Great time travel

Chapter 48, Yamato of girls

a month later.

Beside the wharf of the Kure Port tutelary mansion, the lead ship of the Yamato-class battleship, the former general flagship of the United Fleet, the Yamato was moored quietly.

As one of the supreme kings of the era of big ships and cannons, the battleship Yamato can be regarded as a symbol of the sea power of the Japanese Empire, representing the pinnacle of the battleship era and the highest state of the shipbuilding industry of this era, and it is also the totem of faith in the sea power of the Japanese Empire.

For ordinary Japanese citizens of this era, she is a symbol, a legend.

As a resident of Wugang Naval Guard Mansion, Minako Akiyama has naturally heard about this legendary invincible giant ship, and even has a vision, but she never imagined that she would be like this A woman in the middle of the world will actually work on this huge ship.

——Although I was just doing odd jobs in the soldier's kitchen of the battleship Yamato...

In the case of full crew, a Yamato-class battleship needs [-] to [-] officers and soldiers of all levels to serve on the ship.In order to meet the dining needs of so many people, each Yamato-class battleship has multiple kitchens. Rare all electric cooker, not a charcoal or briquette stove - mainly for fire protection.

The whole ship is equipped with six huge six buckets (110 liters) electric rice steamer, two stew pots of the same size, a 36 liter special porridge pot, two pots that can cut radishes, peel potatoes, and stir mashed meat. "Synthetic conditioning machine", as well as electrified automatic cooking equipment such as automatic rice washing machine and tableware sterilizer.There is also an oven so you can bake your own bread, cakes and puddings.In addition, the ship can also make homemade tea soup and yokan, and use the carbon dioxide used for firefighting to mix lemonade and other refreshing drinks.Each kitchen then has a freezer that can be used to make sorbets and ice cream.

All in all, except for the absence of a microwave oven, the kitchen of the Yamato-class battleship is almost the same as the kitchen of a restaurant in a modern city.

However, no matter how advanced the kitchen utensils are, they need chefs and assistants to operate them in order to cook all kinds of delicious dishes.

Therefore, before dawn, Akiyama Minako had to get up from her bunk and go to the kitchen to start the busy day.

On this day, the first thing Minako Akiyama needs to start preparing is the beef stew as the main course for lunch: in each extra-large stew pot, which is much larger than her rice tank, fill it with pre-cooked rice. Prepare the cooking materials, stew the fried vegetables and tendon meat carefully and slowly, and at the same time, add a large amount of frozen candied sauce in the interval of removing foam to adjust the sweet taste that Japanese people like...and that's it Slowly and gurglingly, until the meal is cooked at noon, it is considered to be fully flavored - that's what the recipe sent to her said.

After preparing the goulash for lunch, Minako Akiyama turned to prepare breakfast.On the battleship Yamato, known as the Yamato Hotel, it has always been known for eating well.Even in wartime when supplies were scarce, even the lowest-level soldiers could enjoy a Japanese breakfast including dried fish, seaweed, miso soup, pickles, and rice; or fried ham slices, poached eggs, bread, and butter. Composition of western breakfast.

However, today's Yamato is no longer the general flagship of the United Fleet, but a training ship parked in the port, and the food standard will naturally be lowered accordingly. The breakfast prepared by Akiyama Minako today is a traditional meal for the poor in Japan ——"Cat meal".

The so-called "cat rice" is a cheap meal for the Japanese bottom class. On the boiled rice, sprinkle some pieces of dried bonito (also known as "bonito festival" in Japanese) (also known as "wooden fish chips"), and Serve with a little soy sauce or miso soup.Because Japanese cats like to eat bonito, and the Japanese are happy to feed domestic cats with this cheap bonito, so this simple meal with only bonito flakes and seasoning as a side dish is called "cat rice" .Of course, in the harsh and scarce war years, even such "cat rice" can already be called a delicacy for the poor Japanese who are about to be unable to eat white rice.At least Akiyama Minako doesn't think it's shabby to eat this for breakfast - even just having breakfast is already a luxury.

