the rice, and could only let their family members harvest it slowly.
…
Agongtang is a place name. There are many fields in Naye Village, including the fields of Deng Changping's family.
It was already noon. Deng Changping, his wife Chen Xiaohua and his parents were harvesting rice together. Although the October sun was not as "hot" as in June and July, it was still very uncomfortable to work under the scorching sun.
But as the saying goes, people are in high spirits when good things happen. Seeing that their family has a bumper rice harvest this year, even though they are sweating profusely under the sun, Deng Changping and his wife always have smiles on their faces.
Similarly, Changping's father and Changping's mother's faces were also filled with joy.
Although their four sons have separated and each has his own family, as parents, they all hope that their sons can live a good life.
They don't have to worry about the eldest and the second oldest. When the family was divided up, there wasn't enough house in the old house, so they helped the eldest and the second oldest first and let them build new houses and move out.
The third and fourth sons were left to live with them in the old house. Their living conditions were indeed much worse, but there was nothing they could do about it. At that time, the family property was divided among four sons, and the couple had limited means. They had already done their best to sponsor the eldest and second sons to build new houses, and there was no way they could sponsor the third and fourth sons to build new houses in a short period of time.
Of course, this is not because they are partial to the eldest and second sons. When they were funding them to build a new house, the two elders had already made it clear in front of their four sons and daughters-in-law that they would continue to help the third and fourth sons until they were able to build their own houses and move out.
So, when it was time to harvest the crops, Changping's father and Changping's mother did not go to help the eldest and second families, but came directly to help the third family, and then went to help the fourth family after helping them.
"Dad, Mom, it's getting late. Let's take a break and have dinner first!" Deng Changping said, wiping the sweat off his face with the towel around his neck.
Changping's father nodded and said, "Well, I'm hungry too, so let's eat first."
Changping's mother and Chen Xiaohua also put down their sickles after hearing this.
The four of them washed their hands in the nearby ditch, and then started eating the lunch they brought on the edge of the field.
In this day and age, during the busy farming season, people would bring their lunch with them when harvesting fields that were a little further away. That way they wouldn’t have to walk back to eat lunch, which saved them a lot of time.
Lunch consisted of rice with fried eggs, and pork belly stewed with sauerkraut. This simple meal was a rare delicacy in Deng Changping's family. They could only afford to eat it because cutting the rice was hard work.
After finishing her meal and taking a short rest, Chen Xiaohua said hello to her parents-in-law and husband, then hurried home carrying a load of wheat. She wanted to go back to prepare meals for the two older children and feed the younger one.
Deng Changping and his parents went to the fields to continue harvesting rice. After all the rice was harvested, they carried the rice home in loads.
It was not just Deng Changping's family that was like this; other families were basically operating in the same way. Everyone was busy harvesting rice. Before the land was distributed to households, some members were slacking off during the harvest. Now that the land is theirs, everyone's enthusiasm has been aroused.
In the autumn of 1980, the entire Bangjie Brigade was filled with the joy of harvest.
(End of this chapter)
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