Chapter 95
The benefits at the County Government were quite good; for the National Day holiday, they distributed rice and cooking oil, as well as towels and soap.
And surprisingly, there was a share for Qiao Wei, even though her personnel file and benefits were still back in the town.
You have to understand, yesterday Hu Sui had already helped her bring over everything that had been distributed in the town.
Whenever Qiao Wei thought about how their already comfortable financial situation would now include her salary plus two sets of benefits, she felt invigorated.
That day, Secretary Meng was walking through the main office holding his teacup when he saw her and specifically stopped to say a few words, telling her that the short-distance bus had been coordinated and would be scheduled after the National Day holiday.
That was fantastic.
Qiao Wei had actually been worrying about what to do when it got too cold in the winter and she had to ride her bike with the child; if there was a bus, that problem would be solved.
“The efficiency of our County Government is truly beyond reproach,” Qiao Wei said. “Not to mention the public, even I, working here in the County Party Committee, feel a boost in spirits upon hearing this news. It feels like the government is there to solve problems and you have something to rely on.”
These words were spoken with genuine sincerity.
After all, it had truly and efficiently solved her practical, personal needs.
Sincere praise also made the leader feel pleased.
Qiao Wei volunteered, “Let me follow up on the propaganda work for Xiahekou.”
“Good, they are all your old colleagues. I’ll leave it to you.”
Qiao Wei now never left home without a net bag. She always kept one in her satchel, ready to be used at any moment. She really loved that net bag.
Just like that, as soon as the benefits were distributed, it came in handy. The amount of rice and oil wasn’t much, as it was the era of a planned economy with grain and oil rationing. But there was an advantage to the small amount; once packed into the net bag and hung on the handlebars, she could transport it home herself.
On the way, Yan Xiang asked, “Mom, does that mean after one more day of Kindergarten tomorrow, we’ll be on holiday the day after?”
“That’s right. Are you happy, Xiangxiang?”
Yan Xiang, however, didn’t seem happy at all. Instead, he said, “Then I won’t be able to see my friends.”
“Oh? Does Xiangxiang like his friends that much?”
“Yeah!” Yan Xiang nodded vigorously. “I will teach the other kids to be obedient. Everyone is a good child.”
Qiao Wei chuckled.
That evening, she said to Yan Lei, “Once the bus is running, my commute will be much more convenient. But it won’t be appropriate to leave at 3:30 anymore.”
And it wouldn’t be appropriate to skip work on rainy or snowy days anymore either.
There had been two instances of rain before where she simply hadn’t gone, staying home to listen to the rain and read books—it had been incredibly comfortable.
Sigh.
The benefit of moving to the County Party Committee Office was that the work had become more specialized. As a skilled writer handpicked and promoted by the Secretary, she was generally not assigned trivial tasks; her current work gave her a feeling of refreshing clarity.
The downside was that even she herself had to put away the relaxed state she had enjoyed in the Propaganda Section.
Secretary Meng was quite an assertive person. Under such a leader, one would involuntarily enter a state of being as taut as a bowstring.
In the Propaganda Section, Qiao Wei had been happy-go-lucky, with eighty percent focus and twenty percent relaxation, but here, she had to be on her toes one hundred and twenty percent of the time.
Although the benefits Qiao Wei had argued with the leadership to obtain earlier were a bit outrageous, they also put Yan Lei at ease.
He knew she was someone who wouldn’t let herself be taken advantage of.
Having such a wife out in the world didn’t make him worry.
Yan Lei calculated the time, “It doesn’t matter if it’s half an hour later. Taking the bus saves effort, and it’ll be warm in the winter.”
Regarding staying warm in the winter, Qiao Wei felt she really needed to start preparing.
In the future, air conditioning and central heating were everywhere. People who were sensitive to the cold could even stick heating pads inside their clothes.
Here, there were only heated brick beds and hot water bottles.
The hot water bottles were large and were industrial products that were hard to come by; they couldn’t be carried around either.
Qiao Wei asked Yan Lei if there was anything else she could use to keep warm on the go.
Yan Lei thought for a moment, “Let’s go see the coppersmith another day. I remember there used to be those kinds you could carry on you, the ones you fill with hot water.”
