Farmers are the most realistic. For these prospective immigrants, those dazzling machines alone do not arouse much interest.
But when the fact that the yield per mu had increased fivefold was put before their eyes, everyone immediately vowed to learn this unique skill!
The prospective immigrants were inspired with the highest enthusiasm for learning, and their cooperation with the training cadres was fully increased. They regarded their every word as a guide and carried out their every order without hesitation.
Wang Qi and others also taught the prospective immigrants everything they knew. In addition to irrigated and dry fields, they also opened up cotton fields, rapeseed fields, beet fields, potato fields, sweet potato fields and other new crop fields, and taught them as much agricultural skills as possible.
Every day after dinner, each squadron would hold a literacy class, which everyone had to attend. If it rained heavily, there would be literacy classes all day long.
In fact, on the way here, immigration officials have already been teaching the prospective immigrants to read and write. With another three months of training at the training center, they will be able to achieve basic literacy.
Of course, they still don't know how to write fennel beans. But the group doesn't require them to know. According to regulations, students in the literacy class can graduate if they can recognize 800 commonly used Chinese characters, write receipts and notes, and basically understand newspapers.
When we move to the administrative district, the commune will organize learning during the slack season, and there will be math and agricultural courses...
The prospective immigrants have a very high enthusiasm for learning. For thousands of years, reading and literacy have been the privilege of the ruling class and have always been monopolized by masters. When will it be the turn of these peasants?
Although they worked all day, they still crowded into brightly lit classrooms at night, following the cultural teachers to learn pinyin and the simplest, most commonly used and most basic Chinese characters, such as "one, two, three, four, east, south, west, north, front, back, left, right, men, women, old and young..."
After the prospective immigrants have mastered pinyin, the teachers will gradually teach them some complex characters from the simplest to the most complex.
Li Shouzhong studied very hard. He never expected that Jiangnan Group would teach people to read and write. In his mind, being able to read and write was a superior thing. Now you can learn to read without spending money. Is there such a good thing in the world?
The only thing that made him uncomfortable was that some of the content in the textbooks seemed to be extremely outrageous.
For example, "Poor people should not be treated like cattle and horses, I want to turn over and become the master", "Learn culture well and break superstition" and so on...
The cultural teacher actually said that all people are born equal and all inequalities are imposed on us by others.
They also say that all gods and immortals are liars and that we should believe in science. This is simply too much!
No wonder the East Factory wanted to investigate them!
Li Shouzhong thought that he could report to Mr. Shen just by taking the literacy textbook back. But he didn't want to do that at all. Would he still be a human being if he turned a blind eye to kindness?
Oh, it's so confusing...
But most people don't have such a strong sense of loyalty to the emperor, so they won't be entangled. Now they believe whatever the teacher says. If you give them a knife, they will dare to rebel with the group...
For example, Gao Da was almost brainwashed, so Li Shouzhong had to inject loyalty into him whenever he found an opportunity to prevent him from doing something stupid.
The two families still have their own unborn child...well, now it's a newly born child, and his life is still in the hands of the East Factory.
~~
More than a month later, the busy farming season was over.
The work in the fields can be done by women, and the training cadres will take the men to build seawalls and reservoirs, and teach them how to carry out engineering projects.
Every morning, the physical education instructor also has to conduct drill training for the men.
First, it is to prepare them to join the reserve force after they are assigned to various administrative districts. Second, through queue training, the discipline of the men can be greatly strengthened.
Wang Qi also took them to the sea to fish by boat and taught them how to use the mudflats for aquaculture. After all, 99% of the overseas cities are located on the seashore, so it is still necessary to learn some skills in this area.
Fishermen along the coast have mastered the technology of cultivating seafood on the beach for hundreds of years. They directly use the beach to cultivate various shellfish such as mussels, scallops, and clams. They also cultivate various algae such as kelp and laver. They also transform the beach into fish ponds to cultivate various fish and shrimp.
But these prospective immigrants had never heard of it before, and it was a real eye-opener.
Although Wang Qi was the team leader, he always did everything himself during the training, wishing to impart all his knowledge in these three months.
