Literary Master 1978.

Chapter 87: Picking up foreign spoils ( monthly ticket update, sent in advance)
In early July, Lin Chaoyang received the manuscript fee slip from October in the mail. In the evening, he gave the money to Tao Yushu, a total of 45 yuan.

"I want to buy a set of stationery for Yumo."

My sister-in-law is about to take the college entrance examination. If you want to do your job well, you must first sharpen your tools. Lin Chaoyang agreed without hesitation, "Of course."

The next day, Tao Yushu bought a complete set of stationery, including a Hero brand iridium fountain pen, Ostrich brand ink, a Huaxing brand triangle ruler, a ruler, and a semicircle...

This set of stationery is much more comprehensive than what Tao Yumo usually uses, and most importantly, they are all branded. A Hero brand iridium fountain pen alone cost three dollars and fifty cents. The price of this set of stationery is almost as much as Tao Yumo's two months' pocket money.

She was so happy that she jumped up and threw herself on her sister, "Sister! You are really my good sister~"

"Don't try that on me!" Tao Yushu pushed his enthusiastic sister away. "This is for your college entrance exam. Don't fail it."

"What a bummer!"

Tao Yumo muttered as she left her sister's arms and turned to look at her eldest brother, Tao Yucheng. "Brother, the college entrance examination is coming soon. Don't you have anything to give me?"

"Have you forgotten that I helped you with your composition for a month?"

Tao Yumo suddenly remembered the fear of being dominated by his elder brother's repetitive words and was speechless.

Two days later, the annual college entrance examination was held as scheduled.

At that time, it was not important for the whole family to send someone to take the exam. Only Tao Yucheng, who had nothing to do, rode his bicycle to accompany his sister to the college entrance examination.

But early in the morning, the whole family still stood very solemnly at the door of the unit and watched the two leave.

"I don't know how Yumo will do in the exam!" Tao Yushu said worriedly.

"Yumo's grades are so good, she must be good."

The three siblings of the Tao family inherited the good genes of their parents and their academic performance is not bad. The eldest brother-in-law was a college student in the 1960s. Tao Yushu was admitted to Yanshi University in the first year after the resumption of the college entrance examination. The younger sister-in-law's grades are usually among the top ten in the school.

Don't underestimate this top ten, she went to the High School Affiliated to Yanda University.

In the 1950s and 1960s, students of the Affiliated High School of Yenching University shouted the slogan "Yenzhong Affiliated University". The so-called affiliated universities were Shuimu and Yenching University. Other famous Yenching schools were not even worthy of the word "affiliated".

After watching Tao Yumo leave, everyone did what they were supposed to do.

After working for a whole morning, Lin Chaoyang came out of the library and was about to go to the cafeteria for lunch when he saw a brown-haired foreign girl carrying a makeshift package wrapped in a bed sheet, which seemed to contain a lot of things.

She ran to the willow tree by the Weiming Lake, where the sun couldn't reach, then opened the bed sheet, revealing a pile of miscellaneous things inside, and sat down by the lake without saying a word.

Lin Chaoyang looked curious, came closer and asked, "Classmate, what are you doing?"

The brown-haired girl glanced at Lin Chaoyang and said, "Sell!"

Lin Chaoyang could tell her Chinese was very average, so he switched to English and asked, "You want to sell these things?"

Seeing that he spoke fluent English, the brown-haired girl became interested in communicating with him and started talking to Lin Chaoyang.

It turned out that the brown-haired girl was Aneta Bones, a Canadian student who was about to graduate and leave China, so she was thinking of selling some things that she couldn't take with her.

After understanding the situation, Lin Chaoyang looked at Aneta's simple stall with interest. English books, stationery, small electric stove...

Most of the things Aneta displayed were daily necessities. Although most of them were written in English, these things could also be bought in China and were nothing special.

Until Lin Chaoyang saw a "brick", his eyes stopped.

"how much is this?"

"Twenty dollars!"

Lin Chaoyang shook his head. "It's too expensive. Twenty yuan is equivalent to half a month's or even a month's salary for people here."

Aneta explained: "You don't have this in your country. I bought it from Hong Kong."

"I've heard that this thing only costs a few dollars in Hong Kong. I'll make it cheaper, five dollars."

