Chapter 037 Still Eggs
Apart from the insecurity, the biggest problem with Tangyuan here is language.
Northern dialects are easy to learn. Even if you don't deliberately learn them, you can naturally pick up an accent after a long time. But Cantonese is different. The pronunciation of this language and Mandarin is completely different. I can't understand it, let alone speak it. I can barely understand a little bit by memorizing the outline of the new vest, but I am still a long way from pronouncing the standard pronunciation.
Therefore, she did not dare to walk far and only walked within a radius of ten or so meters. Occasionally, she would stop to listen to other people's conversations, trying to learn to write words that she could pronounce quickly.
But even if she could learn it, she would still have to be semi-mute for a short period of time.
I hope I won't be treated as a fool again this time.
After a tour, she had some understanding of the prices in Hong Kong at that time. Even the most ordinary workers could earn hundreds to thousands of yuan a month. Those with slightly more decent jobs could earn thousands or even tens of thousands of yuan.
This also makes the prices in Hong Kong much higher than those in the mainland today. The prices posted in roadside restaurants are that a basic fried rice costs four dollars, and a meat and vegetable set meal is seven dollars. Even if you eat sparingly, a rice with a little meat and vegetables will cost five or six dollars.
If you eat three meals a day and save a little, that's ten yuan a day. In a month, the food expenses alone will be three hundred yuan.
The rent is fifty dollars.
This way, with a monthly salary of several hundred yuan, you can save three or four hundred yuan every month.
This is under the condition that she still has salary. Her biggest problem now is that she has no salary.
The stable job in the boiler room has already trapped her there. Finding another stable job here is not a question of whether she is free or not, but she really cannot do two jobs by herself.
While walking, she had to stop from time to time, return to Tang Yuan's body to look at the fire, and flip through the elementary school textbook in her hand.
Now she has changed her elementary school textbooks from the third grade textbooks to the fourth grade textbooks. They are both elementary school textbooks, but at least they are one grade higher. If she doesn't say it, no one knows how she is doing, but at least everyone has seen her change the books.
That way, if the day ever comes when she needs to write or do something else, no one will suspect that it is beyond her ability.
Life is so long, she can't really live it in a "silly" state.
After walking for a while, she finally found a way to make money here. It was still the old way - selling eggs.
Currently, eggs in China cost eight cents each, while eggs here cost forty cents each. As long as she sells ten eggs, she can buy a lunch. However, she does not need to eat the lunch here, so she can save the money.
At least I have to earn the rent.
Just as she was thinking this, she returned to her residence and was stopped by someone. The other person started talking a lot, saying that she had to pay the rent in a few days, and if she didn't, she would have to leave.
Where to go from here?
Should she set up a temporary residence like "Xiao Fang"? Not to mention whether it is possible, even if it is possible, the environment here is different from that in the mainland. The more remote the environment is, the more dangerous it is. In a busy place, she can be seen at any time if she comes out of an empty place, which is also unsafe.
She nodded and went back upstairs through the narrow corridor and stairs.
The corridor was not completely dark. There was a glass window above her head that brought in some light from outside. She took out her key and opened the door. She went into the house and saw that it was even darker. Not giving up, she touched the pull cord by the door and pulled it several times, but the light bulb above her head did not respond.
Before she saves for the rent, she has to spend money on a light bulb.
She closed the door, came to the bed, passed through the "passage" on the bed, and returned to the game space.
In order to welcome the coming New Year, she was not in a hurry to sell eggs. She collected dozens of eggs gradually and took them out to exchange for money today.
She entered the wooden house and took out the bag she had brought with her when she escaped from the countryside from the corner. The bag was old and worn out, with many patches on it. After she ordered it from the machinery factory, she got a new bag from Tang Jianguo, so this bag was left over and was just right for her to use today.
She put twenty eggs in her bag, left the game room with the bag on her back, got out of bed, and went downstairs through the narrow corridor.
After going downstairs, she followed the route she had just explored and headed towards a nearby small market.
The transactions here are not like those in China today, which need to be secretive and cautious. Many people come here with loads on their shoulders, or ride bicycles or tricycles. Once they have sold all the things on the bikes, they can just ride away.
She didn't want to cause trouble, so she squatted down in a place where she wouldn't disturb others, and placed her bag directly on the ground, revealing the eggs inside.
Fortunately, the eggs were still selling well, so she waited there for a while, and someone came over to see and asked about the price of the eggs. She didn't say much and just quoted "4 cents each".
These were the four words she considered several times before making sure her accent was correct.
The other party bargained with her, but she still insisted on quoting "four cents each" until the other party compromised, picked out the five largest eggs in the bag, and left two yuan.
She took the money and continued to wait for customers.
Five eggs seemed easier to count, so subsequent customers also asked for five, until only the five smallest eggs were left.
