Chapter 273: Seventh Great-Uncle's Plan

After the honest couple Zhou Maozhu and his wife finished pondering on their own, they never once thought about doing anything to the tea while it was being stir-fried.

This alone was enough to show that the 5 jin of tea leaves Song Sancheng gave away was truly not a loss at all.

After Song Sancheng saw them off, he couldn't help but feel a bit guilty when he recalled how generous he had promised to be at the time.

Song Tan, however, took the initiative to speak up:

"Dad, your judgment is really good; my Uncle Zhou's family is truly honest. They've been stir-frying tea leaves for so long, and they really haven't taken a single advantage."

Since it had already been given, and so much time had passed, why keep making her dad feel uneasy?

As for the tea, whether it takes 3 jin 6 liang to fry one jin of dry tea, or 4 jin to fry one jin, a little more or a little less, no one can say for sure.

But Zhou Maozhu's family even stir-fried the old leaf scraps screened out every day, sending them over saying they would keep them to boil for water while working at home, and from beginning to end, they were completely open and aboveboard...

Song Tan might not be good at other things, but she was still decent at reading people.

They were truly honest people.

Hearing this, Song Sancheng immediately perked up: "Right? Let me tell you, Dad has eaten more salt than you have eaten rice; the things I say all have deep meaning. Sometimes you can't just look at the surface!"

Until Wu Lan, passing by, let out a light sound from her nasal cavity—

"Hmph."

Song Sancheng:...

He instantly flashed to the side.

Seventh Great-Uncle, sitting there, was also quite moved at this moment:

Parents always try to find ways to manage things for their children, yet his child went to the border to get married and have children, and he hadn't even been there once...

Of course, the child also rarely came back.

Now, pondering this, he couldn't help but ask his wife beside him:

"You say... how about we send something to Shuliang?"

It must be said, Seventh Great-Uncle used to be a stubborn man.

Because he was a chef, his family's life had been decent all these years. In those days, being a cook was a good skill that guaranteed a steady income regardless of the weather.

Therefore, when he saw that his son had no hope of passing exams, Seventh Great-Uncle had the idea of passing this skill on to him.

However, his son Shuliang could do anything, except he didn't like squatting in the kitchen!

As a chef's son, he would rather have poor skills and make terrible food than learn this.

Seventh Great-Uncle had put in a lot of effort, thinking that with a skill, he could take on a few apprentices later, and the whole family could support each other; whether they opened a restaurant, sold snacks, or did anything else, they would always be able to support themselves.

For this reason, he had tormented his son quite a bit back then, and after tormenting him for so long, the son ran away.

Before leaving, he even left a note saying he didn't want to learn how to cook, he really wasn't interested.

Seventh Great-Uncle had been angry, furious, but... with the person not in front of him, what was the use of being angry?

It was only later, after receiving news from his son, that he learned his son had followed someone to the border.

Good heavens, the days were so long there!

Wasn't working there much harder than being a chef??

Sure enough, the son wrote back complaining—the sky would brighten early in the morning, and the sun still wouldn't have set at ten at night...

After the complaining, Seventh Great-Uncle asked him to come back and learn to cook, but he still wouldn't do it!

The border was far away, and communication took a lot of time; slowly, the son got used to life there.

At that time, local lamb skewers were 50 cents each, pure lamb, in big chunks!

Grapes were 30 cents a kilogram, and there were many shops opened by educated youth from back then; the young man didn't feel homesick—he even met a girl!

Slowly, he took root there.

Until one day, he brought his girlfriend back and solemnly told Seventh Great-Uncle: he would stay at the border from now on...

That was many years ago.

At that time, cities weren't developed yet, and a small city like Yuncheng was not much different from a county town at the border.

Parents can never win against their children; even though Seventh Great-Uncle had only this one son, according to his old-fashioned thinking, he was supposed to wait for his son to support him in his old age.

But looking at the child's firm face, he ultimately didn't say anything.

The border was simply too big; the place where his son lived didn't even have direct transport. Every time he went back and forth, he had to take a bus, a bullock cart, and ride a motorcycle... transferring all the way, only then could he reach the train station, and it would take days of suffering before he could return.

【To be honest, I've been using Wild Fruit Reading to catch up on books recently; the source switching is good, and there are many reading voices. Both Android and Apple are supported.】

For so many years, the times the child came back could be counted on one hand.

Seventh Great-Uncle wanted to go over, but he couldn't even find the place.

If it weren't for this situation, he wouldn't have made up his mind to use his house to find someone to support him in his old age.

On this point, his son, who had become a father himself, slowly realized his parents' feelings back then, so he took the initiative to mention the house over the phone.

But he also promised that once his parents needed him, he would definitely come back!

But he had come back once after getting married, but after seeing him off, Seventh Great-Aunt sighed:

"After not seeing him for so many years, I have to be careful when talking to my son... I can't gauge his tastes anymore, and I don't know what his life is like over there; he's even starting to not understand our local dialect."

"We're old... can we still count on him being by our side?"

Time couldn't erase emotions, but it deepened the chasm step by step.

Ultimately, Seventh Great-Uncle also sighed.

At this moment, hearing him suddenly mention his son, Seventh Great-Aunt was truly stunned for quite a while—

She remembered the lamb, fruit, dates, raisins, etc., that her son sent back from thousands of miles away every year, and ultimately sighed too:

"Let's send something too."

After saying this, she hesitated for a moment:

"Don't we still have some money? Look, should we renovate the old house? I see that we'll be staying in the village from now on, so let's write a letter to the child, at least let us see our grandson and granddaughter... If he doesn't have time, now that there's positioning and navigation, and I've learned to go online, just give us an address, and we'll go over ourselves."

Seventh Great-Uncle didn't dare to agree to this.

Seventh Great-Aunt's health wasn't that robust; going to the border at their age, if they suffered from acclimatization, it could cost them half their lives.

But at this moment, he couldn't help but be moved by his wife's suggestion—

Renovating the old house would not only make it more comfortable for the two of them to live in, but if his son brought the children back, the house wouldn't be too dilapidated.

"That's fine, I think this construction team is good; after Tantan's house is built, we'll see what it's like. If it's okay, we'll reinforce and tidy up our old house and redo the courtyard."

As for sending things...

Seventh Great-Uncle asked: "Honey, tea leaves, white fungus?"

The meat at the border is good, the fruit is good, and it's cheap; as for rare things, it's just what he mentioned.

Seventh Great-Aunt nodded: "You talk to Tantan properly, I'm afraid she won't be able to calculate the money with you then."

Speaking of this, Seventh Great-Uncle snorted:

"That girl, would she not be able to calculate the money with me? She'd rather give me an extra jin than reduce the price by a single cent! She's very clear about this."

While complaining, his face was full of deep smiles. Clearly, Seventh Great-Uncle highly approved of Song Tan's way of doing business.