Lin Chaoyang attacked the boy's ankle as soon as he made the move, betting that the foreigner in front of him didn't understand the market situation.

Aneta knew that this thing was rare in the country and did not want to lower the price.

"The price you offered is too low. I don't want to sell it." Aneta said very directly.

At this time, some people also began to be interested in Aneta's stall, so Lin Chaoyang said, "How about ten dollars?"

Hearing the price, Aneta hesitated, "Eighteen dollars."

"Twelve dollars, that's it. You might buy a new one in Hong Kong for that price."

Aneta couldn’t help but retort: ​​“And then there are tariffs!”

"But this is second-hand. So, I'll give you one more dollar, thirteen dollars, no more."

Lin Chaoyang knew that his offer was very close to Aneta's psychological price, so he didn't wait for her to say anything and directly reached into his pocket to pay.

Seeing this, Aneta stopped hesitating. The two of them exchanged money and the goods, and Lin Chaoyang successfully got the "brick".

Lin Chaoyang wanted to check the battery and the recording function, and saw that there were still several tapes on Aneta's stall, two of which were Teresa Teng's songs.

Aneta said that these were for her to use to learn Chinese, so Lin Chaoyang spent one dollar to buy all the tapes.

After confirming that everything was fine, I said hello to Aneta.

"Goodbye, Aneta, I hope everything goes well with your return home!"

“Thank you, Chinese friends!”

Back in the library, Lin Chaoyang hid in the book stack and fiddled with the "foreign books" he bought for thirteen yuan.

This is a brick-sized Sharp player and recorder. Aneta said she bought it in Hong Kong. It doesn't look expensive, so it must be a smuggled product.

Although it is a parallel import product, it is of good quality and has good sound quality.

Lin Chaoyang was fiddling with the recorder when Du Rong ran up from downstairs and said, "I said there was some noise on the second floor."

She ran over excitedly, listening to the "soft music" coming from the recorder, her face full of intoxication.

"This small town has many stories, full of joy and happiness..."

After being lost in thought for a while, Du Rong finally came to her senses and asked, "Where did you get this thing? Such a small recorder?"

"There was an international student who was going back to his country. He went to the lakeside to set up a stall to sell his goods, and I happened to run into him."

"how much is it?"

"Thirteen dollars."

"so cheap?"

Du Rong's face was filled with surprise. These days, the starting price of a tape recorder in a department store is over a hundred yuan.

The thing in Lin Chaoyang’s hand is not even as big as a book. It’s probably not sold in China, but he only spent thirteen yuan on it?
"You finally picked up a bargain today." Du Rong said enviously.

"If I can buy a new one, I really don't want to pick up this foreign stray thing. It's not available now!" Lin Chaoyang was not being ungrateful, but he felt that he should buy a brand new one for his wife.

But who can blame the current social conditions for not allowing it? But it doesn't matter this way. He can buy a second-hand one and he doesn't even have to find a reason to pay for it.

Du Rong nodded. To go to a department store, you need money and a ticket. Although this item is second-hand, it is cheap and does not require a ticket!

"Just be content! I don't think it's any different from a new one."

"Well, I guess it's not very useful."

Considering Aneta's level of Chinese, the damage to the recorder was reasonable.

"You really got a great bargain."

Du Rong said one more thing, wishing she could have such a good thing happen to her.

Lin Chaoyang smiled and didn't answer.

Du Rong didn't say anything else. She focused her attention on the recorder, as if she was completely obsessed with it.

After the song was over, she came back to her senses with a bit of melancholy, "It's so beautiful!"

Du Rong was usually cheerful, and Lin Chaoyang rarely saw her sentimental side. He smiled and said, "It's just a song. How good can it be?"

"You don't understand at all."

Lin Chaoyang really couldn't empathize with him. After all, his ears had been exposed to so much fancy music in later generations.

Du Rong and her friends have been listening to and singing revolutionary songs and model operas since they were young, so when they hear this kind of song suddenly, the feeling may be much stronger.

After saying a few words, Lin Chaoyang glanced at his watch. Before he could say anything, Du Rong screamed "Ouch" and quickly ran downstairs. He couldn't help laughing.

After slacking off for more than ten minutes, I guess there are a lot of book request cards piled up downstairs.