She did not wait for the destined person for the five eggs. Instead, she got up and went back into the house. When she came out, she had thirty eggs in her bag, filling a whole bag.
Returning to her stall, she still opened her bag, then fished out the five eggs she had just sold from her pocket and placed them on top of all the eggs.
The selling price of this batch of eggs is still 4 cents each, and as expected, they are still sold in batches of five.
Not surprisingly, the five little eggs she had placed on top were left behind.
However, at the end of the sale, the slightly larger of the five eggs was picked out, leaving a smaller egg, making five more eggs in total.
She didn't sell any more, but left happily carrying the five little eggs. Such good tool eggs could not be used only this time. If it weren't for these five little eggs, the other eggs would not have been so easy to sell.
She sold a total of 45 eggs this time, earning 18 yuan in her account, leaving her with 32 yuan to pay the 50 yuan rent.
Tomorrow is the day she agreed with Sun Dong and Sun Feng to deliver the eggs. This time, five days have passed. Although the weather has been cold recently, the chicken farm has been well kept warm, so there should be a lot of eggs delivered this time.
As for Shen Wenyu and Aunt Cao, she had already delivered the eggs they wanted last time. This time, she could sell the eggs in the market here, which would be just enough to pay the rent.
On the way back with her bag, she passed by a hardware store and remembered another purpose of selling eggs today, so she went in and bought a light bulb for four dollars.
The price was a bit high, but she couldn't speak the language here, so she couldn't bargain. Even if it was too expensive, she had to accept it.
As soon as I returned to the downstairs of my residence, I heard a roar.
"Gossip, if you bring a man back again, I'll kick you out!"
At the same time, a man and a woman, arm in arm, squeezed out of the passage, quickly passed through the crowd that was almost gathered and ran away, leaving Tang Yuan looking confused.
What do you mean by get out? Get out? It should be similar to get out, right?
Someone came down from upstairs and spat in the direction of the two running away. Then he looked at Tang Yuan and greeted her warmly: "Jia Qi is back!"
She can understand this sentence, and the pronunciation is almost the same as "回來了".
She smiled and nodded to the person, and waited until the other person completely walked out of the passage before going upstairs through the narrow passage. She thought that the human body is also a "liquid". It was difficult for her to walk through this passage alone, but the two people just now were able to come down side by side, which was really amazing.
She fumbled for the key to open the door, went back into the house, and saw the light bulb above her head through the light from the corridor.
Fortunately, this place was not big, and she could reach the bulb by stepping on the bed and replaced it easily.
It may be that the switch was turned on a few times before, and the room became bright as soon as the light bulb was replaced.
The bright light attracted the attention of the neighbors coming and going outside the door. She got out of bed, closed the door, locked it, and looked back at the situation in the house.
She lives alone in this house now, but according to Gang's memory, originally three people lived here. There was a wooden board against the wall, and when it was time to go to bed, the board would be turned down and attached to the bed, and a cabinet would be placed underneath to make a complete bed.
But that's not all. The bed below was where her parents slept. She was thin and had to sleep on the frame above. She didn't know how she managed to get through those years, but now when she looked at the frame above the bed, she always felt that it would collapse at any time.
If she came out of the game space at any time and the bed suddenly collapsed, you can imagine how dangerous it would be.
The lights were on at this moment, so she could see the situation in the room. She stood by the bed and moved piles of things from inside to outside into the game space, even emptying the cabinets.
She didn't return to the game space until there was only one empty bed left in the room.
The room was small, but it contained a lot of stuff, seven or eight boxes in total, most of which were small odds and ends.
Torn socks, torn shoes, torn clothes, even from the perspective of mainland China in the 1970s, these things were very shabby and there was not a single piece that was complete and wearable.
There were also some pots and pans. When the family of three lived there, they would cook, of course not in the house, but in someone else's kitchen. The rent was only a few dollars a month, which was definitely more cost-effective than eating out in a restaurant.
However, these pots, pans, and utensils were not well cleaned and now looked pitch black, covered with coal dust and oil stains. All these things were placed in a cardboard box. She opened it and checked, and after making sure there was nothing valuable in it, she covered it again.
Fortunately, after looking around, I found that there was still something useful.
At least she was able to find a few pieces of cloth, which, although yellowed, were not torn.
There were also some old books and newspapers, which were probably not bought with real money. They were probably collected as waste or picked up from other people's discarded things. Fortunately, they were all placed in cardboard boxes. Although the outside was covered with dust, the books and old newspapers inside looked okay. She kept them all so that she could kill time when she had nothing to do.
The last thing she got was the biggest reward from this packing trip.
A total of ten dollars and fifty cents in cash was found, which was one-fifth of the rent!
Heartbreakingly poor.