The would-be immigrants could naturally feel the sincerity of this "big cadre" and loved him very much. The singles living in the dormitory were even more enthusiastic about Wang Qi and called him Master Qi.
As time went by, Li Shouzhong and Gaoda realized that Qi Ye was actually only 34 years old, but because he was exposed to the wind and sun at the seaside every day, his skin had turned brown and had deep wrinkles on it, which made him look particularly old.
They also accidentally heard the deputy captain say that the name Wang Qingao was related to Master Qi. But when they curiously asked Wang Qi about it, he always avoided the question.
Happy times are always short-lived. The would-be immigrants have never felt that time has passed so quickly. In the blink of an eye, it is already mid-June, the day for the training to end.
All immigrants received completion certificates issued by the training center and ship tickets to different destinations.
Wang Qi and the training cadres were busy for two whole days. They went to the central service station to buy all kinds of wine, braised dishes, and sauces, and slaughtered two big fat pigs. Of course, fish, shrimps, and crabs were also indispensable. They prepared a sumptuous dinner to see them off.
At first everyone was quite happy, but when Deputy Captain Liu asked the captain to give a toast, Wang Qi picked up the wine bowl and shouted at the top of his voice:
"Brothers and sisters, the time has come to go our separate ways..."
The atmosphere in the field suddenly became suffocated, and a feeling of reluctance to part spread.
Some people started wiping their tears, and gradually everyone started crying. The prospective immigrants cried, the training officers cried, and Wang Qi also had red eyes. Everyone was reluctant to part.
The prospective immigrants are no longer in the numb state of neither joy nor sorrow. Their hearts have been completely warmed by the training cadres, and they completely belong to the Jiangnan Group.
"Alright, alright, I won't say any more. Stop crying, or you won't be able to eat." Wang Qi wiped his tears with the back of his hand and said loudly, "Let's start the meal!"
"Come on, everyone, pick up your drinks and have a drink together!" The training cadres also hurried to liven up the atmosphere.
After a while, the yard gradually became lively. The immigrants came in small groups to toast Wang Qi and the teacher. Wang Qi accepted all the toasts and drank more than a dozen glasses of beer. His face was as red as a boiled shrimp.
"Everyone, stop for a moment and let the captain take it easy." Deputy Captain Liu quickly came to Wang Qi's rescue, and successfully transferred the firepower to himself...
Wang Qi looked drunk, smiling as he watched the cadres and immigrants mingle together. Someone at the side stuffed a cigarette into his mouth, and someone else lit one for him from the other side.
But it was Li Shouzhong and Gaoda.
"Two brats." Wang Qi took a puff of smoke, blew smoke all over Li Shouzhong's face and said, "Where did you get it?"
"What Taiwan?" Li Shouzhong said with a sad face, "Oh, I have to take a boat again."
"Be content, kid." Wang Qi laughed and said, "The nearest administrative region to here is Taiwan."
"Is that so..." Li Shouzhong couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. If he had really drifted on the sea for a month or two, his life would have been in danger.
Strictly speaking, Xingang City is only a thousand miles away from Zhoushan, and a hundred miles closer than Taiwan. But a few years ago, the group stopped sending immigrants to the Tamra Administrative Region, and all immigrants went south.
The public statement is that we are about to enter a mini ice age, and the climate of Jeonra Island will deteriorate. As for the real reason, we can only ask Zhao Hao...
~~
"Seventh Master, we won't see each other tomorrow, why don't you tell us what your name is?" Gao Da was a stubborn person and had not forgotten the question that Wang Qi refused to answer.
"My name is really not Wang Qing, my name is Wang Qi." Wang Qi had also drunk some wine, so his mouth was not so tight anymore. He took out his work ID from his briefcase and waved it in front of the two guys who had just graduated from the literacy class.
The two of them saw that it was written:
'Name: Wang Qi.
Work unit: 58th Training Brigade, Fourth Detachment, Zhoushan Immigration Training Center
Position: Captain (Administrative Level 10)
"Your name is really not Wang Qing, then who is he?" Gundam scratched his head.
"That's my nephew." Wang Qi was silent for a long time, and finally sighed and said, "If he were alive, he would be several years older than your brother..."
