The Red Era: Starting from a Truck Driver

Chapter 22 Yellow River Heavy Truck
Living in the city is really good, at least every household has lights on when it's not too late at night. It's not like in the countryside, where it's pitch black when you go out after dark.

After Jiang Cheng washed up, he lay down on the bed. The room was too simple, but it was his own home. It felt more comfortable than staying in a guesthouse. No place could compare to his own doghouse.

Jiang Cheng was lying comfortably, but Zhou Lingying was not having a good time in the female educated youth dormitory in his hometown.

At this time, Zhou Lingying was lying in bed tossing and turning. She had only been in contact with Jiang Cheng for a few days, and she was a little uncomfortable with Jiang Cheng leaving.

Zhou Lingying's mentality has changed, and it's all Jiang Cheng's fault. It's not that she wasn't tired when she worked in the educated youth team before, but she didn't feel tired when her mentality was good. If she was tired, she would just take a nap.

But now the pie that Jiang Cheng painted for her is too big and too tempting. Her partner is a driver in the city. She already has a partner and they will get married sooner or later.

The driver, the monthly salary is that much. The work points earned by these female educated youth are just enough for food and a few expenses, and one work point is only five or six cents on average.

Even the strong laborers in the local rural areas could not necessarily earn full work points every day. The female educated youth could only earn six or seven work points a day. After working very hard all day, they could only earn 30 or 40 cents. If they did not rest for a day in a month, they could only earn about 10 yuan.

Most of the female educated youth actually earned less than 10 yuan of work points a month on average, and their expenses were no match for the rural people. Fortunately, they lived alone and did not need to support a family, so they could barely get by.

But now Zhou Lingying's mentality jumped. She worked hard to earn 30 or 40 cents a day, while her boyfriend could earn at least 2 yuan a day. The most important thing was that Jiang Cheng promised her that after they got married, he would take her to the city and support her.

Zhou Lingying admitted that it was not right to have this mentality of relying on others, but just like what she said when she first came into contact with Jiang Cheng, if she didn't want some dependence, why would she agree to date Jiang Cheng on the first day?

After this change of mentality, Zhou Lingying felt a bit tortured to continue working in the educated youth team. So in the past two days, Zhou Lingying has been thinking about one question: she and Jiang Cheng were so shameless to hug each other. Just for this reason, who else could she marry if not Jiang Cheng?

It doesn't matter whether you marry early or late, so Zhou Lingying was thinking that when Jiang Cheng comes back next time, they will get married, and after that she can leave the educated youth team.

It's a new day again, and the yard where Jiang Cheng lives is bustling early in the morning.

The school-age children had not yet had their holidays, so they had to get up early to brush their teeth and wash their faces. The women had to get up early to cook and wash clothes. The elderly also sat in the yard early to enjoy the cool air. It was hot now, but it was cool outside in the morning.

After some time, you may not be able to sleep indoors at night and have to move a bamboo mat and make a mosquito net to sleep outside.

Everyone uses the water from the pool in the middle of the yard. Each household has a pool. The faucet is the kind that requires a key with a handle to turn on. The key is the switch of the faucet. If you pull out the key, no one can use your faucet.

Tap water now costs 1.4 cents per ton. In order to save water, many elderly people with no income go to nearby wells or rivers to wash their clothes.

"Morning, Master Jiang."

"Hello, good morning to you too."

As soon as Jiang Cheng went out, someone greeted him, but he had just moved into the yard, and even if he had met the neighbors before, he didn't know their last names. He could only respond when someone greeted him.

Holding a washbasin with a towel and toothbrush in it, Jiang Cheng took the key to his own faucet and went to the sink to wash up. Today he had to go to the bus station to start work, and Jiang Cheng was a little excited. Mainly because as a formal driver, he would usually be assigned a car to use.

This is how cars are used in many companies. They will not let you drive this car today and then switch to another car next time. Instead, each car corresponds to one driver, so there is no running-in period.

Cars these days do break down easily. A driver can drive one car and know all the minor problems with the car. If a car breaks down on the road, the cause can be found and solved quickly.

Today, Jiang Cheng will basically have his own car. He will have to take care of the maintenance of the car and basically treat it as his own car. After washing up, Jiang Cheng took a kettle and a cup and went to the bus station to work. Being a driver is like this. You always bring a kettle when driving, and the cup is for drinking water at the station. Even when driving long distances, you have to prepare a bucket for water.

After walking for nearly 20 minutes to the bus station, I still had to report to the personnel department first. I had to follow the work arrangements made by the bus department. In addition, I had to come to work and distribute the new employee benefits to Jiang Cheng. Like many companies, he had to be given two sets of work clothes for changing.

