Reborn in 1977

Chapter 297: The Persona Must Not Collapse

May 16th, Lunar March 29th.

Everything is suitable, nothing is taboo.

Chen Fan rode his horse along the edge of the field, two dogs chasing each other in front, the pony playing happily with them, a peregrine falcon swooping overhead, startling a flock of sparrows, which scattered and fled.

The women were pulling barnyard grass in the fields. Someone heard the movement, looked up, lifted their straw hat, and shouted, "Teacher Chen is going to work."

Chen Fan waved with a smile, "I haven't been there for almost half a month. If I don't go to work again, I'm afraid I'll lose my job."

He had been busy building a house during this time. Zhang Cuie was holding up the broadcasting station. She was doing the work, and Chen Fan was getting the work points. Even a hands-off shopkeeper wasn't as comfortable as him.

As soon as his words fell, a burst of laughter immediately came from around him.

"Who dares to fire you?"

"Xiao'e hasn't finished her apprenticeship yet. If they drive away the old master and the young apprentice can't take over, that would be hilarious."

"The young apprentice can't take over? If someone wants to drive Teacher Chen away, Xiao'e will be the first to disagree."

"It's not just Xiao'e who would disagree, all the girls in the village would disagree. How many people are thinking about Teacher Chen?"

"Hey, Teacher Chen, which girl from our Lujiawan village do you fancy?"

Hearing the teasing words, Chen Fan realized that he shouldn't have joked.

In terms of divergent thinking, these aunties are the natural-born masters!

Chen Fan, sitting on his tall horse, decisively decided to change the subject, pointing to a paddy field not far away, "The seedlings over there seem to be much taller. Did they use different fertilizer?"

The place he was talking about was the educated youth field where Jiang Lili and the others were working.

Hearing Chen Fan's words, Jiang Lili and the others straightened their backs and looked up at him.

On the other side, someone answered his question, "That's the educated youth field. The seedlings are much taller because they used the same fertilizer, but the rice seeds are different. That's hybrid rice."

Immediately, someone chimed in, "This hybrid rice does look different. The stalks are much taller."

"We didn't want to plant hybrid rice before, but now, looking at it, it's growing quite well."

"We just don't know how the ears will be. Don't let it be an empty stalk."

"It's almost time. In a few days, when the ears come out, we'll be able to see how many empty husks there are. If there aren't many, planting this is much more cost-effective than planting the original rice seeds."

Listening to the voices around him, Chen Fan couldn't help but smile slightly.

Of course, he knew it was hybrid rice. He just wanted to change the subject.

However, seeing the villagers slowly accepting hybrid rice, he was also very happy.

Hybrid rice is a watershed in China's agriculture. Before this, even in good weather and a bumper harvest, it could only be said that it could barely guarantee "food and clothing without worry." After the high-yield hybrid rice, not only did grain production increase, but the animal husbandry industry also developed greatly. "Becoming rich through agriculture" truly became possible.

Chen Fan raised his head and looked towards the educated youth field. He happened to see Jiang Lili in the paddy field also looking over here. He couldn't help but grin. Just as he was about to speak, he saw a row of carts coming around from behind a small earthen slope not far ahead.

Chen Fan looked carefully and immediately spurred his horse forward. When he got closer, he stopped the horse and looked at the rapeseed piled on the carts. He couldn't help but be a little surprised, "Is the rapeseed already ripe?"

He hadn't seen enough of the rapeseed flowers yet.

Jiangnan Province is one of the key rapeseed oil production areas in the country. Almost every production team in the province grows rapeseed.

Unlike the large rapeseed fields of later generations, agricultural technology at this time was relatively backward. The "stubble" conflict between rapeseed and rice had not been resolved, and the "oil-rice rotation" technology had naturally not been researched.

In order to ensure a bumper harvest of grain, under the "grain priority" policy, the best paddy fields were planned for planting rice, and slightly worse flat dry land was used to plant a small amount of wheat and rapeseed, while more barren areas were used to plant miscellaneous grains.

Lujiawan has many paddy fields and few dry fields, so not much rapeseed is planted.

If it were in the neighboring Qingshan Commune, you could see large fields of rapeseed flowers. Every year, Gufeng County's rapeseed delivery task is mostly undertaken by Qingshan Commune, and other communes only need to divide the remaining tasks.

That little bit of task can be completed with just a few dozen mu of rapeseed fields. The extra amount is naturally distributed by the brigade, and most of the rapeseed harvested from the "wasteland" that was not included in the statistics is distributed to the commune members.

Therefore, in this area, rural people have higher rations of grain and oil than urban residents, and several times higher.

If grain prices weren't too low and industrial product prices weren't too high, the standard of living here could be raised another two levels, at least.

