Chapter 848: Cannot forget one's roots: First, must thank Old Chen

Just as the sky was brightening and the sun hadn't shown its head, Sun Jia Qiang had already climbed up. He went out to the dry toilet outside to relieve himself, then returned to the room to set up the stove. During the process of boiling water, he took a large broom and swept the large courtyard of the purchasing station again.

Actually, he had already swept it once last night. Early in the morning, except for a few fallen leaves, the courtyard was quite clean, but Sun Jia Qiang felt it was necessary to sweep it again. This way, when people selling things came in, seeing the clean courtyard, their mood should be very good.

After sweeping the courtyard, he returned to the room that had been converted into a kitchen. The water on the stove hadn't boiled yet. He pulled the large iron bucket over, took a package of brick tea from the windowsill next to it, and skillfully broke off three small pieces and threw them in.

After the water in the pot boiled, he used a ladle to scoop it into the large iron bucket. The boiling water infused the three small pieces of brick tea, and it quickly turned into a reddish-brown tea.

The brick tea had already developed "golden flowers" (a type of beneficial fungus). According to later generations' sayings, this thing is very nutritious.

When Sun Jia Qiang first drank it, he thought the tea was moldy and told Li Long he wanted to throw it away. As a result, Li Long told him this was "golden flower," a very useful thing, indicating that the quality of this tea was very good.

Sun Jia Qiang was half-believing and half-doubting. Li Long even demonstrated it for him, drinking it to show there was no problem, and only then did he believe it.

Since he came to work, the first thing every day was to provide good service. Li Long had already processed the household registration for Sun Jia Qiang and gave him the remaining 300 yuan. This made Sun Jia Qiang very moved, feeling that he needed to work steadily and hard here, otherwise, he would be sorry for Li Long's kindness.

This brewed tea was provided to those who came to sell things every day. The idea was Li Long's, which was also to ease the anxious emotions of so many people waiting at that time. Later, feeling the effect was good, it was continued.

After brewing the tea and carrying the iron bucket outside to cool, Sun Jia Qiang began to prepare his own breakfast.

Unlike Li Long who had to eat hot stir-fried dishes every morning, Sun Jia Qiang felt that eating steamed buns or naan in the morning, accompanied by pickles, sauce pickles, or cold mixed dishes, was fine.

After covering the stove lid, Sun Jia Qiang placed a grate on the stove lid, turned to the newly made cutting board, cut the steamed buns bought from the market yesterday into slices, and placed them on the grate to roast. He liked roasted bun slices with oil-splashed chili; it was really fragrant to eat. The only bad thing was that eating this easily caused internal heat.

The internal heat problem was easy to solve. While the steamed buns were roasting, he used boiling water to brew two eggs, adding sesame oil and white sugar inside. This egg tea reduced internal heat and could supplement nutrition; combined, it was perfect.

Sun Jia Qiang loved this kind of life extremely. Every day was busy, but there was a lot to look forward to.

He hadn't touched a cent of the 300 yuan in his pocket. Li Long said that there was still 50 yuan every month, and after saving for a year or two, he could buy a small courtyard in the county town.

Although Maxian is not as good as Shicheng, Sun Jia Qiang likes it very much.

The population here is not as large as the county town of his hometown, but if you work hard, there will be good results.

He plans to save money to buy a courtyard first, then save money to marry a wife, and live here in the future.

The situation at home was like that, and the situation of his relatives was like that. Sun Jia Qiang could be considered to have experienced hardships. Meeting Li Long, a boss he felt was affectionate and righteous, if he didn't hold onto this thigh tightly, then he, Sun Jia Qiang, would really be ungrateful.

Only a few stoves in the purchasing station could be used for fire. Actually, by June, the weather had turned hot, and rural areas used earthen stoves to cook at this time, rarely using stoves. Cities used gas. In Northern Xinjiang, there were no honeycomb coal stoves. Some families used blowers and coal dust.

Sun Jia Qiang had no choice here. The tea at the purchasing station had to be continuously topped up, and building a new earthen stove was relatively troublesome. Although Li Long could haul a truck of firewood from the village to burn here, it wasn't as convenient as a stove. And coal was readily available, so he simply let Sun Jia Qiang use the stove to cook.

Around nine o'clock, Gu Bo Yuan returned to the purchasing station after eating breakfast.

Since Sun Jia Qiang moved to the purchasing station, Gu Bo Yuan had returned to his small courtyard. The agricultural supplies store in the small courtyard hadn't reopened. His agricultural supplies store still hung its sign in the courtyard of the purchasing station. With Sun Jia Qiang watching, Gu Bo Yuan was also at ease.

Compared to the purchasing station, the business of the agricultural supplies store was much worse. There were still customers coming every day, but only a few, mainly to buy pesticides and fertilizers. Dealing with these people was not difficult for Sun Jia Qiang.

Or rather, as long as one trained for a month or so in the busy environment of the purchasing station, one could handle other stores with ease.

