Guangzhou, Tianzi Pier.
It was more than a year ago when I came back to Guangzhou from Fengming Mountain or when I was promoted to Tongzhi of Chaozhou Prefecture. And when I came back to Guangzhou after such a short period of time, I felt like I was in another world.
Guangzhou under the rule of Shang Kexi before and Guangzhou under the rule of King Zhu and Pao Pao Zhu are really two worlds.
Guangzhou under the rule of Shang Kexi, although it is also the largest city in the south of the world, has a depressed and desolate atmosphere everywhere... It is a kind of death! Really lifeless!
At that time, Guangzhou was a dead city, but it had not yet cooled down. As a maritime trade center for more than a thousand years, Guangzhou had been China's gateway city for foreign exchanges since ancient times. Once it encountered a situation like coastal relocation, Isn't the sea ban just a dead city?
In Fengmingshan's impression, the Tianzi Pier at that time was deserted. There were only a few warships, official ships and inland sand barges running on the Dongjiang, Xijiang and Beijiang routes, moored there feebly. The strong workers loading and unloading the goods looked as if they had not eaten enough. There were not many vendors wandering around on the dock. The streets outside the dock were filled with dilapidated and lifeless houses... .Although there are some people who have fled from the coastal areas of Guangdong due to the coastal relocation, they can only live in despair because there is no way to make money.
Oh, it’s not like there are no opportunities at all. There are also three major livelihoods: male thieves, female prostitutes, and begging!
However, Fengmingshan was an official back then, so the "male thieves" and beggars in Guangzhou City would not dare to find him, and would only be entangled by a group of vulgar fans.
Thinking of the vulgar fans in Guangzhou City, Feng Mingshan, who had been "ignoring the taste of meat" for more than half a month, was filled with expectations. This time he went out without a concubine, only with a master, a man from the same clan as him. The old housekeeper and two former team leaders from the yamen.
When he left Ganzhou Prefecture and entered Chaozhou Prefecture, he still wanted to go to Jieyang and Puning's Fireworks Willow Alley to find some old friends. Unexpectedly, upon entering Chaozhou, I discovered that not only the weather had changed, but also the social atmosphere had changed.
Anyway, there are no open brothels or gambling dens in the counties of Chaozhou Prefecture, and there seem to be no mountain or water thieves outside the city. I don’t know where those “unemployed” fireworks women and robbers went to make a living?
But this trend is really a bit new! It's just that this new dynasty atmosphere is a little boring.
From the perspective of Fengmingshan, the former father of the Qing Dynasty, there are still some appropriate bad habits...
Thinking of the bad habits here in Guangzhou, Fengmingshan couldn't help but stop and turned around to look at the Guangzhou Port, which was both familiar and unfamiliar to him.
The wide water surface of the Pearl River, the long embankments and piers, the islands dotted on the water surface of the Pearl River, and the hazy area on the other side of the Pearl River shrouded in morning mist are all familiar.
However, there are many new cargo warehouses on the port terminals, and there are also many strange-looking equipment (human cranes) that seem to be used for loading and unloading cargo. Dock workers with buns on their heads and short coats were shuttled back and forth, carrying various large and small objects.
Fengmingshan knew that the same busy scene existed at the Huangpu Village Pier and Huangpu Island, which were slightly farther away - the passenger boat Fengmingshan took had also stopped there, but his destination was Guangzhou City. So I didn’t get off the boat to take a closer look.
But looking towards Huangpu Village and Huangpu Island from the boat, you can still feel how busy they are there.
There are more barbarians and barbarians in Huangpu Village than at Tianzi Pier in Guangzhou!
At some point on the shore of Huangpu Island, more than a dozen slipways and shipyards for building ships were built, as well as an unknown factory. The tall chimneys were filled with black smoke. The slipway was busy, and the sound of clanging could be heard in the distance, as well as labor chants with Cantonese accents. It seemed that the construction of ships was being stepped up.
The whole of Guangzhou is showing an exciting vitality!
If Guangzhou under the rule of Shang Kexi was a dead city, then Guangzhou under the rule of Prince Zhu and Grandson Zhu was a resurrected big city.
But where does this vitality that permeates everywhere come from?
