Exciting 1979!

Chapter 255 made Sister Xue cry.
Last night, after taking Sister Xue home, Wei Ming and she gave each other a careful kiss outside the alley.

But it was only a small bite, and there were still some people passing by.

Wei Ming didn't wander around during the day. He spread out his manuscript paper, picked up his pen, and prepared to get down to business. When he felt it was about time in the afternoon, he finally set off.

The two had arranged their dinner location last night: Deda Western Restaurant on Sichuan Middle Road, a nearly century-old establishment.

Wei Ming mentioned this restaurant when writing about Jiang Limin's undercover work in Shanghai, but this is his first time visiting it. If there are any inaccuracies, they can be corrected during the revision process.

He arrived first and immediately pulled the shop assistant aside to ask about the shop's history. He then learned that during the timeline of the story "The Road to Awakening," the shop should have been located on Tanggu Road. Wei Ming quickly wrote it down and would correct it later.

Just then, Sister Xue arrived, and the shop assistants' eyes lit up.

It was already November, and winter had begun, but Gong Xue wasn't dressed in bulky clothes. She looked petite and graceful, prioritizing style over warmth. Coupled with her face, which gained fame through the magazine "Popular Cinema," it was hard not to attract attention.

Wei Ming quickly pulled her inside and upstairs to the second floor. She was beautiful, but he felt sorry for her: "Aren't you cold?"

Gong Xue took off the needle cap from her head: "It's not cold, I have thermal underwear inside."

Wei Ming was skeptical and planned to check it out himself when he returned to the guesthouse later.

"What exactly did Ah Long give as a gift?" Wei Ming asked after they sat down.

Gong Xue chuckled and said, "It's a wooden sculpture with Aying's portrait on it. She treasures it and even sleeps with it."

It seems that things are basically going to work out between the two of them, and Wei Ming is genuinely happy.

After ordering the food, Wei Ming asked, "Aren't you concerned about what gift I'm planning to give you?"

Gong Xue: "Gifts are not important, I'm just happy that you came."

Long-distance relationships are really tough, but now it's better. At least they can spend about a month together, and I don't have many scenes to film, so I can also take some time to spend with him.

Wei Ming deliberately didn't mention his birthday, thinking he would catch her off guard tomorrow. It would be even better if she didn't prepare a gift, then he could make any demands he wanted.

However, he prepared a gift for Gong Xue and invited her to accompany him to the guesthouse to pick it up after the meal.

Gong Xue hesitated for a moment, and although he knew that Xiao Wei had ulterior motives, he still nodded.

~
At the same time, it was also a Western restaurant.

Inside a McDonald's on Paterson Street in Causeway Bay, Vivian Chow and several of her close female classmates celebrated her 13th birthday.

This is the first McDonald's in Hong Kong, which opened in 75 and was very successful. Of course, the prices were not cheap.

In the past, Vivian Chow would never have been willing to treat her classmates to a meal in a place like this, but things are different now, and she still has plenty of pocket money.

Amin is currently a chuunibyou (middle school syndrome) girl, a second-year middle school student.

When she was in the first year of junior high school, she didn't actually have that many friends, after all, her family was poor and she was somewhat insecure.

But now she is the most popular girl in the class, bar none.

Several girls were proud to be invited by her to celebrate her birthday, while a large number of male classmates were heartbroken for not being invited and came up with all sorts of clever ideas.

Through sports such as basketball, Amin finally lost the baby fat on her face, and her face became more and more beautiful and delicate. Her height has long exceeded 1.6 meters, and her legs are well-proportioned and long, and they are still growing.

In addition, she is a key member of the school choir, can play the piano, and is good at drawing. Apart from her less-than-stellar academic performance, she is practically perfect.

The amazing thing is that she even knows the famous singer Alan Tam and got autographed photos for several classmates.

Amin believes that all of this was prompted by her excellent pen pal, Amin, which led to the changes she made.

She brought her camera from home today and wants the waiter to take a group photo of them later. She wants to send it to Amin so he can guess which one is her.

Although I've never met his British ex-girlfriend, I'm sure I'm not bad myself.

Just then, a female classmate named Xiang asked her, "Amin, why are you only eating so little? Is it not tasty?"

"No, Mom will be celebrating my birthday too, so I need to save some room," Amin said, holding the fries. She genuinely thought they were delicious and planned to pack some for her mom and Uncle Gui later.

Ah Xiang added, "Ah Jie from my class asked me to deliver a letter to you. Here you go."

Amin roughly guessed what kind of letter it was, and she pushed it back: "What the hell? Give it back to him, I don't want to date right now."

Ah Xiang was Ah Jie's simp, and for this man, she insisted, "But Ah Jie said he just wanted to be your pen pal, that he didn't mean anything else."