Today Li Long didn't come to the purchasing station. He was driving the jeep to do other things.

This fritillary season at the purchasing station earned a lot of money. Li Long felt this wasn't just his own credit, and he wanted to thank everyone else.

The closest one was the forestry team. Li Long drove the jeep and hauled a batch of supplies to the forestry team, a small part of which was explicitly for Hearing Bolati. Without Hearing Bolati's matchmaking, Li Long couldn't have obtained so many "confiscated" supplies from the forestry team.

Besides that small part of things, Li Long also brought good news to Hearing Bolati. He heard that a Hui person on the west side of the county town wanted to sell a courtyard and wanted to ask if Hearing Bolati had any opinions and if he wanted to go take a look.

If he wanted to go, he would take Hearing Bolati to meet the landlord. The landlord's relative was doing business in Wucheng, and now the business was quite good, wanting to pull the landlord over to partner up.

The landlord wanted to join the relative's business and needed money, so he thought about selling the courtyard in Maxian. He had a place to live in Wucheng and thought about developing in Wucheng; the courtyard in Maxian was useless anyway.

The courtyard was very good. Although the area wasn't large, it was kept very clean inside, and Li Long had seen all the facilities. The grape trellis was built with iron frames, and in June, the grapes were already lush on the trellis. Several kinds of vegetables were also planted in the small vegetable garden. Although the wooden heated beds in the two guest rooms were a bit old, they were well maintained. The kitchen facilities were also complete, and there was half a ton of coal in the coal shed.

The original owner wanted to take away his carpets, but this shouldn't have much impact.

The decoration was entirely in an ethnic style, with ethnic carved patterns on the windows, and various decorations in the room. He thought Hearing Bolati should like it quite a bit.

Hearing Bolati wasn't there; he had gone into the mountains to patrol. Li Long told Aili about this and asked him to pass it on to Hearing Bolati.

Aili agreed readily. He felt that selling those things to Li Long was really not a mistake. The money and goods were cleared, and Li Long could still send these things; he was really a good friend.

Leaving the forestry team in the morning, Li Long drove the jeep directly to Beiting City.

Li Long had already thanked Director Qian and Director Wei. This time he mainly wanted to thank Chen Hongjun.

If it weren't for Old Chen's guidance, Li Long couldn't have earned so much money in the previous two years.

Without Jia Tianlong and Zhao Hui, whom Old Chen introduced, Li Long couldn't have opened the purchasing station this year and earned so much now.

It could be said that at least 20% of Li Long's success was helped by Old Chen.

This time when he went to see Old Chen, besides bringing common gifts like cigarettes, alcohol, canned food, and rock sugar, he also planned to give Old Chen a red envelope.

Li Long didn't know much about Chen Hongjun's family situation, only that after the Maxian purchasing station was abolished, he returned to Beiting to work, and the situation wasn't that good.

After all, in the county, Chen Hongjun was the head of a station, and his benefits and treatment were quite good. He was responsible for the purchasing station matters. After returning to Beiting, although his treatment level hadn't changed, the implicit benefits had certainly disappeared.

When meeting Jia Tianlong and Zhao Hui, Li Long also chatted about Old Chen. These two people now had fewer dealings with Chen Hongjun. After all, they weren't collecting supplies anymore. For Jia Tianlong and Zhao Hui, Chen Hongjun was just a normal friend. They could gather when free, but when busy, it was hard to even greet each other; after all, there were no phones at this time.

When Li Long went to Beiting, it happened to be mealtime. He didn't plan to mix a meal at Chen Hongjun's house.

In this day and age, visiting people in the city, unless notified in advance, generally wouldn't happen suddenly at mealtime.

After all, at mealtime, every household cooked according to the amount, and there was rarely any extra.

If you suddenly attacked, others would definitely let you eat. And if you ate this portion of food, someone in this family would definitely eat less, or someone would have no food.

Not to mention this time, even twenty or thirty years later, the situation was about the same. Fortunately, twenty or thirty years later, there were mobile phones, and visiting people definitely required advance notice so the other party could be prepared.

So after Li Long arrived in Beiting, he first went to the state-run restaurant, ordered a bowl of hand-pulled noodles, brought an extra portion, and after eating and drinking his fill, he drove to Chen Hongjun's house.

According to time estimation, Chen Hongjun should have just finished eating at home and hadn't gone to his unit yet.

Chen Hongjun's house was also in the family courtyard. At this time, there were no residential communities. Except for self-built houses, basically, they were all family courtyards.

This family courtyard was quite large, with single-story houses and two-story small buildings inside. According to the address Jia Tianlong gave, Chen Hongjun's family lived in a single-story house.

The single-story house was a whole row in a large courtyard, not the kind with a small courtyard. One or two doors per family. Opposite the door was a wall. By the wall was an earthen stove and a low room; this was the utility room or kitchen.

This living condition wasn't even as good as Li Anguo's in Kuitun.