In addition, drivers are given some different things from other units, such as raincoats, rain boots and wire gloves. This is because it is summer now, and in winter they also need to be given hats, warm white fur coats, leather pants and leather gloves.

"Master Jiang, you are here. Come with me to the stationmaster's office. We have a shipment today and I'm sorry to bother you."

"Chief Zhao, it's nothing to run a car. Didn't you say yesterday that I could get my work clothes and other things today? I haven't received them yet."

"Master Jiang, come with me to the stationmaster's office first. You will be there to get your work clothes later. Yesterday afternoon, Stationmaster Xu specifically told you to go to his place first. There is a shipment of goods from Macheng that needs to be delivered today."

Zhao Feng is the head of the personnel department of the bus station. When Jiang Cheng appeared in the personnel department, he was the first to greet him. Freight transportation has always been in a tight situation in various cities, and drivers are also one-size-fits-all. Jiang Cheng was able to come to Changcheng to be a driver, in fact, his military leaders made a lot of efforts.

Basically, the transportation orders of each transportation station can be queued for several days or even half a month. Except for some urgent orders, the station leaders will intervene to arrange them. Other transportation orders are said to be dispatched by the dispatcher, but the dispatcher and the driver are not in a superior-subordinate relationship. Generally, factories with their own transportation vehicles will follow the dispatcher's arrangements on how to distribute their own goods.

At the transportation department of the bus station, the dispatcher dared not tell the driver which goods to deliver first, and they all discussed it. Every time the driver was not out or just came back from a race, the dispatcher would give the driver some orders to choose from.

Only for some long-delayed transport orders that must be arranged will the dispatcher inform you that you must make a trip.

Therefore, a phenomenon often occurs at the transport station: people from several factories or units would squat at the transport station to curry favor with some drivers. In addition, some drivers like to run familiar routes, so people know clearly what routes the drivers run.

Jiang Cheng followed Section Chief Zhao to the stationmaster's office. After seeing Stationmaster Xu, Section Chief Zhao said, "Stationmaster, Master Jiang is here. Please tell me something. I will go to the logistics department to arrange work clothes for Master Jiang."

"Well, Lao Zhao, thank you for your help." Stationmaster Xu stood up and nodded, then took out a list from the desk drawer and continued to say to Jiang Cheng, "Master Jiang, this is an expedited list from our Changcheng Machinery Equipment Factory, sent to a factory in Macheng. In order not to affect the production of the factory over there, this list was delivered yesterday afternoon, and we have to go to the machinery factory to pick up the goods today. Other masters have already arranged the lists, so I'll have to trouble you to make a trip for this one."

"Stationmaster, this is my job. It's not a big deal." Jiang Cheng took the shipping order handed over by Stationmaster Xu and said, then took a look at the order. It was his first time to come into contact with this and he felt it was quite strange.

The order form has the name and address of the delivery company, as well as the contact number. The same is true for the recipient, but the content of the delivery item is filled in the middle, which is similar to the logistics order format of later generations.

After the goods arrive, the consignee must sign for acceptance, so the goods must be present. If any problems arise during delivery, the driver must report the situation in a timely manner, otherwise he will be held responsible.

Stationmaster Xu also knew that this was Jiang Cheng's first time delivering goods, so he took him out and explained some details. This walk meant taking him to see the car.

There was an extra truck at the station a few days ago. It was said that the leader of Jiang Cheng's army knew a director of the provincial government. Otherwise, there are only a few quotas for cars in the province every year. If the lower-level cities compete for them, they may not be allocated to Changcheng.

After Station Master Xu took Jiang Cheng to the parking lot of the transport station, he took out a few car door keys and gave them to Jiang Cheng, saying, "Master Jiang, this car is great, isn't it? I was under pressure and didn't give it to other drivers."

Jiang Cheng looked at the car in front of him. He never expected that it was a new Huanghe brand JN150 heavy truck. He thought that as a new driver, it was good enough for him to be given a Jiefang truck with few faults.

Jiefang trucks have a load capacity of four tons, while Yellow River trucks have a load capacity of eight tons. Another difference is the front structure of the two trucks. The engine of the Jiefang truck takes up a large part of the front, resulting in a small cab with only the driver and co-driver seats.

The cab of the Yellow River truck is directly in the front row, which is similar to the structure of the front of trucks in later generations. In addition to the cab, there is a row of seats in the back where people can sleep directly in the car.

(End of this chapter)