Chapter 296

Wang An observed the older brother's clothing and tone of voice, wanting to judge what position this older brother held in the brick factory.

However, he couldn't see anything at all, mainly because many leaders in this era looked no different from ordinary workers.

So Wang An asked with a smile: "Brother, sorry to ask, who should I find to buy bricks?"

When this older brother heard that Wang An wanted to buy bricks, he was stunned for a moment, and then instantly became all smiles. It could be seen that this older brother was happy.

This older brother was seen walking toward Wang An while asking urgently:

"Just find me. Buy bricks? Who wants to buy bricks? Do you want to buy bricks? How many can you buy?"

However, before Wang An could speak, he heard this older brother continue:

"Let me tell you, the bricks in our factory are damn strong. Once you build with them, they won't shed a crumb for a hundred years. Do you know why our bricks are strong?"

Wang An was just about to speak, but saw that this older brother didn't look at Wang An at all and started talking to himself again:

"They don't know what's going on. Let me tell you, it's because we added something to these bricks..."

Three minutes later, Wang An watched this older brother still talking, and he was quite passionate about it.

Wang An wanted to interrupt this older brother's speech but held back.

Another three minutes passed, and this older brother was still talking, even starting to talk about the origin of bricks.

Wang An couldn't help it a bit, but he still held back, mainly because Wang An felt that interrupting others without reason was not very polite.

Another three minutes passed, and Wang An really couldn't help it!

The key is, bragging that your bricks are awesome is fine, because sellers don't say their things are bad.

But this damn thing isn't coming to learn the history of bricks; why the hell are you telling me about Qing Dynasty bricks?

So Wang An raised his voice:

"Brother, hey, Brother, I'm here to buy bricks. Shall we go take a look at the bricks?"

Suddenly interrupted by Wang An, this older brother seemed to have not talked enough, but when it came to buying bricks, this older brother was really very happy.

This older brother's left hand was seen gesturing toward the brick pile in the courtyard, and then he said:

"There are plenty of bricks, all good bricks, feel free to look."

Wang An glanced at the blue brick pile and directly ignored the red brick pile, asking the older brother:

"Brother, how much is a blue brick? Can you deliver it to my house?"

Because of the large temperature difference in Heilongjiang, most of the bricks used to build houses in this era are blue bricks instead of red bricks.

Because although blue bricks are expensive, they are frost-resistant!

You have to know that the temperature in Heilongjiang is about minus 45 degrees at its lowest, and at such a temperature, some red bricks will be frozen very brittle and will also swell.

Although not all red bricks are like this, no one can pick out which brick is frost-resistant and which is not.

And whether this thing will be frozen and broken also has a lot to do with the rain before freezing.

Because the red bricks of this era, after being soaked and then frozen, will generally turn into broken dregs.

Therefore, for the houses people live in in this era, using red bricks is a very dangerous thing.

So as long as they build a house, people basically choose blue bricks and ignore red bricks.

Of course, Wang An knew that with the upgrade of brick-making technology later, these problems of red bricks had been solved.

However, that was already after 1990.

Some people might ask, then are the red bricks produced by brick factories in Heilongjiang in this era all thrown away?

It's not like that, because the red bricks of this era are mostly used indoors, such as building stoves, building partition walls, building kang edges, paving floors, etc.

Outdoors, they build sheds, sheep pens, pig pens, cow pens, build courtyard walls, etc.

After all, bricks are calculated by the piece. Using red bricks for these things doesn't have much impact, and the key is to save a lot of money!

It's just that Wang An is not short of money, so no matter what he builds, Wang An chooses blue bricks.

This older brother heard Wang An's question and said without thinking: "Red bricks are 1.5 cents, blue bricks are 3 cents. Little brother, how many do you want?"

Wang An thought for a while and said: "At least 800,000. If it's not enough, I'll come again."

Normally speaking, a three-room brick and tile house in rural Northeast China needs about 50,000 bricks because the outer wall is a 37-wall.

A 37-wall is the width of one brick plus the length of one brick. Such a wall is thicker and warmer. In the south, it is mostly a 24-wall, which is the width of two bricks.

However, Wang An definitely couldn't build a house that small.

Besides, Wang An intended to build two houses. With so many people in the family, how could one house be enough?

And each house couldn't just be three rooms; it had to be at least 5 rooms, because Wang An couldn't just want one child.

Moreover, Wang An also had a younger brother and two younger sisters. When they grow up, they must each have their own room.

Plus the lower room, shed, pig, cow, and sheep pens, and courtyard walls, 800,000 bricks might not be enough!

Wang An's words made the older brother raise his eyebrows, and then he smiled so much that his eyes were about to disappear.

Then the older brother said with a smile: "Delivery is possible, but you have to pay some shipping fees."

Shipping fee is the freight.

Wang An frowned and asked: "How is the shipping fee calculated?"

The older brother squinted and pondered, then suddenly asked: "Little brother, which village are you from?"

Wang An replied: "Xing'an Commune, Kaoshan Village."

This older brother was seen widening his eyes and saying: "I've been to Kaoshan Village; that's a good place..."

One minute later, Wang An concluded that this older brother was definitely a chatterbox; this damn thing was too long-winded!

So Wang An interrupted: "Brother, Brother, whether it's good or not, don't I know? Can we talk about business?"

The older brother blinked and said: "One cart can pull 4 cubic meters of bricks. How about 1 yuan shipping fee per cubic meter?"

After hearing this, Wang An squinted and calculated in his heart.

One cubic meter of bricks is about 500 pieces, 4 cubic meters is 2,000 pieces, which means one cart can pull about 2,000 bricks.

10 carts is 20,000 bricks, 100 carts is 200,000 bricks, so 800,000 bricks would need 400 carts!

Damn, with so many bricks, the shipping fee would be 1,600 yuan!

Wang An calculated the brick money silently in his heart again. One blue brick is 3 cents, so 800,000 bricks would be 24,000.

After calculating, Wang An's inner thought was that money is really damn fast to spend!

The key is that these bricks might not be enough, and he hasn't even bought cement and steel bars yet!

Thinking of this, Wang An frowned and said: "This shipping fee of yours is not cheap, Brother. I'm buying so many bricks; make it cheaper for me."

After hearing this, the older brother also frowned and said: "Your village is more than 30 li away from here; this price is not expensive."

Wang An took out a cigarette and gave it to the older brother, then lit one for himself. After they both lit up and took a puff,

Wang An said: "I heard that there's a saying that if you buy bricks here, you get tiles for free. Is that true?"

The older brother took the cigarette out of his mouth and said hurriedly:

"Free, must be free. 50,000 bricks get 1,000 tiles for free. Our tiles are all red tiles, that's really..."

Before the older brother could finish, Wang An interrupted urgently:

"Brother, how is the shipping fee for the tiles calculated?"

Wang An could no longer care about the problem of politeness, mainly because this older brother's mouth couldn't close once it opened.

Interrupted, the older brother didn't get angry. He pondered for a long time before saying:

"I won't charge the shipping fee for the tiles. Little brother, what do you think? Am I open and aboveboard?"

Bargaining has nothing to do with being open and aboveboard, so Wang An said:

"Brother, then you should be even more open and aboveboard and lower the shipping fee for me."

After Wang An finished speaking, the older brother fell silent and wasn't a chatterbox at all!

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(End of chapter)