Chapter 222: The whole family is mobilized

This was Li Qing Xia's first time officially going out on a bicycle, so he was quite excited.

Tied to the back seat of his bicycle was a sack containing three hundred bundles of boiled reed leaves.

Li Juan was still sitting behind Li Long's bicycle, with a sack piece separating them, ensuring that she wouldn't get her clothes wet from the fish bag while sitting.

After dropping Li Juan off at the elementary school, the two rode their bicycles against the wind toward Shicheng.

Passing by the county seat of Maxian, they went to the big courtyard to get the scale and basin. Li Long said with a smile:

"Dad, it's much easier for two people to go than one."

"That's right!" Li Qing Xia said confidently. "I can help a lot! By the way, should we take the shovel handles?"

"Take them, just in case." Li Long felt it was better to be prepared.

When the two rode to the old street, the east was just a touch of red, the sun hadn't risen yet, and the stalls here weren't full.

Li Long and the others had the opportunity to occupy a good position and opened the stall.

In front of Li Long were three basins, and in front of Li Qing Xia were one basin and a piece of plastic cloth.

"Selling fish..."

Li Long's skilled shouting attracted quite a few customers, and those who came to see the fish also noticed the reed leaves on Li Qing Xia's stall next to him.

"This is..." A woman over sixty squatted down, held the reed leaves, and asked with some hesitation.

"Reed leaves, oh, should be called zongzi leaves, for wrapping zongzi!" Li Qing Xia explained with a smile. "Two or three leaves can wrap a zongzi, look at this Ma Lian leaf, this is used as a rope to tie the zongzi."

"I know, I know..." The old woman touched the reed leaves and asked another question: "Boiled?"

"That's right, boiled ones are easy to preserve."

"How much for a bundle?" The old woman started fumbling for her wallet. "How many leaves in a bundle?"

"Two or three leaves can wrap a zongzi, this bundle has twenty leaves, one dime." Li Qing Xia said. "If it's for your own family to eat, two bundles are enough. It's the holiday, it's a gesture."

"Right, right, right, the holiday is coming, we have to eat a zongzi for the holiday, don't we? In this year, life is good, so we have to eat a zongzi for the holiday." The old woman muttered, "Give me five bundles."

She opened the handkerchief cloth bag and counted out five dimes and handed them to Li Qing Xia: "Five bundles."

"Why do you want so many? Are there so many people in the family?" Li Qing Xia asked with confusion. "These leaves are tough after boiling, no rotten leaves, two bundles should be enough for a family, right?"

"No, I have relatives in my family, I'll wrap more and give them away." The old woman said proudly. "My son is a worker and has a salary, he gives me pocket money every month, this money should be spent!"

Li Qing Xia took five bundles of reed leaves and handed them to the old woman, and took the five dimes and held them in his hand.

He hadn't thought about where to put the money yet, but immediately a few people surrounded him, squatted down, and started picking.

Li Long had told him earlier that these reed leaves could be picked, unlike fish, people who wrap zongzi usually wash them when they go back.

So you take two bundles, I take three bundles, and this business opened.

Li Long was weighing fish for others while watching the situation here with his peripheral vision. Seeing that although the old man was a bit flustered, he could take care of the whole stall, he felt relieved and sold his own fish.

"Crowded, everyone don't squeeze! Watch out for the three-handed ones! Don't let anyone reach into the basin, everyone don't squeeze!" Li Long reminded while weighing fish. He found that someone in the crowd seemed to be squeezing on purpose, so he shouted, "We can't lose our wallets because of buying fish, that's not worth it!"

He shouted like that, and the crowd immediately dispersed. Quite a few people touched their wallets or covered the places where they kept money.

Those who wanted to fish in troubled waters didn't succeed and glared at Li Long hatefully before squeezing out.

Li Long wasn't afraid of them and continued to shout loudly.

Someone reacted, gave Li Long an appreciative look, and then started buying fish. Some didn't feel it, felt that the people nearby were making a fuss, muttered a few words, and either bought fish or left.

Approaching the holiday, everyone who came to shop here wanted to bring something back, so the fish sold very quickly. When Li Long finished his basin, the reed leaves on Li Qing Xia's stall next to him had also sold more than half.

To say the money really wasn't much, less than twenty yuan, and it was all one-dime and two-dime notes, almost no one-yuan notes, but a thick stack made Li Qing Xia quite happy holding it.

"You go rest for a while, I'll sell for a while longer, and we'll talk after selling out." Li Qing Xia saw that Li Long was done here, so he said to him, "Or do you want to go eat first?"

"No, no, no, together." Li Long said, and then started to shout loudly:

"Selling zongzi leaves! Zongzi leaves, twenty leaves per bundle for one dime, selling cheaply! Dragon Boat Festival wrapping zongzi eating zongzi, selling zongzi leaves!"

