Book Synopsis
Book Tags
Donation Rankings
Comment
0 Comments
You May Also Like
墨書 Inktalez
The villagers wake up early, and before five o'clock, the sound of rustling clothes can be heard. Yezhi is particularly fond of the warmth of the bedding in the morning. If it weren't for Aunt Zhou lying next to her, she might have stayed in bed despite the humid air mixed with a hint of foot odor. Even with the noise, she could have remained there, a skill she has regained after a month of rural life, slowly feeling more grounded as her lazy nature begins to show. After putting on her clothes and yawning, she queues with Aunt Zhou to wash up. With only one faucet available, some people can't wait or are indifferent and just wipe their hands casually. Yezhi and Aunt Zhou wait for over twenty minutes before it's their turn. After washing up, Yezhi grabs her basket while Aunt Zhou carries a large basket as they head to the front gate, where Zhou Village Head and others have been waiting for a while. A few people don't even bother to eat breakfast and hurry to the Local Produce Purchasing Department.
Outside the purchasing department, a long line has formed, with a male clerk maintaining order. After about forty minutes of waiting, they finally enter the purchasing department. Inside, an old clerk is attending to a woman selling eggs, a thin male clerk is weighing items, and a young girl is quickly calculating prices. The air is filled with a pungent smell of sulfur and saltpeter.
Yezhi's stomach growls as she waits for Zhou Yiqiang. The thin male clerk smiles brightly at Zhou Yiqiang: "Zhou Yiqiang! It's been a while since you came by. What good stuff do you have today?" He sizes them up as he speaks.
Zhou Yiqiang opens his large cloth bag to reveal two wild boar skins. The Bamboo Pole Male Clerk unfolds the skins: "Brother, your shooting skills have improved! These two skins are big and small, perfectly intact. I'll count them as first-class goods." Zhou Yiqiang beams at this compliment. Zhou Village Head, Cart Master, and Aunt Zhou take turns weighing their mountain goods for payment while Yezhi doesn't dare take out her ginseng to sell in front of everyone. The Bamboo Pole Male Clerk squints at her: "Miss, do you have anything good? Hurry up and show us; I won't deliberately lower your price!"
Yezhi instinctively hugs her basket tighter and shakes her head.
"Master, you're acting like you have something to hide," Xiao Fang's soft voice chimes in. Yezhi mentally replies: "Go away; don't make a sound." Just then, Xiao Fang's square body appears before her, trying hard to roll aside. Yezhi feels powerless and doesn't want to argue with it anymore. After leaving the Local Produce Purchasing Department, Yezhi counts the number of people still in line and heads straight to a small eatery with Zhou Village Head and others: "Five bowls of millet porridge and ten steamed buns." After waiting for over two hours, everyone is hungry and slurps down their porridge without minding its heat.
After finishing half a bowl of porridge, Yezhi pretends to have a stomachache and sneaks back into the Local Produce Purchasing Department with her basket. At this time, there are very few people inside; when the Bamboo Pole Male Clerk sees Yezhi, his eyes light up as he enthusiastically greets her: "Miss, do you have any good goods? Don't hold back."
Yezhi uncovers the coarse cloth covering her basket to reveal two plump ginseng roots.
"Wow!" exclaims the Bamboo Pole Male Clerk in surprise. People around gather closer; realizing his blunder, he touches his nose in silence and lets the Old Clerk step forward. The Old Clerk takes out his reading glasses from his pocket and carefully places the ginseng on the counter.
The Old Clerk's eyes nearly stick to the ginseng as he studies it intently. After examining it thoroughly, his eyes shine with excitement as he praises: "Great! Thick roots, rich sap, fine patterns, long stems—this is top-notch! We haven't had such quality ginseng in years! Miss, did you dig this?"
"Yes," Yezhi lies nonchalantly without breaking a sweat. "These two roots are high quality with sufficient age; how much will you give me?" Completely out of her depth but noticing the envious gazes around her, she tells the Old Clerk: "Just tell me how much."
The Old Clerk pulls out a shiny yellow scale and weighs both ginseng roots separately. The young female clerk quickly calculates based on their weight and cheerfully announces: "A total of five hundred thirty-one yuan."
"That's so little!" Yezhi blurts out without thinking about the surprised looks around her; she feels like burying herself alive. She genuinely forgot that this was 1980; she had always thought wild ginseng would cost tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands! Her face turns red as she takes the money without counting it and quickly leaves the Local Produce Purchasing Department.
Back at the eatery, everyone has already finished breakfast and is waiting for Yezhi. She sits down and devours her food hungrily. After breakfast, they all disperse: Zhou Yiqiang goes to visit friends, Zhou Village Head heads off to handle commune matters, and Cart Master goes to help villagers buy farming tools. Meanwhile, Yezhi and Aunt Zhou head towards the Department Store with great enthusiasm since Yezhi now has money to spend freely. Upon entering through the main door illuminated by rows of fluorescent lights brightening up the entire store, Yezhi envies how long it will take for Zhoujiatun to get electricity for lighting. The two-story store is quite large with everything from food to clothing, shoes and socks, fabrics...!
