Dong Qiangqiang's Story of Leaving Germany

Through the rain curtain outside the window, Dong Qiangqiang saw that the water in the pond had overflowed onto the grass next to it, forming a small puddle connected to another. The landlord's newly bought poultry timidly shrank into the poultry house at first, but later the brave ones ran into the rain, and more followed suit, happily jumping into the pond to play.

Although Fang Shuang was in a hurry, he still had to complete the assigned tasks step by step.

There were many things to do during the day, so he decided to have a serious talk with Lao Bai when he came back in the evening. No matter how difficult Lao Bai's situation was now, he should not tell anyone about Dong Qiangqiang's investment. This was Dong Qiangqiang's privacy and should not be a topic of conversation for Lao Bai.

When he finished washing up and went downstairs, the landlord was already sitting in the kitchen with reading materials ready for him.

After fluently reading the newspaper prepared by the landlord, Dong Qiangqiang quickly made himself breakfast: the milk was boiled and set aside, the boiled eggs were put into cold water, and the bacon taken out of the refrigerator was thrown into the hot water for boiling the eggs. After twenty seconds, it was taken out and sandwiched with tomato slices, lettuce leaves and cheese slices on whole wheat bread that was toasted to a crispy outside and tender inside, golden on both sides, and spread with strawberry jam on one side.

"Dong, I went to the China Week yesterday, and of course our neighbors were there too." The landlord watched with interest as Dong Qiangqiang drank milk while blowing carefully on the surface of the milk.

"I saw you and her." Dong Qiangqiang had a milk mustache on his upper lip.

"Do you know which activity impressed me the most yesterday?"

Dong Qiangqiang was thinking of "speech" but was too embarrassed to say it. He felt that he would be disgusting if he said it, so he smiled and said, "I can't guess. Is it lion dance? Or a photo exhibition?"

"Neither, it's Wanfu... Am I pronouncing it correctly? It's Wanfu's snacks, fried spring rolls, sugar-fried cakes, and pancakes." The landlord struggled to recall the Chinese names of the food, "Did you eat these yesterday?"

"There are too many people. I don't have time to queue."

"So you can do all of them? I mean, every single one of them."

"Not at the moment," Dong Qiangqiang said honestly, "but if we can buy the raw materials, I think it shouldn't be difficult to make it."

"If you can make any of the ones that Wanfu sold yesterday, I will consider allowing you to cook Chinese food one day a week."

Dong Qiangqiang smiled but said nothing. When he was studying in the preparatory course, he had time to go to the vegetable market, and when he got home he had time to wash vegetables, pick vegetables, cook and wash dishes. But since he came here, he really has no time. If he puts a little thought into cooking, it will definitely take at least an hour, and one hour is considered too little.

Seeing that Dong Qiangqiang was just smiling but not talking, the landlord continued, "You prepared a lot of pictures this time. Some of them shocked me, and some reminded me of the places I visited and the scenes I saw when I traveled to China last time. The exhibition was very well organized." When talking about the activities of China Week, the landlord opened up immediately, "I want to take time to go to China again, but I haven't decided yet. What about you? Will you go back during the summer vacation?"

"I have to prepare for exams (during the summer vacation), so I probably won't go back. Besides, I just came back not long ago."

"So is there any city you can recommend?"

"There are many beautiful, historic and charming cities in China. I can recommend many of them. But it depends on what you prefer, history, culture, scenery or food?"

"Then I'll tell you after I've thought about it," the landlord said, his tone suddenly changing. "Yesterday, one of your friends told me at the China Week event that he also wanted to move in, but I rejected him outright. I told him that he's not a local student and I don't like tenants who are too mobile. Also, although I don't hate Chinese people, I don't want to have only Chinese tenants."

If Lei Lanting hadn't called him first to talk it over, Dong Qiangqiang would have been surprised, but now he just listened calmly, without showing any further expression on his face.

"I'm very worried about Bai's situation recently. I'm not only referring to his daytime drinking, but also his nighttime noise. If I hadn't felt so uncomfortable last night, I would have gone up to tell him. Do you know? In the end, I took a lot of pills before I fell asleep. I'm old and shouldn't have to suffer all this, so I decided to let him move out half a month in advance, and I will refund him the extra rent. I'm telling you this now because you introduced Bai, so you should say these things to him." The landlord complained a lot like a machine gun, and then quickly announced his decision, without giving Dong Qiangqiang any chance to defend himself. Although he knew that the landlord must have thought carefully before making this decision, Dong Qiangqiang still symbolically advised: "Ms. Yulia, I will find time to communicate with Lao Bai today. Please give him another chance to correct his mistakes. I promise he won't do it again..."

"Dong, I'm confused. How can you guarantee it for him?"

Dong Qiangqiang was stumped by the question. He really couldn't promise anything for Lao Bai, especially Lao Bai, who was prone to drinking and had become very unstable. He had reminded Lao Bai to be self-disciplined, but he didn't know how to restrain himself and became even worse. Now the old lady was determined and there was no room for buffer in her words and deeds. He could only say that he had it all his own way.

Seeing Dong Qiangqiang silent, the landlord knew he couldn't answer, so he tactfully changed the topic back to China Week: "As a foreigner, your speech yesterday was very good, and your German has improved a lot since you first moved in."

"Thank you for the compliment." Dong Qiangqiang admitted somewhat embarrassedly, "I was very nervous yesterday, and I made many mistakes in the middle."

"In front of so many people, even Germans will make mistakes. It's okay. You will get better and better with more practice."

"I have to thank you for talking to me and reading newspapers with me every day, which has greatly improved my spoken English."

"You seemed to be sweating a lot. Was it hot on stage?"

"My suit is soaked. It rained all day yesterday and I couldn't hang the clothes out to dry. They haven't dried yet." Dong Qiangqiang thought to himself: I'll have to put a simple dryer in the house in case of emergency.

"My son has a few suits still in the closet. I'll find them for you later. You two have similar builds, and you're thinner than him, so you should be able to wear them." The landlord suggested kindly.

"No, no, those are your son's things. He will need them when he comes back. I have some suits here. They will definitely be enough." Dong Qiangqiang didn't want to take the old man's things for free, so he quickly declined.

The light on the old man's face dimmed instantly, and after a while he asked quietly: "It's still raining today, will you continue your activities?"

"Rain or shine, after dinner I'll set out to put up the awning, oh, the rain awning."

"I'm going to the hospital for a follow-up check this morning, and then I'll go to China for the week."

"Looking forward to seeing you. Do you need me to take you to the hospital?"

"I can drive myself, no problem," the landlord stood up and reminded, "Remember to call me anytime if you need a suit."

When Dong Qiangqiang stepped into a corner of the Economics Department hall, he saw from afar several other members of the preparatory group standing in front, behind, and around the same display board. In addition to familiar faces, he also saw several German faces surrounding the crowd, whispering and gesturing about something.

Taking into account that all the exhibition boards of the two themes mainly contained photos and texts, the preparatory group decided not to remove the two theme exhibition boards due to the end of the first day of activities, but to keep them in the hall as fixed exhibition content during the China Week. However, they did not expect that the exhibition boards would be hacked in just one night.

Dong Qiangqiang didn't dare to delay and walked quickly towards the display board area. (End of this chapter)