However, even such a simple "cat meal" takes a lot of effort to make it well-the so-called "bonijatsu", also called bonito or dried pine fish, is a kind of fish from the tuna family. After removing the head, fins, bones and belly fat of bonito, it is a dried condiment made by boiling, smoking, mildewing and other processes. It is called "the hardest food in the world" or "fish mummy". If you gnaw it, you will probably break your teeth. Generally, it needs to be cut into thin slices with a planer in advance, that is, "bonito flower" before it can be eaten with rice.And to get the top-quality bonito flakes that are "thin as geese paper and as bright as glass", not only need a sharp planer, but also test the cooker's knife skills and arm strength.Although as early as the end of the Meiji period, someone had invented the bonito slicer and opened a factory to sell ready-made bonito flakes.But pre-sliced ​​bonito flakes are not conducive to long-term storage, so the food storage of the Yamato still stores whole pieces of bonito... When Minako Akiyama and a few kitchen helpers, it was hard to get so many people what they needed for breakfast. When all the "bonito flowers" were dug out, they were already sweating from exhaustion, and their hands were a little numb.Alas, the sumptuous cuisine of the Navy is really not so easy to eat!
However, Minako Akiyama's work this morning was far from over. She looked up at the wall clock inlaid on the bulkhead, hurriedly changed her apron and headscarf, put on a uniform and a military cap, and then took it out of the locker. A golden brass trumpet, go out and take the elevator to go straight to the deck: this is Minako Akiyama's real job on the warship-the trumpeter of the Yamato military band, and sometimes she also plays the guitar part-time.

Back then, in order to please the guests, she had learned western musical instruments for several years, but she never imagined that they would be used in such a place now.

Just when she stepped out of the elevator door, a crisp electric bell sounded in every cabin of the ship...

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"...Ring ring ring—"

"...Assemble! Assemble! Prepare for the flag-raising ceremony!"

"... Get up quickly! Lazy pig! Everyone on the foredeck!"

"...Ah! I'm going to be late! I'm going to be late!"

"...Baga! Which bastard stepped on his shoes?"

"...Idiot! Where are you running! The direction is reversed!"

Amidst the crisp electric bells, several middle-aged women with armbands with the words "Feng Ji" on their arms, holding sticks wrapped in white cloth in their hands, walked through the narrow cabin aisle, slapping the cabin doors one by one, Urge the newcomers on the ship who are still in a daze to get up and gather quickly.

——Although they themselves have only been on the ship for a few weeks, but now they are all proud to call themselves seniors.

Then, groups of disheveled and unkempt girls in sailor suits poured out from various cabins in a mess.

That's right, it's really a group of girls in sailor suits—although some of them have obviously reached the age of sister Yu and even aunt... I saw them scurrying in the narrow steel passage like headless chickens Come and go.Although all recruits boarding the ship must receive four to five days of training, learn the ship's regulations, and be familiar with the positions of various departments in the Yamato-class ship.But women's sense of direction seems to be generally poor, and there are still a lot of road idiots, who often get lost in the ship all day long - the only exception is the way from the residence to the cafeteria, even the most stupid people can remember...

The reason why there are so many women appearing on this giant steel ship that should be full of masculinity is naturally a last resort.

——Since getting the super cheating device of [chronological vending machine], the red Japanese government, which can legally print Japanese yen banknotes, has instantly turned into a shopaholic, and immediately started a frenzied super big purchase: Fuel, food, guns, ammunition, cars, military horses, airplanes, warships...everything you can think of, you keep buying and buying.In particular, the Yamato-class battleships, which have been world-renowned over the years, bought the sixth ship "Ezo", the seventh ship "Tsushima", the eighth ship "Deba", and the ninth ship "Kai". ", No. 11 ship "Satsuma", No.12 ship "Wakasa", No.13 ship "Aki", No.14 ship "Echizen", No.[-] ship "Echigo"...

Coupled with the newly repaired and launched No. [-] ship Kii in the naval arsenal dock of Kuregang Township, the Navy Combined Fleet has added ten new Yamato-class battleships at once, plus the original four Yamato-class battleships, a total of up to ten The four ships can be said to be extremely powerful in military capacity, which makes people feel proud.