Amin smiled: "I already have a pen pal, I don't need any other pen pals. Axiang, if you insist, then I can only assume that Ajie is more important to you than me."

Upon hearing this, all the other female classmates looked at Ah Xiang.

Ah Xiang thought to herself, "Of course Ah Jie is more important to me than you, but if I say that, I can forget about getting along with the girls in the class." So she could only awkwardly put the letter away.

Because of this little incident, Amin was disheartened and didn't even take a group photo. Instead, she packed some McDonald's hamburgers to take back and share with her mother and Uncle Gui.

As for their suggestion to take a night tour of Causeway Bay, Ah Min decisively refused, having heard that there were many gangsters in Causeway Bay.

When she got home, the lights were off and her mother hadn't returned yet. Holiland's business had been booming since its expansion, and her mother was always busy until very late. Amin even wondered if her mother had forgotten her birthday.

Amin went back to her room and opened a drawer. Inside was a Rubik's Cube, along with Amin's solution to the Rubik's Cube, which he had written down for her. He had even drawn a diagram, showing his great care.

She was indeed able to solve the Rubik's Cube relatively easily using this method. I heard that it was developed by her younger sister, Ah Hong. She's a really smart girl.

I reckon the Rubik's Cube I mailed should have arrived by now, but I don't know when I'll receive his reply.

Just then, the lights went out.

"Oh? Is there a power outage?" Amin sighed. This kind of thing is very common in public housing. If there is a power outage, it will definitely start with them first.

Just as Amin was about to go out to find candles, she suddenly saw her mother appear with a birthday cake, on which 13 thin candles were lit.

Behind Mom were Uncle Gui and Uncle Bin.

Amin was both amused and exasperated, never expecting her mother to play such a little surprise on her.

"Amin, hurry up and blow out the candles and make a wish," Uncle Ghost reminded the touching little girl.

Amin walked up to the birthday cake, put her hands together, and blew out the candles all at once, signifying that her wish would definitely come true.

"What did Amin wish for?" Mom asked.

Amin shook her head: "It won't work if I say it out loud."

Uncle Gui chuckled and said, "He definitely hopes that Mom will be healthy so that Lailai can make a fortune."

Zhou Huimin was a little embarrassed, as she actually hoped to see Amin in the coming year.

She quickly changed the subject by saying she was cutting the cake: "Oh, by the way, I also bought some hamburgers from McDonald's for you guys. I don't know if you like them."

"It's just a foreigner's roujiamo (Chinese hamburger)," Uncle Gui said dismissively, as their shop also served roujiamo.

However, after actually eating it, Uncle Gui said, "It seems to be actually quite good."

Then Zhou's mother and Liu Bin also ate one. Although it wasn't very hot anymore, it was still okay to eat. It had meat, vegetables, sugar, and noodles. One was enough to fill them up. It was indeed a good choice for fast-paced Hong Kong people.

Old Ghost said, "This is called McDonald's, right?" Vivian Chow replied, "Yes."

"How's business?" Old Ghost asked.

"That's great. When we went there, the place was almost full, mostly with young people and kids. The kids even got toys."

Old Ghost then asked, "And the price?"

Zhou Huimin recalled for a moment and told him, and Gui Bo and Liu Bin immediately exchanged a glance, realizing that the profits involved were considerable!
After leaving the Zhou family, Lao Gui instructed Liu Bin to find out the truth about this McDonald's the next day.

~
"come in."

After coaxing Gong Xue into the guesthouse, Wei Ming impatiently closed the door.

Gong Xue had stated beforehand: "I'm only going to sit for a short while before leaving; the waiter recognized me."

Wei Ming sat up on the bed: "Of course."

Gong Xue paced back and forth somewhat awkwardly, then asked Wei Ming, "Where's the gift you mentioned?"

Wei Ming pointed to the table.

Gong Xue saw a stack of letters: "What's this?"

Wei Ming: "I'm preparing to write a script, and you're the female lead."

"I?"

"The female lead's character is modeled after you—gentle yet resilient, making her exceptionally endearing. No matter which studio or director is casting, the female lead can only be you." Wei Ming stood up, gently placing his hands on Gong Xue's shoulders. His determination was unwavering.

Gong Xue glanced at Xiao Wei gratefully. Her good younger brother spoiled her too much; she was practically becoming his personal leading lady.

"Can I take a look?" She stared at the words "Mom, love me again" on the cover. This time, the protagonist seemed to be a mother again, and it seemed to be very touching.

Wei Ming: "It hasn't been officially written yet. It's all just character design and outline, so you can't really tell anything yet. Let me tell you about the background of this story."

"Mmm." Gong Xue nodded obediently; she liked hearing that.

Wei Ming suddenly picked up Xue Jie in his arms and said, "It's getting cold, let's talk under the covers."

He wanted to check out his thermal underwear while he was at it.

