Chapter 119 Discussion

Chapter 119 Discussion

Chapter 119 Discussion
In the next room over, at Brother Li's house, the couple were lying side by side on the bed, breathing somewhat rapidly.

After a while, Mrs. Li heard the snoring of Brother Li. She patted Brother Li sideways, propped herself up, looked at him and said, "A Ping, guess how much A Le has earned during this period?"

"I don't even need to guess!" Li Changping said sleepily, "I made at least several hundred yuan by catching big fish, big flower dragons, crabs, and small sharks!"

"More than that!" Mrs. Li counted on her fingers, "When I went to cast traps, I encountered fish flipping over the pond. After the typhoon, I went to fish in the sea and found sea urchins. When I cast traps, I caught cod."

"Ah Le also bought several hundred plastic cans to catch octopuses. We bought some too. You can go fishing with him tonight."

"Ale has been smart since he was young. If his father and others had been stricter with him before, he wouldn't have been messing around and only grew up now." As Brother Li spoke, he became more energetic, sat up, lit a cigarette and started smoking.

"That's not all! He also established a relationship with Uncle Kun, the manager of the Phoenix Restaurant in Tuxia Bridge. The Buddha's hand snails that the two of them brought back from the deserted island were sold for more than a hundred yuan each."

"Then the third brother has earned thousands of dollars during this period of time, right?"

"Of course there is none!" Mrs. Li said enviously, "It's really that silly boy Awei who is so clever. The third child found him on the first day he went to fish in the sea, and followed him to help."

"Ah Le's personality is the same as yours, very generous. I split the money 40% and 60% with him. These days, Ah Wei also got a lot of money. Later, when we bought our family's fishing boat, Ah Wei paid more than 100 yuan and got 20% of the shares."

Anan said that Ale was afraid that he would suffer a loss, so he asked Awei to add a share, but the boy refused, saying that he had already taken advantage and would talk about it later when they made money and bought a big ship.

"Ah Wei has been Ah Le's little follower since he was young. He is really kind to Ah Le. He always helps plow the rice fields next to the two families, helps water the rice seedlings, and helps bring the harvest home."

Brother Li sighed and said, "If Ah Le had always played with Ah Wei, he wouldn't have become such a scoundrel."

Mrs. Li saw that he still didn't understand what she meant after talking for a long time, so she said to him, "Ah Le has such a good income from fishing at home, don't you have any ideas?"

"How could I not know!" Brother Li turned his head and looked at her, "I know you are tempted by seeing Ah Le earn so much, but we still have two years of contract with the ship, and the captain will not agree if we quit midway."

Mrs. Li glared and raised her voice. "We just signed a long-term contract with him. We didn't sell it to him. If you don't want to go, can he still tie us up?"

Brother Li said hurriedly: "That's not the case, but it's really not okay to quit midway. It's the end of the year and they can't recruit people."

"Why don't you think about me when you think about others?" Mrs. Li thought of the days when he was not at home, her nose felt sore and she wiped away her tears, choking and saying:

"I'm not at all worried about you being outside. As long as there's wind, I can't sleep all night. And Xiaoyang is getting older and older. He's hard to control. He's sneaked off to the beach to play with seafood several times."

"Especially during this period, he saw that his third uncle could also make money by mining the sea. He kept telling me that he didn't want to study, but wanted to make money by mining the sea with his third uncle and buy a big ship to be the captain."

When my son was very young, he knew how to earn money to buy a boat and work on his own. And I, as a father, knew how to help others. I am a really honest man.

Brother Li sighed, "You little brat is not good at studying. You can only graduate from elementary school at best. Forget about junior high school."

"I also want him to finish junior high school and join the navy like his uncle, and then come back to work on a big ship. The monthly salary is two hundred."

Mrs. Li curled her lips in disdain, "What's so special about two hundred dollars? A Le Tao has had good shipping more than once!"

"When Xiaoyang comes back from the army, it will be more than that. The wages are increasing every year. The higher the rank on the ship, the higher the wages."

Mrs. Li saw that the topic had gone off track again, and she said angrily, "The higher the level, the higher the salary. Do you think Xiaoyang and Xiaotao will help others when they grow up?"

"I've discussed it with A-Zhen. Let's buy a small boat together, use traps to fish near the coast, and if we find good catches, we can ask A-Le to help sell them. In any case, it's better than helping others."

"I know you want to buy a boat and start your own business, but think about it, the Chinese New Year is less than five months away. Even if you want to quit and start your own business, you have to finish this year before you quit, otherwise people will criticize you."

"Whatever you want!" Seeing that he was still stubborn, Mrs. Li said unhappily, "Do you think I want people to gossip about me?
"Why don't you think about it, the children are growing up day by day, Xiaoyang and Xiaotao are boys, no matter what, Xiaoqing is a girl, the family only has such a small child, where are you going to let her live?"

"How could I not know? You originally went to help with the boat because you wanted to save money to build a new house. Now that you see Ah Le making money by fishing, you want to buy a boat and do it yourself." Brother Li scratched his hair in annoyance. "Wait until the second brother gets up, I will discuss it with him."

"It's up to you!" Mrs. Li got up, put on her clothes in a few seconds, and went out to weave the net.

