Two more days passed. Lu Ronghui maintained the same pace as before, unlike other educated youth who only worked 6 work points a day.
She went to the brigade leader to ask for half a day's leave, and the brigade leader thought for a moment and approved it with a wave of his hand.
Lu, the educated youth, had a sister-in-law who worked at the textile factory. In addition, she was always very diligent in her work. All the other educated youth had asked for leave to go to the county's supply and marketing cooperative, but Lu had never asked for leave.
"I've approved the half-day leave. Your work points have been full recently, keep it up."
After receiving some guidance at the brigade headquarters, Lu Ronghui finally got leave. As soon as she stepped out, she saw Zhou Han pacing beside her. Upon seeing her, Zhou Han immediately turned his face away.
Zhou Han came to ask the captain for leave. He had already used up his previous leave, and his performance recently had been much worse than before, so the captain didn't want to grant him leave. As a result, he came every day to pester the captain.
"Auntie, auntie, let's go to the zoo."
Lu Yang still didn't have a holiday, so Song Qing took the two of them to the city. As soon as An An got on the bus, she kept talking about wanting to go to the zoo.
"Go, go, but we only have half a day, we can't stay too long."
Song Qing mainly wanted to take Lu Ronghui to the city to buy some things. Lu Yang had brought back a lot of cloth coupons a few days ago, which would be enough to make him a set of clothes. The extra cloth coupons were planned to be used to make a set of clothes for Lu Ronghui and a top for An'an.
Fearing that An'an would stay in the zoo for too long, Song Qing first took her to a department store.
"Xiao Hui, what do you want to buy?"
Song Qing was exceptionally generous. Lu Yang had just received his salary a few days ago, which was over ninety yuan, and she immediately felt much better off.
Although I wasn't short of money before, I still wanted to spend some of it whenever I got paid.
"Sister-in-law, there's nothing I want to buy."
Song Qing had already bought her a set of fabric and a lot of cookies, so Lu Ronghui lacked nothing.
However, she took An'an's hand and strolled around the department store, where they arrived at the bicycle showroom.
"Comrade, these are the bicycles that just arrived."
The sales clerk saw them coming, said a word, and then went on to do other things; everyone was used to it.
"Xiaohui, why are you looking at the bicycle? Didn't we just buy one?"
Song Qing found it strange. Her family had only recently bought the bicycle, and she had been using it the whole time. Why was she looking at bicycles again?
"Comrade, are these the only signs we have here?"
These days, there are only a few bicycle brands that everyone is familiar with. The most famous ones are Phoenix and Forever. Department stores mostly stock these two brands of bicycles in order to make them easier to sell.
"This is a Phoenix brand!"
The sales clerk glanced at them indifferently, assuming they were ignorant and didn't even recognize the most famous Phoenix brand.
Lu Ronghui continued looking around and found that there were only a few bicycles on display in the exhibition hall, including Phoenix and Forever, and only one White Dove.
After they left the department store, Lu Ronghui carried An'an as they walked down the street, keeping an eye on the bicycles everyone was riding.
These days, buying a car isn't easy. Many people save up for the ticket and then save up the money, so they usually buy the best brand. Besides the two brands that department stores carry, there are a few other brands on the street.
It was called a no-name brand, but it just wasn't that well-known. Lu Ronghui walked for a while and found a bike in front of her that was exactly the same as the one the villagers had ridden back yesterday.
It wasn't a brand from a department store; we found several more of them later.
This bicycle looks very similar to a brand called "Qilin" on the market, but upon closer inspection, there are many differences in the details, so it should be a counterfeit.
"What's wrong? Is our bicycle hard to ride? Do you want to get a new one?"
The road they were walking on was the busiest street in the city, and there were many factories nearby, so there were lots of bicycles, and Lu Ronghui kept staring at those bicycles.
"What brand is that, sister-in-law? It's different from ours."
Song Qing didn't buy the bicycle in the city; Lu Yang asked a colleague to buy it for her in the county. She preferred the White Dove brand, and since she already had a White Dove bicycle at home, she bought the same brand.
"Qilin, I guess." Bicycles all look pretty much the same; you have to look closely to see the difference. After saying that, Song Qing became uncertain again.
"I remember the crossbar on the Qilin foot support wasn't in that position."
Song Qing's former colleague had bought a Qilin brand car, and she had borrowed it a few times before; it seemed that many details were different.
I walked quickly and caught up with a middle-aged man pushing a cart ahead of me. The man was wearing a machine factory uniform, which had oil stains on it, so he must have just finished get off work.
"Hello comrade, are you an employee of the machinery factory? My cousin also works there."
People aren't as wary of strangers these days. The middle-aged man stopped his car and started chatting with Song Qing. "What a coincidence! Which workshop does he work in? Maybe we even know each other."
Song Qing didn't know which workshop Liu Jianqiu worked in, but that didn't stop the two from chatting. As they talked, they started talking about bicycles.
"Your bicycle is really beautiful. Is it a Qilin brand? I wonder how much it costs. My family has saved up some bicycle vouchers. We originally wanted to buy a Phoenix brand, but Phoenix is a bit expensive."
The middle-aged man patted the seat forcefully to show them.
"This isn't the Qilin brand. If you have tickets, you can easily buy it. I bought this because I didn't have tickets. It's much more expensive than the Phoenix brand."
"Huh? Bicycle tickets are so expensive now?"
Song Qing feigned surprise, saying that Phoenix should be more than 20 yuan more expensive than other brands, and a bicycle ticket on the black market should only cost 30 yuan, so it would only be more than 10 yuan more expensive.
"This bike cost me 180 yuan. How could a Phoenix brand bike cost that much?" The uncle touched the handlebars. "I just couldn't save up enough tickets and needed them urgently. It would be great if you guys had tickets."
"Although this bike is not well-known, it is still easy to use and it is definitely no worse than the Phoenix bike in terms of riding experience."
The uncle left quickly, and Song Qing led them toward the state-run restaurant.
"It turns out it was bought on the black market."
These days, everything is rationed, and the black market is particularly active due to shortages of goods. Song Qing was already used to it, but she frowned when she saw a few more vehicles behind her.
This is too much.
"Sister-in-law, don't you also think there are too many fake Qilin?"
No matter how bustling this road is, it's abnormal for them to encounter seven or eight vehicles in such a short time.
"Could someone be smuggling this brand here to sell?"
Song Qing stopped in her tracks. She suddenly realized that Lu Ronghui, like her, had been reborn. She had just paid special attention to bicycles in the department store. What was the connection between them?
If it were any major news related to bicycles, even if it happened in Northeast China or Xin'an, she would have heard of it in her past life.
If not, in this unfamiliar city, there are only a few people that Lu Ronghui knows and pays attention to. What could these people possibly have to do with bicycles?
For some reason, the first person that popped into Song Qing's mind was Zhou Han.
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