In the past few days since he became a popular figure in the office, Chen Muwu has been making slow progress in writing his second paper, and he has barely typed out the English version of the paper on exact solutions to three field equations.
The next task is to translate the English version of the paper into German word for word while flipping through a German-English dictionary.
German is barely a bonus skill included in his time travel gift package. Chen Muwu is not very proficient in it, so he can only use this stupid method.
When he communicated with Einstein, he simply drafted it in advance and memorized it by rote.
Fortunately, there are finally no trivial matters to slow down Chen Muwu, because new hot spots appear every day, and his enthusiasm in the office has quietly subsided.
On January 6, the latest issue of the Miller Review was released.
Originally, the main readers of this kind of weekly magazine published in pure English were either foreigners in concessions across the country, or foreigners who were abroad but wanted to understand China, so their influence in the Chinese circle was limited.
But today's issue is different, because it contains a very topical voting result.
On October 7 last year, the Miller Review published an announcement in a prominent position and distributed "electoral ballots" at the same time, asking readers to vote for "Twelve Great Figures in China Today."
This questionnaire survey can be regarded as the first large-scale voting conducted strictly in accordance with social survey standards in history, and thus attracted a lot of people's attention and participation.
The Miller Review also captured the essence of the talent show a hundred years later. The newspaper published it every week, and the votes and rankings of each candidate were also published weekly.
However, the current audience is quite normal. There are no crazy fans who buy a lot of drinks and pour them into the sewer in order to vote for their little brothers and sisters.
Those who have voted once will give the voting coupons published in the next issue of the newspaper to relatives and friends, asking them to also vote for the twelve important figures in their hearts.
During the voting period, Hu Shi also published an article "Who are the Twelve Big Figures in China Today" in the "Effort Weekly" he sponsored, criticizing the ongoing election.
He believes that "Miller's Review" is an English weekly newspaper and is mainly marketed among Americans and other English speakers living in China. "So this kind of vote can only express the tendency of this group of people and does not deserve any serious attention." .
I don’t know if this great writer really wants to criticize this vote, or if he wants to jump out and brush his own sense of existence.
Anyway, since the publication of Dr. Hu's critical article, he has been a "blessing in disguise" and his position on the rankings has also risen, from thirteenth to twelfth, and he has remained in this position until the end of the voting.
Voting closes on the first day of the new year, the day Einstein lectures at the Ministry of Industry and Commerce Bureau.
After a week of intense counting, as the new issue of "Miller Review" was published today, the final voting results also ushered in the announcement moment.
Chen Muwu was not very interested in the voting results, but other colleagues in the office were very interested. Everyone held up their newspapers and discussed with each other the discrepancies between their voting candidates and the final results.
That situation gave him a sense of déjà vu, as if everyone was holding a lottery ticket and looking at the lottery information in the newspaper to claim the prize.
Out of curiosity, Chen Muwu also took a look at the voting results. Eight of the top twelve big names on the list were warlords, politicians and officials [1].
Among the remaining four, in addition to Hu Shi in twelfth place, there are Cai Yuanpei, president of Peking University, in sixth place, Zhang Jian, a great industrialist in eighth place, and Yu Rizhang, a religious figure in tenth place.
Chen Muwu originally thought that this vote had nothing to do with him, and planned to continue to hang out in the unit day and night.
He had no idea that he would soon come into contact with several of the above-mentioned characters.
…
On January 10th, Chen Muwu finally typed the last period of his German paper on the typewriter.
After checking that they were correct, he took two sealed Western-style envelopes and walked to the North Railway Station branch of the China Post Bureau, which was closest to his work, before going to work, and completed the mailing business at the counter.
The two letters remained the same, one to the British "Journal of Philosophy" and the other to the German "Annals of Physics".
Obviously, Chen Muwu still doesn't know about the scandalous shit that happened in the editorial department of "Journal of Philosophy", otherwise he would never submit another manuscript to this contemptuous white-dog journal.
Some people may ask, why did he not contribute to the two top physics journals of later generations, "Modern Physical Review" and "Physical Review Letters"?
Come on, in this day and age, the former has not yet been published, and although the predecessor of the latter, "Physical Review", has been published for nearly thirty years, it is still just a small journal.
The center of world physics is still in Europe. If the United States wants to have no say in theoretical physics, it will have to wait until Germany persecutes Jews on a large scale and Mustache attacks Poland to reignite the war on the European continent.
The postage for the two letters, plus the cost of sending registered and express letters, cost Chen Muwu a total of one yuan and eighty cents.
You must know that just this year, Lu Xun bought a small courtyard with six rooms in the West Santiao Hutong of Fuchengmen, the most beautiful place at the foot of the emperor, for only 800 silver yuan.
The cost of sending an international registered letter in 2022 is: postage is 6 yuan, registration fee is 16 yuan, which adds up to a total of 22 yuan for one letter, and 900 letters are less than 20,000 yuan.
With this kind of money, let alone the center of Beijing, you can't afford even one square meter in Miyun Pinggu, where the housing prices are the cheapest, or even in Yanjiao.
The purchasing power of the ocean during the Republic of China was really complicated. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, Chen Muwu, a later generation, would never have imagined that the cost of sending 900 international letters was actually equivalent to the price of buying a yard.
He left the post office and just walked into the office and sat down with today's newspaper. Before he could make a cup of tea and water, the concierge from the unit burst in with a telegram: "Engineer Chen, I have a letter from you."
This concierge has long memorized the name and appearance of every employee in the railway administration, so that he can help everyone by running errands on weekdays and earn some personal money to buy drinks.
Chen Muwu was also familiar with the secrets, so he took out the two dimes found at the counter when he just sent the letter from his coat pocket. After thinking about it, he quietly put one back and put it in the concierge's hand: "Thank you very much." It’s up to you, take this.”
"How embarrassing!"
"You're welcome! Take it."
"Then, thank you Engineer Chen!"
*****
[1] Author's note: I don't know which of these people can be said and which cannot be said, so I have omitted the specific list. Interested readers can check it out.