Jiang Lili had told him before that many educated youth families didn't buy meat and fish during the New Year, and they could have a good year just by relying on the cured meat and fish distributed to the educated youth by the production team.

Perhaps it is precisely because of this that the people who have lived here for generations don't have much ambition, and there hasn't been much change even after the reform and opening up for more than ten years. It wasn't until the 1990s, when they saw others earning money by working, and the original earthen-walled houses became brick houses, and the old bungalows became buildings, that a "wave of migrant workers" suddenly arose.

At that time, the "land of fish and rice" was only supported by some old people, but even so, it could still guarantee the completion of the annual grain delivery task, which shows the richness of this land.

Chen Fan shook his head, withdrew his thoughts, and looked at the rapeseed again. The grains were full and tight, and they looked like high-quality rapeseed.

The first cart was being pulled by Captain Yang. When he saw Chen Fan, he pulled the cart to the side of the road, let the carts behind go first, then took off his straw hat and fanned himself, and said loudly, "This is winter rapeseed, planted in winter. It's almost time to harvest it. This batch is maturing earlier. There are still several batches behind. It is estimated that all the rapeseed will be harvested before the double搶."

Chen Fan had already jumped off his horse, took out a cigarette and handed it over, lit it for him, and then said with a puzzled face, "I feel like the rapeseed has just started to bloom, how can it be harvested already?"

Hearing this, Captain Yang laughed and coughed several times in a row, pointing at him and laughing, "You are just like those educated youths who just came to the countryside, not distinguishing the seasons, and living a muddled life. You only know that the rapeseed has been harvested when you eat the oil."

Chen Fan coughed twice, "I call this grasping the big and letting go of the small, only grasping the main contradictions, knowing when to breed, transplant, and harvest rice is enough, the others are not important."

"Not important?"

Captain Yang squinted at him, "Not important, then don't you eat oil?!"

Chen Fan chuckled dryly, "Not important doesn't mean I don't want it."

Then he threw the cigarette butt into the ditch, jumped back on his horse, "You're busy with your work, I'm going to work."

After saying that, he spurred his horse and ran, leaving Captain Yang shaking his head and smiling.

Riding his horse and bringing a cloud of dust all the way to the 5th team, an old man who hadn't gone to work immediately came out of his house and shouted at Chen Fan, "Teacher Chen is here to work."

Chen Fan was speechless. There was no need to publicize the fact that I skipped work for half a month, right?

Fortunately, not everyone was paying attention to whether he was working or not. At this time, an aunt humbly asked for advice, "Teacher Chen, how much did it cost to build your house?"

Finally!

Chen Fan immediately stood his horse sideways, the little mare reared up, her two front legs kicking in the air, and let out a neigh.

After considering this question for ten days, he was ready to give what he believed was the most appropriate answer.

He sat on his horse, a Luger pistol he'd won from Zhang Wenliang at his right hip, a PPK he'd bought at his left, and a hand-forged hundred-steel horizontal blade hanging from the saddle, its handle and sheath made from a single piece of wood, looking like a mere stick from a distance.

The little mare landed on the ground, and Chen Fan struck his most handsome pose, uttering the most miserable words, "Alas…"

Before the words even left his mouth, he let out a long sigh, "You wouldn't believe it, I lost a fortune just building this house!"

Before he finished speaking, a dozen or so women and old men had already gathered around, curiously looking at him.

The older woman from before immediately pressed, "Lost a fortune? What do you mean?"

Surrounded by so many people, Chen Fan couldn't very well stay on his horse, so he dismounted and immediately began to spin a yarn, "Putting aside everything else, just the blue bricks alone completely exhausted the bricks I'd saved up over the past few months, using up a total of more than 40,000. The only reason it's not worse is because I slowly fired these bricks myself. If I'd bought them from a brickyard, it would've cost me over 1200 yuan! And that's just calculating at the price of red bricks, I don't even know how much blue bricks sell for."

As soon as these words came out, the surrounding people immediately began to discuss.

"Wow, over 1200? That's enough to build a three-room brick house."

"Isn't it? A three-room brick house, with a main room and two side rooms, only costs around 1000 yuan, and that's including labor and banquets. That's way more than enough."

"More than that, you could even add a set of high-quality furniture, with 48 legs!"

A piece of furniture generally has 4 legs, so 48 legs would be 12 pieces of furniture, fit for a wealthy family!

Hearing the women's discussions, the corners of Chen Fan's mouth slightly curved up, then quickly turned down again as he continued with a bitter face, "Isn't that right? And you can't just use bricks to build a house, I bought 20 bags of cement, and several bundles of steel bars for the prefabricated slabs, and that was only thanks to An Ganbu's connections.

An Ganbu even said that this was a one-time thing, and he'd used up all his favors. He wouldn't be able to get any more, and told me not to ask him again."

These words immediately dispelled the idea some people had of asking Chen Fan to help them buy steel and cement.