When Brother Li saw her leave, he couldn't sleep. He thought about his children who were growing up day by day. The house was so small. He wanted to build a new house, and he also wanted to buy a boat to make money. Which one should he take care of first?
He simply sat up, leaned against the head of the bed and smoked one cigarette after another. Soon the small room was filled with smoke.

When Mrs. Li heard the coughing in the room, she rushed over to him angrily and said, "You're coughing like this, and you're still coughing. Can't you cough less?"

"Okay, I won't smoke anymore!" Brother Li put out his cigarette and lay back down with his head in his arms. ...

When Li Changle woke up, she saw her two sons still sleeping soundly with bulging bellies. She went out and saw that Zhou Ruonan was not there either. She thought that she must have gone to Ah Xiang's house to make clothes.

I picked up the tea on the table, took a few sips, smacked a few times, and found out that it was wild tea that my mother picked from the mountain. I felt that it tasted much better than the fake Longjing tea of ​​later generations.

Then he saw Li's mother wearing a bamboo hat and carrying a vegetable basket, and his eldest brother carrying a hoe and a bamboo pole. "Mother, what are you doing in the fields in such a hot sun?"

Brother Li smiled and said, "My mother said that the big winter melons on the melon racks on the mountain are a bit heavy, and she is worried that the racks will collapse, so she asked me to carry a few bamboo poles up there to reinforce them, and to pick some beans, eggplants, and radishes."

Li Changle recalled that it was his elder brother who helped his mother with the chores at home. "Brother, you helped my mother with things as soon as you came back. No wonder my mother kept nagging about you after you left."

Mother Li glared at him in reproach, "How dare you say that? If you're willing to help me, you don't have to wait for your eldest brother to come back."

"I'll help you today!" Li Changle ran back to get his hat, said hello to Li's father, came out to take the hoe from Brother Li, and followed the two of them towards the foot of the mountain.

Brother Li looked back at him, and when he got there, he said, "Ah Le, your sister-in-law wants to... I want to wait until I finish working this year, but your sister-in-law can't wait. What do you think, should we buy a boat and work on it ourselves first, or earn money to build a new house first?"

He never thought that there would be a day when he would go to the third brother for advice.

"Brother," Li Changle said bluntly, "In my opinion, making money is the most important thing. As the old saying goes, debts are as numerous as cow hairs, and the sea is as high as the tide!
If we are lucky, we can earn a year's wages in just a few trips. As long as we have money, it will only take three to five months to build a new house."

Li Changping thought he was right. "This time in Zhoushan Fishery, there was a fishing boat that was very lucky. They caught 20 to 30 loads of yellow croaker, which costs more than 200 yuan per load."

"The fishing boat behind him was better than ours. Changgui said behind the captain's back that he was not following the right route, and was scolded by his uncle's son in front of everyone."

Li's mother curled her lips and said, "You are so stupid! You dare to offend the captain of the ship? You even forgot your last name after making a little money."

She then looked at Li Changping and said, "Ah Ping, I think you should just listen to Ah Fang and buy a small boat with the second brother. You brothers can go out to sea together. If anything happens, you will have someone to take care of you."

Li Changle nodded and said, "Yes, big brother, we can have someone to look after us when we go out to sea together."

The sea is different from the land. In recent years, people on the south coast have relied on the size of their fishing boats to fight with those on the north coast for territory, and large ships colliding with small ships are common.

Brother Li: "The second one hasn't woken up yet. When he wakes up, I'll ask him what he thinks. Also, whether it's buying a second-hand fishing boat or a new one, it will take some time. Even if I do it myself, I have to wait until they find someone before I can quit."

It’s already difficult to recruit people this year, so it’s okay if there’s one less person. But if both brothers don’t go, they definitely won’t let them go.

Li's mother: "You guys discuss it. If you don't want to go, tell them clearly as soon as possible."

The Li family's mountain land is just halfway up the mountain, and it only takes about ten minutes to walk there. The land on the mountain is not in complete pieces, but scattered here and there.

Li Changle could see the tall Castanopsis trees halfway up the mountain from afar. He looked up at the trees and remembered that he used to come to the mountain with his brother to pick Castanopsis fruits to eat.

"Mother, to which family did the Castanopsis tree get distributed?"

"It's not divided into any families, it's still the brigade." Li's mother smiled, "When your grandfather was alive, he said that this mountain used to be full of Castanopsis trees. This kind of tree was very valuable in the old days. Later, when nylon line was invented, the trees were cut down."

"I've heard grandma talk about it before."

In the old days, fishermen used ramie to weave fishing nets, but because it was easy to tear, it was later discovered that the gelatinous substance in the juice obtained by boiling the bark of the Castanopsis tree in a large pot could enhance the toughness of the fishing nets and improve their resistance to seawater corrosion.

After a new fishing net is woven, it must be soaked in castanea juice boiled from castanea bark to reinforce it. Fishermen call this a "castanum net."

The juice boiled from the bark of the Castanopsis chinensis tree is reddish brown and has a very unpleasant odor. The fishing nets are passed through the "castanopsis nets", then fished out to dry, and finally placed in a pool filled with pig blood to soak. Fishermen call it a "blood net."

In order to increase the sturdiness of the fishing nets, the nets must be re-blooded and then dried every time they come back from fishing. In the old days, it usually took 7-15 days to return from fishing.

The old saying "three days to set out the shrimps and four days to dry the nets" comes from here.

(End of this chapter)