A passenger bus just happened to pull over, and the passengers who got off heard Li Long's shouting, and a few walked over and started asking for the price.

One dime a bundle, it was indeed not expensive, so they bought one bundle, two bundles, and there was new business.

The reed leaves were sold out, it was already close to eleven o'clock, the sun had risen very high, and the shade where they were was now covered by sunlight.

"Let's go, Dad, go eat breakfast." Li Long and Li Qing Xia packed up the stall together. "Drink milk tea, eat naan."

"Sure, I'll try milk tea today too!" Li Qing Xia was happy, so he wanted to try the taste of the frontier.

The fish and reed leaves were sold until the day of the Dragon Boat Festival. On the day, they sold the fastest, and the six hundred bundles of reed leaves they brought were sold out.

Li Qing Xia sighed:

"The people who come here feel like they are all so rich, these reed leaves are like they don't need money..."

"If the zongzi wrapped by my sister-in-law were sold, they would also sell quickly." Li Long said. "It's just that it's too troublesome."

"That's right." Li Qing Xia deeply agreed.

Although most people in this year felt that such food was better made by themselves, quite a few people who came to buy reed leaves were asking if there were zongzi for sale now.

Li Long actually asked Liang Yuemei when he went back if she wanted to wrap some to sell. Liang Yuemei didn't have that confidence and declined.

In Li Long's view, the zongzi wrapped by Liang Yuemei were big, with four distinct corners. Even a young man like him would be about the same after eating two, and three would definitely be full.

Wrapping three red dates and a small pinch of raisins inside, the cost wasn't high, and selling them for two or three dimes was definitely no problem.

But Liang Yuemei was embarrassed, so Li Long gave up.

This kind of seasonal product was only sold for a few days. Li Long himself wanted to try it, and now it seemed the effect was not bad, so it could be sold next year too.

From the first day Li Long started selling until the day before the Dragon Boat Festival, it was always the Li family selling reed leaves. On the day of the Dragon Boat Festival, there was an extra stall, but the leaves sold by that stall owner were unboiled and didn't have Ma Lian leaves. Even so, the leaves on the stall were finally sold out.

It was like this this year, maybe more people would come to sell reed leaves next year, but Li Long felt that this short-term money-making could still be engaged in.

Returning home, the Li family ate warm zongzi—honestly speaking, this stuff really wasn't very delicious.

Fortunately, there was the sugar syrup given by Section Chief Hu, and it was not bad to dip it.

Zongzi, this stuff, is very firewood-consuming to boil. If it were in the hometown, Li Qing Xia definitely wouldn't eat it. Because there really wasn't that much firewood in the hometown—it takes a very long time to boil zongzi until cooked. Most people in the later life bought cooked zongzi, or used natural gas or coal gas when boiling, so they didn't feel it.

The Li family started boiling it on the night before, started boiling after nine o'clock, stopped the fire after eleven o'clock, and had to simmer in the pot for a while.

Originally Li Qiang had been waiting, but didn't get to eat it in the end, and went to sleep disappointed.

Fortunately, he got to eat it when he got up early the next day.

Li Long didn't know if it really wasn't cooked the night before, or if Li Jianguo and Liang Yuemei were worried that glutinous rice was relatively heavy and not suitable for eating at night, so they didn't let Li Qiang eat zongzi.

In the afternoon, Li Long and Tao Daqiang came back from setting nets in the Little Haizi, and Qin Jiajie's family also came over with a hand-pushed cart. Li Long saw that the cart was loaded with shaved shovel handles, and Li Long was happy.

"Brother Old Qin, how many did you cut?"

"One hundred!" Qin Jiajie's voice was very loud. "I ran to the east big ditch to cut them. There are many poplar and willow trees there, and I can cut another hundred in two days... do you want them?"

"Want!" Li Long said. "I want as many as you cut! This hundred, I'll deduct twenty according to what I said before, right?"

He went into the room to take out the IOU, wrote down that twenty had been deducted, and signaled Qin Jiajie to look.

"Good, good!" With half of the borrowed money deducted, Qin Jiajie was a bit excited.

Didn't expect making money to be so easy! Of course, he also knew that it was Li Long who would give him such treatment. If it were someone else, exchange shovel handles for money? What kind of beautiful dream are you doing?

Unloaded the shovel handles into the Li family courtyard, Qin Jiajie declined Li Jianguo's invitation to sit and chat for a while, saying he had to go back to cook dinner for the children, and left with the cart.

Li Long sold fish for another two days, and then suspended this business.

Li Xiangqian called.

It went directly to the brigade leader, oh no, the village director's place.

!.

Xu Chengjun recognized the familiar voice and immediately shouted on the loudspeaker to call Li Long to his home.