Yezhi, the foodie, rushed to the food section first and bought a pound of Sugar Balls, a pound of fist-sized cookies covered in powdered sugar, and a pound of sunflower seeds. She wanted to buy another pound of peanuts, but Aunt Zhou wouldn’t allow it, saying they had peanuts at home. She argued that raw peanuts couldn't compare to the roasted ones. Despite Aunt Zhou's objections, Yezhi still bought a pound. Then she spotted some mixed candies, which made her nostalgic; she loved mixed candies as a child because they had everything, like Peanut Candy, Sesame Candy, candied peanuts, and Sweet Rice Sticks. However, here in the Northeast, they weren't sold as mixed candies but individually. Without hesitation, Yezhi asked for a pound of each. With several small receipts in hand, she moved on to the clothing and accessories section, where she bought a dozen white cotton underwear sets. Aunt Zhou suggested getting something prettier, so Yezhi ended up buying a dozen colorful ones.
The shoes available were only cloth shoes and rubber shoes. Yezhi found the cloth shoes too soft and uncomfortable, so she chose two pairs of rubber shoes. After trying on the rubber shoes and confirming the size, she looked up and noticed Wan Hei standing out among a row of rust-red cloth shoes. She insisted that Aunt Zhou try them on. Aunt Zhou resisted: "At my age, how can I wear something so bright!" Yezhi argued back, "It's not bright; it's dark red! You'll look great in them." Ignoring Aunt Zhou's reluctance, she squatted down and put one of the red cloth shoes on Aunt Zhou's foot while tossing aside her patched-up cloth shoe far away. Feeling a bit embarrassed, Aunt Zhou put on the new shoe.
"They look good! Really good!" exclaimed Yezhi! "Really? Are they too red? Oh my! I feel so embarrassed," she said while covering her face.
Holding up another red cloth shoe to the Salesperson, Yezhi said, "In this size, give me two pairs in red and black!"
"No! I don't want them! Don't listen to her!" Aunt Zhou quickly took off the shoe and exclaimed anxiously. Just as Yezhi was about to take the receipt from the Salesperson, Aunt Zhou stretched out her hand to stop her: "One pair of shoes is so expensive; you can buy them for yourself. I’m an old lady now; I don’t need them. Besides, I have shoes!" She had already given one new pair to Yezhi, while her own was full of patches. Feeling a pang in her heart, Yezhi said with tears in her eyes, "Auntie, let me buy them for you." Reluctantly, Aunt Zhou nodded in silence.
When they reached the ready-to-wear section, with no particular styles available, Yezhi casually picked out two outfits for change. In the fabric section filled with an array of materials that caught Aunt Zhou’s eye, she chose a piece of bright red floral fabric to make clothes for Yezhi. Seeing all the flowers made Yezhi dizzy: "Auntie, let’s get some plain fabric instead."
Unwillingly, Aunt Zhou replied: "How can you wear plain fabric? A girl as pretty as a flower should wear bright colors for good fortune." Fine then; let’s go with what makes Aunt Zhou happy! As she happily moved between various fabrics, Yezhi noticed that she lingered longest in front of a piece of dark blue cotton fabric, touching it repeatedly. Seeing that she liked it, Yezhi decided to buy it for her. This time, however, Aunt Zhou refused adamantly and accused Yezhi of wasting money. When she saw that Yezhi wasn’t listening to her advice, she angrily walked away.
Knowing that Aunt Zhou wouldn’t go far and would wait for her, Yezhi continued shopping without worry as the pile of receipts grew larger. Her frenzied shopping began attracting attention from many people who were now watching her closely. Quickly clutching her receipts, she approached the checkout counter and handed over a stack of paper tickets. The cashier stamped them with a loud "thud! thud! thud!...", marking each one with a big red seal before calculating: "Two hundred seventeen yuan and ninety-one cents." Thankfully, Aunt Zhou wasn’t around; otherwise it would be hard to explain how she spent so much money—she would definitely be upset about it. Calmly, Yezhi handed over 22 notes from her stash of Unity. Then she grabbed another stack of stamped receipts to collect her goods. When she reached the food section again, she found Aunt Zhou waiting there for her. After circling around with her auntie for a bit longer, they finally gathered all their purchases together. Looking at the towering pile of items resembling a small mountain made Yezhi feel a bit overwhelmed; it hadn’t seemed like much when buying but now posed quite a challenge to carry!
Surprised by how much they had bought, Aunt Zhou exclaimed with wide eyes: "How did we end up with so many things? How much did this all cost?"
"It... wasn't expensive; I didn't spend much," replied Yezhi, vaguely deflecting the question while noticing how often Aunt Zhou glanced at their pile with regret or shot disapproving looks at her.
Clearing her throat twice to shift focus away from their purchases, she said: "Auntie, we need to figure out how to carry this!" They tried several times but found it too scattered and heavy to manage easily; eventually they bought two large bags to stuff everything into before finally managing to pack it all up. Breathing heavily after their efforts, Yezhi wiped her sweat with a handkerchief she had just purchased and then helped wipe some off for Aunt Zhou. Who would have thought that packing things could be such hard work? After discussing their next steps again with Aunt Zhou, they decided that one would stay with their belongings while the other went to find the Cart Master to bring over a cart for help. The three of them rode together on the cart until they arrived at their meeting point where both Zhou Yiqiang and Zhou Village Head were already waiting for them. The two climbed onto the cart while the Cart Master, cracking his whip loudly, set off at an easy pace along the street back towards Zhoujiatun.
Comment 0 Comment Count