Gong Xue's face turned red to the roots of her ears: "Speak properly, don't touch me like that."

"Don't worry, I'll touch you in a regular way." Wei Ming put the person on the bed, covered them with the blanket, and then began to talk.

"The story begins with me helping my family find my aunt. This summer, I..."

Wei Ming began by recounting a letter from Teacher Song Lian, which then led to the introduction of a pitiful, mentally ill woman named Hehua. During the narration, Wei Ming added many details, all of which he had prepared for the new script, making it very persuasive.

Soon Xuejie started crying, and Wei Ming quickly stopped what he was doing.

"I'm sorry, sister. Did I go too far?"

Gong Xue gently patted his arm, her eyes brimming with tears: "Yes, the story is so touching. This mother is so pitiful. Is she going to lose her child forever?"

Seeing that Gong Xue wasn't crying because of his rudeness, Wei Ming breathed a sigh of relief and continued to do whatever he wanted with his hand.

"In reality, that's where it ends, but in my script, I certainly don't want the ending to be so tragic. I hope to give the audience a bright future."

Gong Xue strongly agreed: "Yes, reality is already tough enough, so there's no need to make it so cruel in movies."

Wei Ming thought to himself: Not cruel? Impossible!
As the biggest tearjerker of the 80s, this movie brought hundreds of millions of Chinese viewers to tears. Now, with the script written by Wei Ming, he can only do a better job than the original.

The original version's tear-jerking scenes were somewhat rough, so I wanted to make them more delicate and reasonable while maintaining the tear-jerking effect, so that the movie would still have an audience decades later and could still make people cry.

Unlike the Taiwanese version, which loses its appeal after a few years and has little to offer besides the song "Only Mother is Good in the World".

"Sister Xue, shall I sing you another song?"

Gong Xue pressed down on the increasingly unrestrained hand under the blanket: "I... I want to go back. How about tomorrow? I don't have any scenes to film tomorrow, so I'll stay with you all day."

Wei Ming: "Go back, back to the Shanghai Film Studio or home?"

"Let's go back to the Shanghai Film Studio." Gong Xue thought for a moment, it would be more convenient to take a shower there, and she needed to change her underwear.

Wei Ming said "okay", but then asked, "Do you want me to go back with you, or do you want to go back by yourself?"

"I can go back by myself."

Wei Ming: "I'm not entirely at ease with you. Let me take you home."

"Alright."

"So, do you want to walk back, take the bus, or take a taxi?" Wei Ming asked slowly.

Gong Xue finally understood. He was stalling for time. The rascal was trying to make himself too weak to go back so he could succeed.

Gong Xue mustered her strength, forced herself to throw off the covers, and got out of bed, struggling to straighten her clothes.

"Let's take a taxi," she said, her eyes brimming with tears.

Wei Ming liked her just the way she was, and he wanted to tease her, but he couldn't bear to.

However, he also understood that this was, after all, a guesthouse, not her own home, and doing such a thing in a guesthouse was rather unconventional for a woman of this era.

I still need to have a home in Shanghai. Tomorrow, I'll go look at apartments.

~
the next day.

Holiland's top-educated and chief strategist, Liu Bin, had been busy investigating McDonald's and soon informed Gui Bo.

"McDonald's is the number one fast food brand in the United States and the world, with more than 6,000 stores worldwide. I saw in the newspaper that McDonald's recently opened another branch in Hong Kong, which is exactly its 1000th overseas branch. The company's annual global turnover is in the billions of dollars!"

Upon hearing these figures, Lao Wei, who was eager to buy property in Hong Kong, exclaimed excitedly, "I knew it! This thing may look simple, but it's perfect for white-collar workers in big cities. It's very promising!"

Liu Bin nodded: "I also found out that KFC, the world's second-largest fast food brand, once entered Hong Kong, but withdrew after two years, apparently because the taste was not well accepted."

What does KFC do? Does it sell chicken?

"Yes, we mainly sell fried chicken, but we also sell hamburgers," Liu Bin said.

Old Gui thought for a moment and said, "Bin, you're a college student. If you apply for a job at McDonald's, do you think they'll hire you?"

Liu Bin perked up: "Uncle Gui, are you asking me to go undercover?"

Old Gui couldn't help but reminisce about the old days: Back then they were called special operations forces, and they infiltrated the Japanese and the Nationalist army. Who would have thought that things would change so much, and now they're even thinking of infiltrating a fast food restaurant? They've let General Chen down.

~
November 10th is Vivian Chow's birthday, and November 11th is Wei Ming's birthday. I wonder if Sister Xue knows this.

She arrived at the guesthouse early in the morning to find him, but Wei Ming was still in bed.

Hearing that it was Sister Xue knocking at the door, Wei Ming simply went to open it wearing only his underwear.
(End of this chapter)