Thanks to Sha Zhu's persistence, the repair team finally relented: they could provide repair materials, but they were short-handed. Either they did the repairs themselves, or they had to wait. As for the waiting time, sorry, there was no time.
"Master, I don't quite understand why you're helping Xu Damao with these things?"
In the kitchen of the first canteen, the fat man asked Sha Zhu, puzzled, why. In their understanding, their master and Xu Damao were mortal enemies.
Ma Hua, another apprentice of Sha Zhu, nodded in agreement, expressing his incomprehension. The two apprentices had been running around with Sha Zhu, exhausted from helping Xu Damao repair his house, and were unwilling to put their minds to it any longer.
"You don't understand. That bastard Xu Damao relied on his good luck to become a factory director and acted all high and mighty in the compound, looking down on everyone. Now that he's fallen on hard times, it's time for me to show my strength."
After everything is settled, I'll have Xu Damao set up a few tables of food and drinks in the courtyard, and then apologize to me. That way, your master will have both face and dignity.
"You're all too young to understand. A person's life in society is all about appearances," Sha Zhu remarked.
Ever since he got his marriage certificate with Qin Huairu, this guy has made a mistake that all men are prone to: he's easily bored with the old and crave the new. He discovered that his former crush was nothing special, and since what he had been pursuing was suddenly gone, he started looking for other things to comfort himself. Like power, like face.
The two apprentices genuinely couldn't understand their master's pursuit, yet they were eager to help him fulfill his wish—no, Xu Damao's wish. What a ridiculous situation! A deputy section chief trying to stand up for a division-level cadre—it's almost ironic.
"You two hurry up and think of a solution. If you can't, then you can go do repairs."
Sha Zhu had exhausted all his ideas and could only pin his hopes on his apprentice.
“Master, why don’t we do the repairs ourselves? We have a few people in this canteen, and we can ask the armed forces department to send a few more. In a few days, we can renovate the building inside and out.”
"This way, you can be self-sufficient and save yourself the trouble of asking others for help."
Sha Zhu's words reminded Fatty that he should just do it himself and stop begging for help. With Fatty's lazy ways of slacking off, it would be a piece of cake when it came to actually doing it.
"That won't do. With our skill level, we're good at chopping vegetables, but how could we possibly do a good job painting walls or fixing doors? You don't want to end up getting blamed for not doing a good job."
Ma Hua immediately objected. He knew very well that if they did the work themselves, all the dirty and hard work would end up on his end, since he never refused anyone.
The two then started arguing about whether they should do it themselves or hire someone else.
"Alright, stop arguing. You've made such a big deal out of this. I've thought about it, and all your opinions are problematic. In the end, I've decided that we should do it ourselves. We shouldn't go to the maintenance office or the general office of the armed forces department."
"It's such a small matter. If I go to the Armed Forces Department, they'll probably give me a piece of their mind." Sha Zhu made the final decision.
He'd figured it out: as long as the job was done, he didn't care if it was done by the maintenance department or the cafeteria staff—it didn't have to be him. All he needed to do was brag to Xu Damao after it was fixed. He wanted to show that down-on-his-luck armed forces minister that a powerless section-level cadre was less capable than a cafeteria cook like himself. Just thinking about it made him feel pretty good.
“Master, but if we don’t contact the Armed Forces Department, we don’t have many people in our canteen who can do this. Chef Song and Chef Wang are both cooks, and they’re not young, so we definitely can’t get them to do it; Sister Xu, Sister Liu, Sister Song, and Liu Lan are all women, and they can’t do this kind of repair work.”
In the end, I estimate that only 3-4 people can do it.
After Ma Hua's analysis, Sha Zhu realized that he really had a shortage of capable workers. There weren't many young men in the canteen; if you added the three of them together, that would only be four or five. They also had to cook and prepare meals, so they didn't have time to cook.
However, Sha Zhu thought that these weren't heavy tasks, and older women could handle them. With more people, they could finish quickly. Since everyone usually had to cook, they could just come in on weekends to work overtime.
So, Sha Zhu took it upon himself to assign everyone in the cafeteria a weekend overtime task, completely disregarding the rest rights of others.
"Everyone, please be quiet. I have something very important to say. The Armed Forces Department heard that everyone in our canteen is capable and skilled, so they specifically asked me for a favor: they need everyone to work overtime this weekend."
"Considering that our cafeteria is a very helpful group, I've already promised on everyone's behalf. Please come during your normal work hours on weekend mornings." Sha Zhu announced the news as soon as he arrived at the cafeteria.
Everyone initially thought it was good news, but upon hearing that they had to work overtime even though they finally had a day off, they all complained and cursed the Armed Forces Department for being unfair. They all assumed the Armed Forces Department would organize some kind of drill over the weekend and have the canteen staff come to provide meals. This kind of thing had happened before, and although they were unwilling, they knew the importance of such matters.
Sha Zhu was very satisfied with everyone's reaction; no one objected on the spot, so he continued to make demands.
"Okay, when you come over, bring all your trowels, rollers, paintbrushes, and oh yes, the carpenter's plane. Bring as many as you can. If we all work together, we can overcome anything. I'm sure one day will be more than enough." Sha Zhu gave a passionate speech, with bubbles flying everywhere.
Then everyone in the cafeteria was full of questions. What the hell was going on? Weren't they supposed to bring kitchen knives and rolling pins? Was Sha Zhu possessed?
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