"Ah..." Gundam finally understood why Master Qi had always been reluctant to talk about this matter.
But the conversation had already started, so Wang Qi continued.
"Actually, my family is also an immigrant family. We are from Anqiu County, Qingzhou Prefecture, Shandong. Anqiu is a good place. The green onions grown there are as tall as a person. But unfortunately, there is an Anqiu King in the county."
"That year was the first year of the Longqing reign, and Shandong was hit by a locust plague. My father and my brother Wang Liu were conscripted to repair the royal mausoleum. The family had already run out of food, and if they left, the whole family, young and old, would starve to death. We had no choice but to pack up our things and flee our hometown overnight."
Thinking of the tragic situation when he fled from famine, Wang Qi couldn't help crying and said, "There was no immigration office at that time, not even a group. My family could only beg for food all the way south. At that time, the whole Shandong province was hit by a disaster, and we couldn't even get a few bites of food."
"My mother begged for food to save for us, but she was reluctant to eat it. In the end, she starved to death on the road. My father and brother begged for mercy and asked the cemetery to collect the dead for a month. It was with great effort that they found a place for my mother to rest in the mass grave."
Li Shouzhong, Gaoda and others felt sympathetic after hearing this, as it turned out that the Seventh Master was also a similarly miserable person.
"Later, we arrived in Suzhou after much hardship. My father and brother carried heavy bags in Hushuguan. My sister-in-law took me and my eighth sister to do odd jobs everywhere. We reeled silk in the spring, harvested rice in the summer, and picked cotton in the autumn... We worked so hard all year round, but we could barely make a living."
"But the following year, the market in Suzhou was not good. There was no work to be found all winter. My father broke his back from carrying sacks, and the whole family depended on the little money my brother earned from carrying sacks. We started to have no food to eat again, and we couldn't eat a grain of rice for several days. My nephew, Wang Qing, was so hungry that he couldn't even hold up his head..."
"Luckily, a fellow villager came to me and said that there was a Jiangnan Company in Kunshan that was looking for people to farm the land, and the whole family could go there together. Once we got there, we would have a place to live, food for the whole family, and we could split the harvest in half at the end of the year!"
"My brother was more conservative and thought this was too risky, but the family was starving to death, so he had to take the whole family to Kunshan." Wang Qi said with deep emotion: "Later he said that he never thought this was the best decision he had ever made in his life."
"Since joining the group, our family has never gone hungry, and our lives have gotten better year by year. My two nephews are both in school, and Wang Qing is the most successful one, becoming the first junior high school student in our Liujiu Farm! He joined the group as a cadre right after graduation, which made my father, brother and sister-in-law very happy."
"Because his brother was a coast guard and was sent to the Atlantic theater. According to the policy, he could have stayed in Suzhou at the time, but Wang Qing took the initiative to report and asked to go overseas to do something for the immigrants."
"His enthusiasm is commendable, but policies are policies, so the organization assigned him to Zhoushan, which is not far from home and can do something for immigrants as he wishes."
"Wang Qing came here and started as an agricultural technician. He was well-educated and devoted himself to immigrant training. He was promoted to team leader at the age of 19." Wang Qi pointed to the first seawall on the south beach and said:
"That was the place he built with the immigrants in the second year after he became the team leader. But a typhoon hit right after the construction was completed. He was worried about the seawall in Xinwei, so he led people to patrol the dike day and night."
"As a result, he was swept away by a wave when reinforcing the seawall. He was less than 20 years old..." Wang Qi pointed at Wang Qingao with tears in his eyes and said, "In order to commemorate him, the group named this place Wang Qingao. What he didn't finish, I, as his uncle, will continue for him..."
After saying this, he wiped away his tears, and his eyes slowly swept across Li Shouzhong, Gaoda and others, and said expectantly: "I am not saying this to move you. I am telling you that everything you have gained this year was earned by our predecessors with their lives and blood and sweat.
"In short, everyone must cherish this hard-earned good life! Use all your strength to make your life better and better, and live a life to the fullest! Defend it with your life..."
ps. I finally finished writing this article today.