Chapter 12: Exchanging for Sanitary Supplies
“Captain Zhou.”
The two women saluted Captain Zhou, then smiled and asked, “What can we do for you?”
Captain Zhou thought for a moment and pointed to Huai Yu, who was nearby. “Ask her what she wants to exchange for, and what she can offer. As long as it’s not too much, anything under 200 points is fine.”
The two women exchanged looks, speechless.
What did “not too much” mean? Surely there should be a limit.
But since Captain Zhou had given the order, one of them approached Huai Yu. “Little girl, what do you want to exchange?”
Huai Yu loosened the hem of her clothes. “Green beans. What can I exchange for them?”
As expected of a girl, her thoughts were more detailed than Captain Zhou’s. The woman looked Huai Yu over, then softly said, “Toiletries, glycerin, elastic ropes, clothes… you can exchange for any of those.”
“Wow…”
Huai Yu slightly opened her mouth, her eyes glowing. Every item the woman mentioned was something she really needed!
But… with just these two handfuls of green beans, she could probably only exchange for a few of them, right?
She hesitated, unsure of what to choose, and finally looked at the woman with a pitiful expression. “Sister, could you help me figure out how much these green beans can be exchanged for?”
Just then, another female officer came over. “Hello, may I test the quality of the green beans first? If they are of good quality, you can exchange for most of the items mentioned.”
Huai Yu felt a surge of hope!
Although she wasn’t sure about the quality of the green beans, they looked so plump, they couldn’t be too bad, right?
The officer took out a device similar to a thermometer and lightly scanned the green beans in the hem of her clothes.
“Beep—”
The device emitted a long beep, and the green screen displayed the number “9.”
Captain Zhou saw this and was slightly disappointed—this wasn’t like the “3” from the pine nuts last time.
However, after thinking for a moment, a “9” was still quite good, indicating high-quality grain. He nodded at the female officer, who put away the testing device and smiled.
“One meter of elastic rope, two soft and hard toothbrushes, and one 400g tube of toothpaste.”
“Two towels, one set of underwear in standard size.”
“You can exchange for all of these at once. Or, you can swap any of the items for others. You can let us know your needs.”
Another officer smiled and added, “You have about half a pound of green beans. The quality is excellent, so the contribution points for market exchange are around 20 to 30.”
“After all, you know, the primary demand these days is for high-yield crops, and green beans aren’t a priority. So even though the quality is excellent, the price will be discounted.”
Huai Yu didn’t immediately respond with her choice, but instead pondered, “So, when I exchanged pine cones for the waterproof tarp yesterday, Captain Zhou, you helped cover part of the difference, right?”
“No,” Captain Zhou quickly answered, “The pine nuts you brought were of excellent quality, even higher than ordinary. But because they were low yield and took over 20 years to grow, the official contribution points were set at 50.”
Huashan pines typically need fifteen to twenty years to bear fruit, so planting from seeds is incredibly slow.
But although he said this, Huai Yu thought to herself: when she handed over the seeds, Captain Zhou didn’t test them but directly exchanged the tarp for her.
So, in the beginning, he had actually covered part of the price difference.
Therefore, instead of asking about the points for the items the female officer mentioned, she lowered her voice and asked, “If I just take one towel, could I exchange the other towel for a pack of sanitary pads?”
The female officer was taken aback for a moment, then patted Huai Yu’s shoulder. “I forgot. You look slim, but you’re actually a grown girl. How about this? I’ll cover two packs of sanitary pads and two rolls of toilet paper for you. As for the towel, you can exchange it for a bottle of thirty water purification tablets.”
“Do you know how to use these water purification tablets? They’re for household use. One tablet can purify three liters of water.”
Huai Yu’s eyes widened in surprise!
She hadn’t drunk any water in the past few days and hadn’t even thought about using something like this.
But the problem was… she didn’t even have a container for water right now.
She shyly looked up, her gaze sincere. “So… do you have any unwanted buckets or bottles? Or maybe the local trash disposal site? I can go pick some up.”
The female officer didn’t expect this response at all—was life really that difficult for her? What had everyone been doing for the past six years after the disaster?
She didn’t know about Huai Yu’s zero contribution points, but Huai Yu knew well enough. However, Huai Yu didn’t feel ashamed; after all, she had to build her own house, and her hardship was just the result of the world’s pressures.
At least she was still trying to support herself—that was an achievement.
Now, though, urban life had barely started to get back on track, and many things were still distributed by the government. Living resources were still quite scarce.
The two female officers conferred with Captain Zhou, and after a while, one of them returned to the camp, holding a large red plastic bucket in one hand and an empty mineral water bottle in the other.
“Here!”
“Check it; everything is inside. These two buckets are our camp’s help for you. In the future, if you have good seeds, you can also bring them to exchange.”
Huai Yu gratefully accepted them.
Although the world wasn’t kind to her, the people she met were very kind, and that made her happy!
She thought for a moment, then pulled out a handful of wheat from her pocket. “Thank you, sisters. Thank you, Captain Zhou. Thank you, Uncle from logistics.”
“This is the wheat I got. I’ll give it to you.”
Captain Zhou didn’t want to take her things, but seeing how small the handful of wheat was, he paused for a moment before accepting it.
He couldn’t help but ask out of curiosity, “You found the pine cones by the rose bush, but this wheat… Surely there aren’t wheat ears there?”
Even if there were, winter wheat wasn’t ripe yet, and last year’s spring wheat had already passed through the winter. How could she have found any?
“No, I didn’t.”
With the abundance of living supplies, Huai Yu smiled contentedly, looking obedient and grateful.
“I dug up a field mouse’s burrow, and there was a lot of wheat in there.”
The others were speechless…
If they hadn’t known that the government had provided her with nutrition liquid and protein-packed beans, they might have just pitched in and gotten her some food.
Digging up field mice’s burrows to survive? Things were really that tough?
They’d been through six years of post-disaster struggle, with normal life paused, and living resources were tight… but with the government backing, they hadn’t heard of anyone struggling this badly.
For a moment, seeing her now, they had quietly put aside their impression of her zero contribution points and began to feel sympathy.
Captain Zhou paused, then said, “Work harder and gather more things. Next time you come, I’ll apply for a field kettle for you.”
As for how much to gather, he didn’t specify. He figured if she came back, he’d just cover the difference again.
Here it is!