Li Long picked up the phone, and Li Xiangqian said on the other side:

"Xiao Long, the task here has been issued, a task to hand in big brooms in one month, see if you can complete it?"

"One month? Is it still three thousand?" Li Long asked.

"Yes."

"One month... if it's one month..." Li Long thought for a moment and said: "No problem."

"Is there really no problem? If you can guarantee it here, then I'll agree. But if you can't supply the goods when the time comes, not only you, but I will also have to bear joint responsibility."

"Section Chief, don't worry, since I said it, it can definitely be completed..." Li Long said surely. "Maybe it won't even take a month!"

"Really? Don't you need to distribute the task to other units?"

"No need, no need, our brigade can handle it completely!"

"That's good, just like the work of the shovel handles last time you did well, I believe you this time. Work hard!"

Hanging up the phone, Xu Chengjun looked at Li Long, his eyes a bit urgent:

"Xiao Long, work came?"

"Came, Director, this work is relatively tense..."

"Tell me."

"Tying Jiji big brooms, three thousand."

"Three thousand?" This number also startled Xu Chengjun. "Need so many? How much for one?"

"Three yuan."

"Then it can be done! I can tie at least seven or eight brooms a day by myself..."

"Now it's that Jiji is not enough..."

"The handles are also not enough. Jiji can be cut now, but what about the handles for the big brooms? The brigade doesn't have so many trees..."

"I'll handle the handles." Li Long said. "The brigade here, you organize people to start cutting Jiji. I see that the brigade still has quite a lot of last year's Jiji grass left, preparing to use it as rope to tie wheat bundles and rice bundles, right? Use it first, let the brigade tie the heads of the big brooms first, and I'll go to the mountains to get the handles for the brooms..."

"That's right. There's a lot of this stuff in the mountains!"

"Then I'll say it first, the broom handles I bring back won't be for nothing, one also has to count money."

"No problem. How can I let you do it for nothing? I'll count you five dimes for one pole!" Xu Chengjun directly gave Li Long a high price.

Five dimes!

Li Long understood that if it were someone else, Xu Chengjun could give three dimes, which would be not bad.

In these five dimes, it included the benefit fee for introducing this big order—as for whether he could get benefits at the supply and marketing cooperative, Xu Chengjun didn't care.

Being able to earn money for the brigade, the brigade couldn't treat him badly!

Three thousand poles, fifteen hundred yuan, this is a big sum of money!

Li Long was very satisfied with Xu Chengjun's attitude. Before leaving, he said to Xu Chengjun:

"Director, there might be work after autumn, we'll talk then."

"Sure, sure, sure." Xu Chengjun was very happy.

After Li Long left, Ma Hongmei calculated the account:

"Three thousand poles, five dimes each, that's fifteen hundred yuan... can't you distribute some to let others do it?"

Xu Chengjun knew his wife's thoughts. He pointed to the phone and said:

"You let your brothers introduce a one-thousand-yuan job to our brigade, and I can give your brother a two-hundred-yuan benefit fee, without even having to do the work. Do you want to tell your brother?"

"Where can I find a job? If there were one, wouldn't my brother do it himself?"

"That's right." Xu Chengjun's voice suddenly became loud. "The job was introduced by Li Long. If we don't give him benefits, if there's work later, can he still introduce it to our brigade?

Three thousand brooms, even without handles, counting two and a half yuan each, that's seventy-five hundred yuan! Giving the people who do the work two yuan, the brigade can still net fifteen hundred... Is this money falling from the sky?"

"Then if he doesn't let the brigade do it, who else can he find?" Ma Hongmei still didn't understand. "How can he do it himself?"

"There are seventeen production teams in the whole Red Flag Commune. Li Long can go out and find any brigade director and tell them there's this job. Do you believe they will treat Li Long like a treasure? Not to mention a pole for five dimes, if they don't want poles, they can directly give Li Long fifteen hundred, do you believe it? Spoon..."

Ma Hongmei didn't speak.

Li Long returned home and started the whole family mobilization.

"Twenty days, cut three thousand poles..." Li Jianguo heard this and said, "There are quite a few poles in the mountains, and they can be cut down. Our family has three people..."

"Plus Daqiang." Li Long said.

"That's four people. One person cuts forty poles a day, this is not a difficult task..."

"Then let's do it!" Li Qing Xia had long felt it could be done. "Let's go into the mountains tomorrow!"

"Still go into the mountains tomorrow, have you been into the mountains?" Du Chunfang muttered. "Listen to the eldest when going into the mountains, listen to Xiao Long..."

Li Qing Xia suddenly became not so confident.

"It's fine, we have guns."

The family hadn't finished discussing when Tao Daqiang arrived at the Li family.

Xu Chengjun had already started to screen people to prepare to draw people to tie big brooms. Tao Daqiang knew this matter was definitely caused by Li Long.

So he came to find Li Long.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 223 =====