As for asking Chen Fan to fire bricks?

Who the hell would have such an idea?!

Teacher Chen was only firing bricks for his own house, you really think you can treat him like a brickyard worker?

Have you ever seen him sell a single brick?

In short, firing bricks was just a last resort for Teacher Chen to build his house. If you have money, go buy them from a brickyard yourself. If you don't have money, find a way to fire them yourself. Firing bricks isn't like firing pottery, as long as you don't fire black bricks that crumble at the slightest touch, you can fire red bricks with a few tries.

Even if red bricks aren't as durable as blue bricks, how could you even have the nerve to trouble Teacher Chen?

The women were already feeling disheartened, and Teacher Chen was continuing to pour cold water on them.

"The labor cost for hiring master builders to build a small brick house starts at 80 yuan. If you want to build a three-bedroom, two-living room, or a four-bedroom, one-living room house, that'll be at least 100 yuan.

And then there's the cost of meals, you can't skimp on the cigarettes and alcohol. If we're asking the villagers to help, can we afford to treat them poorly? Anyway, over those ten days, I spent more than 1000 yuan on meals, all told.

Of course, my standards are a bit high, but since the master builders from the construction team are helping for free, I can't treat them poorly, can I? So I just used the labor costs for meals. If you cut out that expense and shorten the time by a few days, I guess it would still cost two or three hundred yuan.

And then there's the lime for plastering the walls inside, the cement or fermented soil for painting the outside walls, the three-in-one soil and floor tiles for the floor, the glass for the windows, the furniture inside and out, and then there's the kitchen and toilet, which are calculated separately…"

After calculating for a while, Chen Fan roughly estimated, "If you follow the standards of my house, it would cost at least 4000 yuan."

4000?

Men, women, old, and young, a dozen people looked at Chen Fan with wide eyes.

Are you sure you said 4000?

Chen Fan immediately coughed dryly and gave his final summary performance, "So, if it weren't for the help of the villagers, the help of An Ganbu, and the righteous support of the construction team from the 4th team, I definitely wouldn't have been able to build this house.

Even so, I've now spent all the money I'd saved up with great difficulty, and I still owe the team and the brigade a lot of work points. I hope the value of this year's work points will be slightly higher, so that I can pay off my debts by the end of the year, otherwise…"

Chen Fan raised his head, his face miserable, his phoenix eyes filled with tears, "I'll have to owe it until next year!"

How pitiful!

Amid the sympathetic gazes of the villagers, Chen Fan led his horse, dejectedly walking towards the brigade headquarters.

Only leaving behind scattered bits of gossip, who knows how many days it will take to spread throughout the team, or how many days it will take to spread to the commune?

…

"You really don't have any money?"

Ye Shubao and An Quan looked at him with wide eyes. Teacher Chen, who was known as the most entrepreneurial person in Lujiawan, actually had a time when he didn't have any money?

Chen Fan changed to a more comfortable position, repeated what he had just said, then picked up his teacup, blew on it a few times, took a sip of tea, and then raised his head and said with a miserable face, "Isn't that right? After building such a big house, how could I have any money left over?"

As he spoke, he turned his head to look at An Quan, raised his chin, "Brother An, you've seen the world, tell me, how much would it cost to build my house well?"

An Quan wasn't a builder, how would he know the inside story?

Not to mention him, even the master builders from the construction team wouldn't be able to estimate an accurate number without overseeing the entire process from beginning to end.

However, he could still estimate a rough range. An Quan estimated for a while, and felt that Chen Fan's calculation should be correct, so he put on an air of knowing everything and said with a face full of emotion, "Since ancient times, it's been difficult for ordinary people to build houses, difficult to build houses…"

As he spoke, he raised his head, looking like he hated iron for not becoming steel, "Tell me, you're obviously just one person, even if you get married and have children in the future, you won't need such a big building. Look, now you've overspent, haven't you? Tell me, why did you build such a big house for no reason?!"

The way he said it made it seem like he didn't know Chen Fan was going to build a big building before.

Chen Fan raised his head, his face full of regret, "I'm still young, and I didn't think things through. I thought that since I had such a big homestead, I'd build such a big house. It was a miscalculation!"

Ye Shubao looked at Chen Fan, then looked at An Quan, then looked at Chen Fan again, hesitated for a moment, and said, "Why don't you sell those rabbits you sell to the brigade, and they can give you some cash first?"

As soon as Chen Fan heard this, he immediately waved his hand righteously and refused, "No need, I can't break the rules for one person. Everything should be done according to the rules, the entire brigade settles accounts uniformly at the end of the year, how can we make an exception for me?!"

Just kidding, I finally created a persona of being in debt, if you give me a few hundred yuan in cash, wouldn't that persona collapse?!

Absolutely not.