However, before the top navy executives were happy with the instantly soaring military capacity, they found themselves in a huge trouble:

Although there are countless powerful warships at once, there is simply no way to gather so many manpower to sail them!
As I said before, in the case of full crew, a Yamato-class battleship needs [-] to [-] officers and soldiers of all levels to serve on the ship in order to operate and fight normally.With the addition of ten Yamato-class ships, at least [-] more skilled sailors are needed to play well.

What's more terrible is that the navy didn't just buy ten Yamato-class battleships from the [chronological vending machine], but also bought a lot of submarines, torpedo boats, supply ships, aircraft carriers, destroyers and cruisers, making the whole army The total tonnage soared by more than 200 million tons in an instant.In addition, 300 million tons of fast-transport merchant ships were bought... According to the calculations of the naval staff, in order for these ships to run at sea instead of rusting in the harbor, naval pilots and ground crews alone need to recruit at least 10 people, and about 100 million sailors and port personnel.Obviously, even if all the personnel of the entire navy are exhausted, even if the coolies at the pier and the cleaners at the headquarters are all filled in, it is still far from enough.

Faced with such a huge shortage of human resources, the navy must carry out a very large-scale recruitment and mobilization anyway.

However, the brutal war that has lasted for more than ten years has made the number of young men in Japan exhausted to the limit.Moreover, with the large-scale landing of the US military, the Kinki Plain, the Tokaido area, and the Kanto Plain, which are the most densely populated on the Japanese archipelago, have all become enemy territory.The core base that the Hiroshima base camp can still really control at present is actually only half of the Saikoku area west of Kobe, plus half of Shikoku Island, all of which are sparsely populated and barren.Kyushu Island is still ambiguous for the time being.Moreover, the human resources on the remaining territory have to be shared with the army.

As a result, the high-level navy quickly discovered painfully that if they did not plan to leave a large number of warships unmanned to drift around, and finally become shamefully the enemy's spoils of war, then there are only two options left: either conscript A group of disobedient children and trembling old men can either only allow women to go on warships—that is, either turn the Japanese Navy into boy scouts and nursing homes, or turn the Japanese Navy into a women's army.

This is really an extremely difficult choice, even so difficult that it almost makes you traditional and conservative admirals on the verge of mental breakdown.

However, no matter how difficult the choice is, it cannot be avoided after all. After carefully weighing the difficulty of training bear children and training young female workers, the high-level navy finally pinched its nose and made a decision to "establish a naval women's fleet" decision...

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In fact, as early as 1932 at the beginning of the war, out of the consideration of general mobilization during the war, Japan established the "National National Defense Women's Association" in order to organize ordinary housewives and provide various support for soldiers who went out. Serve.Their uniform clothing is the daily attire of Japanese housewives - a white apron with a lettering "Dainippon National Defense Women's Association" slanted on the outside.Members not only included housewives, but also gradually expanded to working women in various industries such as textile workers, military factory workers, and salespersons, and finally even actresses, waitresses, and prostitutes.

In the first few years, the female members of the "Great Japan National Defense Women's Association" only made and sent condolence bags for soldiers, greeted the departing or returning troops, held condolence meetings, mourned the dead, cleaned cemeteries, and sent condolences to soldiers. Families of soldiers, caring for wounded soldiers, publicizing national defense knowledge, etc.

Well, there is also the mobilization of some unemployed women to serve as comfort women in the frontline battlefields, which is also one of the businesses of the "National Defense Women's Association of Japan".

But soon, with the continuous escalation and expansion of the war, in order to maintain Japan's domestic economy, support the wartime system, and fill the domestic labor gap caused by large-scale wartime conscription, the "National Defense Women's Association" was forced to break through The traditional Japanese concept of "women's morality" began to mobilize women to enter various arsenals, produce aircraft and artillery shells for the front line, and even unload goods at the docks and dig coal in the mines like men...

Therefore, after the Navy made the decision to "establish the Navy Women's Fleet", it quickly recruited hundreds of thousands of school-age women through the organizational channel of the "National Defense Women's Association" in the Hiroshima area.But the quality of this personnel... Basically, there is no need to count on it.Among them, there are very few female drivers who can drive cars, and there are a limited number of female workers who understand plumbing machinery. As for those who have driven large motor boats alone, there are not a single one. There are quite a few fishermen who know little about paddling sampans and operating sails. Know a thing or two - basically everything has to be learned from scratch anyway.