After work, Lin Chaoyang walked home humming a little tune. Coincidentally, his brother-in-law and sister-in-law had just returned from the examination room.

"Brother! Yu Mo!"

After saying hello, Lin Chaoyang did not ask about the exam. When they returned home, the Tao family also tacitly did not mention this matter, but Tao Yumo took the initiative to mention today's exam.

The Chinese language test was held from 8:00 to 10:30 in the morning, and Tao Yumo had no idea about the final composition.

She repeated the topic and the content of her composition to Lin Chaoyang, wanting to hear the opinion of her brother-in-law, a great writer.

"I have been tutoring you on your composition for a month, there will definitely be no problem." Brother-in-law Tao Yucheng said.

Tao Yumo was impatient, "Brother, don't interrupt!"

The eldest brother-in-law retreated with a look of shock on his face, and complained to his wife Zhao Li: "This girl is now superstitious about authority."

"You also said that Chaoyang is the authority."

Tao Yucheng opened his mouth but remained speechless.

The topic of Yenching's composition this year is: Read the following article "The Second Exam" carefully and rewrite it into a narrative essay "The Story of Chen Yiling".

The most important thing for writing in the Chinese language exam is to stick to the topic, followed by the structure of the article and the choice of words and sentences. Lin Chaoyang listened to Tao Yumo's general retelling of her composition and said thoughtfully, "I think it's well written. If I were to grade the paper, I would definitely give it an 'excellent'."

At this time, even if the sister-in-law wrote a piece of shit, Lin Chaoyang would have to say it was "excellent" because there was an exam tomorrow.

After dealing with his sister-in-law, Lin Chaoyang returned to the room and pulled Tao Yushu into the house. He carefully took out the Sharp tape recorder from his clothes.

"Thump, thump, thump!" He held the thing in front of Tao Yushu as if he were presenting a treasure.

"This is..." Tao Yushu looked hesitant and didn't dare to recognize it for a moment.

"A tape recorder for you to use in learning English."

Tao Yushu showed a look of surprise, "Is it really a recorder? So small? Where did you get it from?"

"This one is portable, so of course it has to be smaller."

Lin Chaoyang was very happy when he saw Tao Yushu playing with the tape recorder in his hands and couldn't let it go.

After a long while, Tao Yushu finally came out of his joy and asked again, "You haven't told me yet, where did you get it from? It's very expensive, right? Where did you get the money?"

The excited tone showed the hostess's good mood. Lin Chaoyang kept it a secret, "Guess!"

"How can I guess it? Forget it."

Lin Chaoyang immediately held her back and said, "Okay, I'll tell you what I'm saying."

"You know there are international students in Shaoyuan, right?"

"nonsense!"

Tao Yushu rolled her eyes at him. She had lived in Yanyuan since she was a child, how could she not know such a thing?

"I was going to the cafeteria to eat lunch today, and I happened to see a foreign student..."

Lin Chaoyang recounted his experience of buying a recorder and asked Tao Yushu, "Is this what all international students do when they graduate?"

"No. Some people give them directly to their roommates. Very few people sell them second-hand. But even if they are given as gifts, many people dare not accept them, let alone trade them."

"why?"

"They're afraid of getting into trouble. Anything involving international students is a big deal, and no one wants to get into trouble."

Lin Chaoyang shook his head speechlessly.

"Then this tape recorder."

Tao Yushu smiled and said, "It's okay. Everyone is just worried about the possible troubles, but there won't be any troubles."

She stroked the recorder with her hand. "With this thing, learning English is much more convenient."

Lin Chaoyang smiled with relief, "Then you should give it a try."

Tao Yushu shook his head and said, "Don't try it. Let's put it aside for two days. Yumo is taking the college entrance examination these two days. Don't distract her."

Listening to her words, Lin Chaoyang held her hand and flattered her, "My wife is so thoughtful!"

Then he leaned close to Tao Yushu's ear and said, "I want to study hard at night, too!"

Tao Yushu rolled her eyes at him charmingly, "That will have to wait until Yumo finishes the college entrance exam."

"Ah! My sister-in-law is taking the college entrance examination, why is she giving my brother-in-law a hard time!"

Tao Yushu patted his chest lightly, "Don't talk nonsense!"

(End of this chapter)