Chapter 1009: Both Reasonable and Sensible

Upon hearing that the village was going to be electrified, Wang An couldn't help but be stunned for a moment.

Because if Wang An remembered correctly, in his past life, it wasn't until next year—that is, 1982—that each village began to have power lines installed and electricity connected.

Now, however, it had actually been moved forward.

Wang An discovered that ever since he was reborn, perhaps because the fates of many people had been forcibly changed by him, the timelines of many events had also drifted off course for no reason, no longer developing along their original trajectories.

Could this be what later generations called the "Butterfly Effect"?

The change in one thing directly affected other things, and the change in multiple things caused everything to become chaotic?

It had to be said that this matter was truly a bit strange, very strange indeed.

To be honest, this was also very baffling to Wang An; the main thing was not knowing whether this constant changing was ultimately good or bad, right or wrong.

Fortunately, for Wang An, the sooner the electricity was connected, the better; this change had no downsides at all.

Because Wang An had long since had enough of a life without electricity.

After Sun Da finished speaking, the vast majority of the villagers looked very happy.

It was very obvious that everyone held high expectations for this electrification.

Because both the county and the township had electricity, the vast majority of people in the village were not unfamiliar with the thing called electricity.

And very quickly, one after another, they began to express their own understanding and knowledge of electricity.

"Electricity is good. I've seen electric lights; that thing is super bright."

"Yeah, I've seen it at my uncle's house too. Lighting a whole room full of kerosene lamps doesn't compare to how bright that thing is."

"You're still lighting kerosene lamps? Even if you light candles, it's useless."

"If our village turns on electric lights when the time comes, won't our village be like daytime?"

Village meetings had always been like this, and even in later generations, it remained the same; as soon as they started bickering, they bickered, and each one was more knowledgeable than the last, each one louder than the last.

It was as if if they didn't say a few words or shout a few times, it would be a particularly disadvantageous thing.

It had to be said, this kind of thing was truly quite speechless.

Seeing that everyone was getting more and more excited, and their voices were getting louder and louder, Sun Da couldn't help but roar:

"Alright, shut your damn mouths! Are you talking or am I?"

It had to be said, the village chief was still the most effective; after one shout, everyone immediately quieted down.

Seeing that everyone had stopped talking, Sun Da continued:

"Electricity is electricity, but there are many things inside that we all need to know about, and after that, some things need to be discussed."

Immediately following that, Sun Da continued to speak.

It turned out that although the village was going to be electrified, the authorities were only responsible for setting up the power lines to the outside of each household's courtyard.

The power lines from outside the courtyard to inside the house, including the electricity meters on the utility poles, needed to be purchased by the villagers themselves.

Of course, because the price of electricity meters wasn't cheap, the authorities' intention was that several neighboring households could also pool their money to buy one meter to use, and then the electricity bill would be split among these households.

Besides this, the utility poles from the township to the village also needed the villagers to be responsible for digging holes and burying them in the ground.

And the purpose of this meeting was to discuss with everyone the matter of the villagers needing to provide labor for burying the utility poles and setting up the village's power lines.

As soon as Sun Da finished speaking, the villagers began to bicker and discuss again.

"Then every household should just provide one person; anyway, electricity is something every family needs to use."

"You make it sound so easy, what about those families without strong laborers?"

"Yeah, you think everyone needs to use electricity, but what about those who can't afford the meter or the power lines?"

"If there are no strong laborers, everyone can just help out; those who don't have money just won't pull electricity into their homes."

"If everyone thought like you, it would be easy to talk about; it's just that I'm afraid those narrow-minded people will bicker over this matter."

"Bickering" was a local dialect term, meaning to be petty.

After a round of chaotic arguing among the group, Sun Physician interrupted again:

"Come on, everyone settle down for a moment. The village office has come up with a plan; let's see if you all agree."

Sun Physician's idea was for the village to hire villagers to do the work, with the workers earning work points just like before the land was divided among households, and then settling the accounts together once the work was completed.

However, there was no money in the village treasury right now, so after the work was finished, those who wanted land would be given a plot to farm for a few years in lieu of payment, and those who wanted money would have to wait until the village contracted out the land and then use that money to settle the accounts.

Only then did Wang An realize why there had been no news about the 1,000 mu of barren mountains and 1,000 mu of wasteland that were supposed to be contracted out in the spring.

It turned out Sun Physician wanted to contract these lands out bit by bit; this way, whenever the village ran out of money, they could contract out some more land.

It must be said that Sun Physician was indeed much better as a village chief than Niu Yiqun had been. One must know that in Wang An's past life, Niu Yiqun had sold off all the village's land early on, yet the villagers hadn't received any real benefits.

Once Sun Physician finished speaking, he won the approval of almost everyone.

After all, those barren mountains and lands, while nominally belonging to the village collective, didn't seem to have much to do with the individuals in the eyes of the villagers.

Who got the contract and who didn't was never something the villagers could decide, and not a single cent of the money earned from contracting out the land ever reached the villagers' hands.

Therefore, contracting out the land or using it to settle debts seemed perfectly reasonable and fair to the villagers.

Having obtained the villagers' consent, the accountant Li Youcai began to record the names of those who would work, as well as the households that agreed to have electricity meters installed.

For this kind of work, one shift earned at most fifty or sixty cents. Of course, no matter how much money it paid, it was impossible for Wang An to sign up.

And as for installing electricity meters, it was also impossible for Wang An to share one with another household.

Just like that, after Wang An submitted the report about buying a separate electricity meter for his home, he strolled back home to continue tinkering with his medicinal liquor.

Ever since he drank the Three-Penis Liquor and Deer Blood Liquor, a door had opened in Wang An's world, making him clearly realize that these medicinal liquors were equivalent to an ammunition depot.

As long as he drank a little regularly, Wang An would always be in a fully loaded state.

Dealing with Shen Wei, Fang Fang Xiue, Sun Nian, and even Wang An's wife Mu Mu Xueqing, wasn't that an easy task?

Therefore, Wang An intended to keep up the habit of brewing medicinal liquor.

It must be said that Wang An's home now had all kinds of medicinal liquors.

The most precious among them were the Three-Penis Liquor and the Tiger Bone Liquor, mainly because both contained tiger parts—one had a tiger penis and the other had tiger bone—and since they were related to tigers, they weren't easily obtained.

(End of chapter)