Chapter 50: Reborn in the Nineties: The Tyrant Flower Chapter Fifty — Drawing Lots and Past Events

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Protagonist:

Chai Mi

Upon hearing Chai Mi say this, Chai You Fu's face instantly darkened……

The Chai family's separation had already been a matter of ten-odd years ago; at that time Chai Mi was only six years old.

The three Chai brothers separated from Chai Zhongxiao.

Chai You Fu was a teacher; although he was a privately hired teacher, he still ate from the state grain supply.

(Eating from the state grain supply is a special group; the author does not know what it is called elsewhere, so I will explain it simply: this is a local term in Liaoxi, referring to rural people who left the land and became urban household registrants, thereby eating commercial grain. It is a designation that appeared before Reform and Opening-up.)

Both Chai You Fu and Che Lianyun were privately hired teachers; they caught the nationwide teacher shortage tailwind, and even though both were only elementary school graduates, they were rehired back to teach at the elementary school, thus becoming urban household registrants.

Although the salary was not high, grain, flour, oil, and other staples could all be purchased, and in this era teachers' noon meals were provided.

A single noon meal might seem trivial in later generations — wherever you eat is the same —

but in that era this basically covered a person's entire food ration. Take Che Lianyun: she didn't eat breakfast, and when noon came and she ate at school she turned into a rice bucket — one person could match ten…… a single meal let her eat the whole day's worth of food, so she didn't eat dinner either. In this way her monthly salary was purely saved, not to mention holiday bonuses and the grain, flour, and oil distributed by the school — all saved.

Therefore at that time, if a family had someone eating from the state grain supply, their days passed very well.

Chai Mi knew this past; theoretically speaking, the three Old Chai brothers — Chai You Fu and Che Lianyun both ate from the state grain supply, had no land, yet had jobs and earned money — at this point it was very obvious that if they separated, from the standpoint of fairness, Chai Mi's father Chai Youqing had no job and farmed at home, living the poorest, so the family's land should have gone to Chai Youqing and his wife.

Because of Reform and Opening-up, there were some special circumstances when land was allocated.

The Chai family's land situation was this: Chai Zhongxiao and his wife qualified for land allocation — two to three mu of basic farmland per person, plus two to three mu of the village's private plots. Basic farmland unchanged for thirty years; private plots changed every five years, but no matter how the private plots changed, as long as you were a villager you had them — you just had to pay some contracting fees.

However, because Chai Zhongxiao's three daughters had not yet married at that time, they also received land allocations; but after the land was allocated, all three married, so in this way Chai Zhongxiao and Wang Huirong had five people's worth of land.

Chai Mi's family, because at that time only Chai Mi had been born, had only three people's worth of land.

Chai You Fu's family — Chai You Fu had none; only Chai You Fu's wife Song Qiuping and daughter Chai Min had land; Chai You De's family likewise had only Chai You De and eldest son Chai Dajun with land.

Chai You Fu was the cleverest of the three brothers; from the start he said he wanted to separate, but demanded that Chai Zhongxiao and his wife must build him a house.

When Chai You Fu put it this way, at the first separation Chai Mi's father Chai Youqing and Third Uncle Chai You De felt this was workable. After all, no matter who separated out, they would need a place to live; building a house was beyond reproach, so the two brothers did not oppose it.

Thus the Chai family first contributed money and labor, helped Chai You Fu build a good house and finish the courtyard wall, and Chai You Fu considered the separation complete.

Relatively speaking, it looked very fair, and Chai You Fu even seemed to have made concessions.

But in reality, Chai You Fu's house was built so well……

It spent all of the Chai family's money……