Xiahekou used to have many coppersmith shops, but later they were nationalized and merged. Later on, as people started using industrial products, manual coppersmithing declined. But some still existed.
“We only work half a day tomorrow; we’ll go in the afternoon.” With a potential substitute available, Qiao Wei brightened up.
The 30th was the last day before the holiday. After lunch, every section went through the motions of working for an hour just to make it look like they were working, and then everyone knocked off.
It was time for the holiday.
Qiao Wei returned early and headed straight for Craft Alley.
The Old Tailor was sitting on a small bamboo chair at his doorway, swinging his feet and basking in the sun.
Qiao Wei greeted him.
The Old Tailor asked, “What are you up to?”
Qiao Wei explained.
The Old Tailor said, “In the past, there were hand warmers that burned charcoal. They were cleverly made; no matter how you turned them, the part holding the charcoal stayed steady and upright.”
Qiao Wei said, “I’ve heard of those.”
She had seen the structural diagrams of such ingenious objects passed down through history online; they were truly a testament to craftsmanship.
The Old Tailor said, “Don’t bother with that; it’s hard for you to find charcoal. You need top-quality smokeless charcoal for that. Other types won’t work. You can’t be walking around emitting smoke.”
The image was hilarious, and it made Qiao Wei burst out laughing.
“My husband said there are ones you fill with water,” she said.
“Right, just get one you can fill with water,” the Old Tailor said after hearing her situation. “That’s a ‘tangpozi’ (hot water bottle). Use the big ones at home to warm the bed. If you want to carry it with you, get a small one, hang it around your neck, and tuck it inside your clothes against your stomach; you won’t be cold the whole way.”
Qiao Wei’s eyes lit up as she listened. “You really know your stuff; this is exactly what I wanted.”
The old man swung his feet. “Back in the day… eh, never mind, you’d better hurry.”
Qiao Wei went to the coppersmith’s shop. The coppersmith was slumped over the counter sleeping, which showed business wasn’t very good. However, since the state paid salaries now, he didn’t really care.
Although Qiao Wei felt a bit embarrassed, she firmly woke him up. “Comrade, Comrade.”
The coppersmith wiped away his drool and, with sleepy eyes, listened to Qiao Wei explain what she was looking for. He rummaged through a pile of pots and pans of all sizes, finally found two small ones in a cabinet, wiped off the dust, and gave them to her. “How about these?”
They were the size of an adult’s palm—two small, round, flat pots. They were exactly what the Old Tailor had described.
“This is it!” Qiao Wei loved them so much. This era actually had such small and wonderful things too.
Many of the things she saw daily were just too big.
She didn’t go home on her bike; instead, she bought thirty cents worth of brown sugar and headed straight for the Residential Compound to find Hu Sui.
Hu Sui was skillful with her hands; she could knit sweaters and crochet.
She asked Hu Sui to help her crochet two small bags, sized to fit the two small hot water bottles, with long straps on top so they could be hung around her neck.
Hu Sui’s own water cup was a glass bottle, encased in just such a crocheted bag with a handle. Qiao Wei had seen it before.
Hu Sui chided her, “I’ll crochet them for you, why buy things? You’re being too formal.”
But she accepted the brown sugar anyway.
Hu Sui asked her, “Did you know there’s a meeting being arranged for Manman to meet someone tomorrow?”
“Another meeting?”
“This time, it was arranged by your man.”
“Oh, really? He hasn’t told me yet.”
Hu Sui said, “Manman’s standards are too high. Sister Yang and I have found several for her, but she doesn’t like any of them. They were all handsome young men, but she just wouldn’t have it.”
Qiao Wei just smiled and said nothing.
The logic of the older sisters when it came to matchmaking was sometimes incomprehensible.
Lu Manman required someone good-looking. Indeed, the ones Sister Yang and Hu Sui found were decent in terms of looks.
But in other aspects, they were always… hard to describe.
For example, there was one before who was good-looking, but when asked about his family background, it was truly so impoverished it left people speechless.
Hu Sui’s logic was, “The Lu family is rich, his family is poor; it’s a perfect match.”
