After Zhang Rui said goodbye to Li Rong, he felt a little thirsty. Looking around, there was a tea chat too far ahead.
The tea chat is typically built with wood and covered with straw. A piece of cloth with the character "tea" hanging on the eaves shows its purpose. There are two stoves under the tea cloth, one is used to boil water, and the other is steaming things.
Within the tea chat, a few people were sitting in twos and threes, drinking tea and chatting. There was also a table playing chess and a few people watching. It was not deserted but not lively either. The shopkeeper was carrying hot water to heat the teapots on a table.
This summer, drinking tea and chatting is indeed a good place.
Zhang Rui took Li Niushi to the tea chat place and sat down at an empty table on the right side of the door. At this time, the boss of Chachao also saw Zhang Rui and others and stepped forward to greet them.
"What do you guys want to drink? Do you want anything to eat?"
Zhang Rui asked: "What do you have here?"
"My hot water is one cent per bowl, and coarse tea is five cents per bowl. Maojian, Longjing, and Biluochun are fifteen cents, twenty cents, and thirty-five cents respectively. I also have soybeans for two cents per plate, and beans for three cents. For a plate, steamed buns cost 2 cents each, steamed buns and vegetable steamed buns cost 4 cents each, and meat buns cost 8 cents each." The boss of the tea chat said to Zhang Rui one by one.
"I'm a rough man and don't know how to taste tea, so I'll just give you two bowls of rough tea." Zhang Rui said and asked Li Niu Shi beside him: "Brother Niu Shi, is one bun enough for you?"
"That's enough, that's enough. In fact, I'm already very full at noon. You don't have to eat meat buns." Li Niushi said quickly to Zhang Rui
"Okay, let's get two meat buns."
"Okay, just wait a minute."
"Woooo..."
A low child's cry came
Zhang Rui was speechless for a while. In such a hot weather, there were actually children who came out to play and cry. As expected, children have good physical strength.
The boss of Chachao skillfully served Zhang Rui tea and meat buns and asked them to use them slowly.
Zhang Rui took a bite of the meat bun, and the oil and water from the bun flowed out from the corner of his mouth, mixed with the unique aroma of flour, and then took a sip of tea. Zhang Rui instantly felt happy.
The crying continued intermittently, with sounds of comfort in between. It's not very clear, but it's a bit similar to Mandarin, not a local dialect.
Zhang Rui followed the sound and saw a family of four standing in the shade of a house not far from the tea chat.
The one crying was a little boy about three years old, with dark skin, no clothes, and very thin. At this moment, he was being held and comforted by his mother. His mother was wearing a shabby dress with numerous patches, her face was as pale as a vegetable, and her face was so thin that her cheekbones were exposed.
Next to him was a middle-aged man with the same pale face and a numb look on his face. Only the head appears to be larger than his extremely thin body, with only a handful of hair on the top of the head remaining bare, and the money rat tail looks indescribably ugly and greasy. Wearing a worn short-sleeved trousers with numerous patches. The feet are the same as those of most villagers, with thick dead skin on the soles and no shoes.
The man was holding a little girl about six or seven years old. The little girl had some straw stuck in her head and was inevitably hungry and thin. At this time, a smile appeared on Caise's face and she was helping her mother comfort her brother.
Zhang Rui looked at them and listened attentively
"Oh...Mom, I'm hungry..."
"Little treasure, be good... drink some water... drink some water and you won't be hungry..." The child's mother handed a bamboo tube to the little boy.
"You lied to me. I can't even drink enough. I'm hungry all of a sudden..."
The child's mother had no choice but to hold the boy tightly in silence.
"Brother, it's okay. Sister, I can be full just by drinking water... Look, I'm so full and I'm not hungry at all..." The little girl said as she touched her belly with her hand and made a gesture. It looks like I'm very full and hungry.
The little boy pushed away his mother who was hugging him tightly, stretched out his neck, and showed his innocent eyes. Said to his sister
"Really? Sister, can you drink enough with this water?"
"Really, brother, you need to drink water first. I heard from dad that I can buy you food after the sale. Then I will buy steamed buns for you to eat." The little girl seemed to have thought of steamed buns and was very happy. said to her brother.
"Oh, oh... you can eat steamed buns. I'll drink water. Sister, how about we play hide and seek together after eating the steamed buns..." The little boy was very happy when he heard that he could eat steamed buns. He obediently took the bamboo tube and drank water desperately.
At this time, Zhang Rui's eyes suddenly turned red, and tears fell involuntarily. In Zhang Liu's memory, his mother didn't know anything.
This world
"Brother Six, what's wrong with you?" Li Niushi saw Zhang Rui suddenly shed tears and asked quickly
"It's okay, I just got some sand in my eyes." Zhang Rui wiped his tears and argued.
"Oh... this place is very dusty." Li Niushi replied understandingly.
"Do you know them?" Zhang Rui pointed to the family in the shadow of the house.
Li Niushi followed Zhang Rui's finger and looked at it.
"I don't know him. He should be someone from the north who works as a sharecropper in another village." Li Niushi looked at them for a while before saying.
"I didn't expect someone would sell their daughter so early."
"People often buy daughters here?" Zhang Rui was a little unbelievable.
"Yes! In many cases, as long as the weather is a little worse, most people in our village are locals, so the land rent is 50 to 50 cents most of the time, and sometimes it can be a little less. But sometimes the people from the north are Thirty-seven cents, so as long as the economic situation is worse, I can only sell my daughter to pay off debts and make a living." Li Niushi seemed to have seen a normal thing, and then murmured.
"I didn't expect to start selling my daughter so early. This has not yet been taxed."
Zhang Rui invited the Chachao boss to come over and find out more. It turns out that this family just came from Jiangxi two years ago. It is said that the family was pretty good at that time. However, the good times did not last long. The Manchu uncle took a fancy to his family's land and took it by force.
He didn't get a penny in compensation, so the man's grandfather tried to argue, but was beaten to death. I want to sue the government, but the government dares to control the man. If the government hadn't been so concerned about face a while ago, their family might have been gone. So he ended up living here, and now he works as a tenant farmer in Shi'er Village, renting for 40-60 cents.
It has been dry these past few months, the fields have not harvested, we owe a lot of rent, and summer taxes are coming again. I really didn’t have anything to eat at home, so I sold my daughter here. It’s been two days since I sold it, and it hasn’t been sold yet.
After listening to the simple explanation of the tea chat boss, Zhang Rui asked Li Niushi to wait for him here, then got up and walked towards the family.
Zhang Rui suddenly remembered a story. A wave of waves photographed a group of fish on the beach. A little boy passed by and threw the fish back into the sea one by one. At this time, someone said to him: Don't be busy, who cares about the life and death of this fish. The boy responded: The fish cares.
Wear it clean and don't rebel, use an electric drill as a chrysanthemum. Sorry, I want chrysanthemums. No matter how many people die because of this, I will still change this world.