This was an old residential area, and there were many people in the unit. Being able to be assigned such a house was already not bad.

When Li Long's jeep drove to the side of the single-story house, Chen Hongjun had just come out of the door, carrying a black briefcase, preparing to go to work.

He rode a bicycle to work. In the utility room by the wall, there were two bicycles, one his and one his wife's.

Pushing the bicycle forward a few steps, he saw Li Long carrying things. Chen Hongjun was a bit surprised, then revealed a smile:

"Hey, Little Li, why did you come? Are you here to see me?"

"Yes, I've been busy for a while and haven't had time to come over. Now that I've been busy for a stage, I hurried over," Li Long said with a smile, "Does it delay your work?"

"Doesn't delay, doesn't delay. There's still more than half an hour before work." Chen Hongjun propped the bicycle against the wall and pointed to the things in Li Long's hand, saying:

"It's enough that you came; why bring so many things?"

Li Long was holding a large cardboard box. This box was for beer. At this time, a box of beer could hold 24 bottles. The box was relatively large and stuffed full, with things even showing outside.

"It's not easy to come see you; how can I come empty-handed." Li Long held the things and walked to the door, smiling and saying:

"It's not anything expensive. Come, let's go into the room?"

"Come." Chen Hongjun knocked on the door and pushed it open.

Walking two steps into the room, Li Long frowned.

This room really wasn't large. Two rooms, inside and outside. The curtain hanging at the door of the inner room couldn't be seen clearly. The outer room was about half the size of the room in the large courtyard where Li Long was in the Fourth Squad. On the east and west walls of this room were two single beds. By the window was a cutting board, piled with rice, flour, bowls, and the like.

In other words, this room served as both a bedroom and a kitchen.

At this moment, an old lady was sitting on the left bed, and an eleven or twelve-year-old boy was sitting on the right bed.

"This must be Grandma, right? Hello, Grandma, I am Chen Ge's friend, Li Long." Li Long took the initiative to greet the old lady, "I'm here to see you."

"Good, good, good, put the things down quickly, come into the inner room and sit." The old lady stood up and pointed inside, saying.

The old lady wasn't fat, less than 1.6 meters tall, her hair was a bit gray, she felt like she was in her sixties, and her spirit was quite good.

The boy looked at Li Long curiously, still wearing a red scarf around his neck. He didn't know if he was in the upper grades of primary school or already in junior high school. At this time, many people joined the Youth League in junior high school. Li Long guessed he should be in the fifth grade.

"Come, come into the room." Chen Hongjun lifted the curtain. At the door of the inner room, a middle-aged woman with a bob haircut looked at Li Long with a smile:

"This must be Li Long. I often hear Old Chen talk about you, saying how excellent you are, saying he made such a young friend as you. Looking at you, you are really a talent. Come in and sit; I'll pour you water."

Li Long put the cardboard box by the cutting board, nodded to the old lady, and entered the inner room.

The inner room was larger than the outer room. A double bed was placed in the northwest. By the door was a chest of drawers, which also served as a TV cabinet. On top was a 14-inch TV; he didn't know if it was black and white or color, covered with a cover.

By the windowsill was a sewing machine. The sewing machine head was tucked into the machine belly, covered with an artificial leather pad, on which were a few books. This sewing machine also served as a table.

Against the west wall facing the door was a sofa. In front of the sofa was a coffee table. Between the sofa and the bed was a round table; this should be the dining table.

The inner room was stuffed full, and the space was fully utilized. Although there were many things, it wasn't messy, and the floor was swept very clean.

It seems Old Chen's family isn't living very well. Li Long regretted coming a bit late. Old Chen helped him so much before and later introduced him to two very reliable purchasers, yet he didn't even understand Old Chen's family situation. To be honest, this young friend is a bit unqualified.

Chen Hongjun's wife, Zhou Xiujuan, poured a glass of tea for Li Long and said with a smile:

"Li Long, are you free now? I heard our Old Chen say you started a purchasing station; you should be very busy, right?"

"It is quite busy," Li Long took the cup, took a small sip, and put it on the coffee table, "Collecting fritillaries for a while, because it was the first year, it was a mess. It was also thanks to Old Chen for introducing me to two reliable purchasers, otherwise, this year would have been troublesome."

"Old Chen just matched the line. To succeed in doing things, it still depends on your own efforts." Zhou Xiujuan smiled, "I rarely hear our Old Chen praise a young person. He praised you several times in front of us, showing that your own ability is very strong."

"No, no." Li Long said modestly, "If it weren't for Chen Ge leading the way, I couldn't have opened the purchasing station now." He said this sincerely. Before Chen Hongjun left, he told Li Long all the collection prices for various supplies, otherwise, he would definitely have stepped on pits in this line and would have needed many lessons before he could walk the path smoothly.

So the gratitude to Chen Hongjun is very sincere.

It's just that I didn't expect Chen Hongjun's family situation to be like this.

Came late! (End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 849 =====