She was very satisfied with it herself, feeling that a rich woman and a poor man were highly complementary.
She believed this from the bottom of her heart. From the depths of her soul, she carried a spirit of wealth redistribution.
It was just that Manman was easygoing and used to being wealthy; seeing that the young man looked quite spirited, she was even a little tempted at first glance.
But after her family questioned him a bit on the side, they immediately rejected him.
And poverty, truly, can make a person feel inferior. Although the young man had nice features, in this era, you didn’t rely on your face to make a living. A man being good-looking offered no advantage in an all-male environment that was particularly focused on physical strength.
He couldn’t derive any confidence from that.
There was a distinct sense of shrinking timidity born from inferiority in the young man.
After the first impression passed, and she looked again.
Lu Manman used her sister Weiwei’s husband, Regimental Commander Yan, as the benchmark.
Once compared, she rejected him herself at the second glance.
Hu Sui felt that Lu Manman’s standards were too high.
She said she wanted someone good-looking, so they found her someone good-looking, and then she didn’t like him.
Qiao Wei went home and asked Yan Lei, “Did you introduce someone to Manman?”
“Oh, right.” Yan Lei just remembered. “I forgot to tell you. I went directly to Battalion Commander Fang, and he said his wife would arrange it.”
Battalion Commander Fang was Hu Sui’s husband.
Qiao Wei asked about the situation and felt it was alright.
Although he was also from the countryside, first of all, he was a Company Commander with a good salary.
And although his family was ordinary, there were many sons, and the elderly parents were still healthy.
In this day and age, having many sons meant not being bullied and earning more work points.
Another point was that the health of the elderly was too important.
Qiao Wei once had a woman in her hospital ward who was a grassroots civil servant from her hometown, who had come to the big city specifically to treat an illness.
This woman told her how a poverty-stricken household she was responsible for had escaped poverty.
“The elderly in the family all died, and they were automatically lifted out of poverty.”
When the elderly were sick, it not only meant the loss of a laborer, but long-term medication was also a burden. At the same time, they needed someone to take care of them, which meant at least one laborer in the family couldn’t go out to earn money.
The reason that household was poor was because there were three elderly people bedridden, taking medication, and needing care.
Until that year, the three elderly people passed away one after another.
They were directly and automatically lifted out of poverty.
It sounded painful, but that was the reality. When it came to dating, it was very easy to be muddle-headed, but when it came to marriage, if you weren’t clear-headed, it would be half a lifetime or a whole lifetime of suffering.
Qiao Wei was very clear-headed, especially seeing that the people Hu Sui and Sister Yang introduced always had this or that point she found to be a huge red flag, but they thought was “quite good, no problem, just right for the Lu family.” So when she asked Yan Lei to find a partner for Lu Manman, she had made many specific requirements.
Yan Lei even criticized her.
Yan Lei felt she placed too much importance on these external conditions, especially that it seemed a bit like she despised the poor and favored the rich.
He argued that one should still look at a comrade’s inner character, whether they were positive and upward-looking, and whether they were loyal to the Party.
Qiao Wei said, “Then you should make me wear ragged, patched-up clothes, and don’t buy me any new ones.”
“Don’t let me eat meat, let me eat only half-full every meal, keep me hungry, and let me be unable to sleep at night from hunger.”
“Don’t buy me face cream, just let my skin get chapped and wrinkled.”
Regimental Commander Yan put his hands on his hips, “How could that be!”
My wife must live a good life.
Otherwise, it means I’m incompetent.
“So you know you should let your wife live a good life, huh?” Qiao Wei rolled her eyes at him. “Then why, when introducing partners to others, do you think it’s fine to find someone with a whole family of burdens? Are other people’s daughters destined to suffer?”
Regimental Commander Yan rubbed his nose, played dumb, and just smiled.
But when he went to look for suitable people, he still carefully figured out their family situations.
Families with a bunch of sick people who couldn’t earn work points and relied entirely on the soldier son’s salary were out.
Those who were just good-looking but sly were out; those who were good-looking but dull were out; and those he had seen in the bathhouse, well, certain individuals were out.
In short, after careful screening, he picked a good one for Lu Manman.