Is this what Guangzhou was like before it was captured by Shang Kexi and Geng Jimao?
Just when Fengmingshan was curious, he suddenly saw three officials wearing black cross-collared cloth clothes, red scarves on their heads, and long swords and grenade hammers hanging on their belts approaching with smiles. The first one among them asked as he walked: "Where are you from? Are you from Guangfu, Chaozhou, or Hakka? Are you here to participate in the Conference of Ten Thousand Nationalities?"
Many of the people who got off the passenger boat with Fengmingshan and others were Confucian scholars wearing "Confucius uniforms" with three-foot swords hanging from their waists.
In fact, Feng Mingshan himself is also dressed in the same outfit now. His braids have also been cut off, and a piece of black cloth has been wrapped around his head, which has not yet grown much hair.
In addition, he also got a long sword and hung it on his waist, which really looked like a "confucian killer".
Fengmingshan has been an official in Chaozhou for several years and can speak a little Chaozhou dialect, but there is no need for him to speak now. Someone will answer the questions of the three officials.
"We are Hakkas from Longchuan County, Huizhou..."
"The student is a Hakka from Chengxiang, Chaozhou. He was recommended by the tribe to attend the meeting of all ethnic groups. This is a letter issued by the prefect Luo of Chaozhou Prefecture."
"The students are Hakkas from Dabu County, Chaozhou..."
Almost all the people who came on the same boat as Fengming Mountain were Hakkas who came to Guangzhou to attend the Ten Thousand Nationalities Conference - Fengming Mountain took the boat from the Hakka settlement area in the northeast of Huizhou Prefecture, passing through Xunwushui and Longjiang (Dongjiang). Floated to Guangzhou.
Of course the people who got on the boat with him were all Hakkas.
One of the team leaders who followed Fengming Mountain was also a Hakka, and he showed a forged letter from Chaozhou Prefecture on the spot - the Guangzhou court had just opened, and many systems were not yet complete. Standardized documents such as letters were left over from the Qing Dynasty. Inventory is used first. That is, the official seal has been replaced by a seal with no Manchu characters but only Chinese characters, and the fonts are the same as before. Fengmingshan can engrave seals himself, so he carved one in Chinese.
Moreover, he was quite familiar with the Hakka surnames in the Chaozhou area, so he gave one of his squad leaders the name Dabu Wu, which was the identity of Wu Liuqi and his family. He was asked to fool the Ming Dynasty officials who were investigating, but the three officials were not careful and couldn't find anything wrong. So they let them go and gave them a "post ticket" to go to the Guangzhou city to stay at the hotel. They also said that food and accommodation would be included. It seems that the recent surge in the price of "special white sugar" has made the Guangzhou court a lot of money. Less!
Fengmingshan and his group took the post tickets and walked out of the passenger boat pier of Tianzi Pier, and found that the streets outside the pier had changed drastically!
The original shantytowns and thatched houses were gone and turned into contiguous construction sites, with scenes of vigorous construction everywhere. Some of these buildings are almost completed. Looking at their appearance, you can see that most of these buildings are used to open inns, shops, and restaurants. Some are Chinese-style buildings, and some are Western-style buildings. They should be business houses of foreigners. pavilion.
The street leading from the bank of the Pearl River to Wuxian Gate has also been widened and renovated. The street is straight and open, and the ground is paved with bluestone slabs.
Fengmingshan and his group walked forward along the street paved with bluestone slabs. When they approached the Five Immortals Gate, they also discovered that a large-scale academy was being built on the west side of the street.
The reason why they knew this was the academy was because the gatehouse of the academy had been repaired, and three plaques were hung on the gatehouse - the plaque on the left was engraved with the word "Sacred Heart", and the plaque on the right was engraved with "Mingde" Two words. On the plaque in the middle are the characters "Guangzhou No. 3 Academy".
A wooden street sign was erected on the street outside the gate of Guangzhou No. 3 Academy. Fengmingshan went up to take a look and wrote three big words - Jiefang Street!
"Liberation..." Fengmingshan whispered, "Come and sing "Qingjiang Yin" in your spare time, liberating sorrow and boredom... It is indeed liberation, use it well!"
