Age: My Small World

Chapter 18 School starts

The day of school starting is coming soon.

On the morning of August 15th, before dawn, my mother pulled Yang Jun out of bed.

"Xiaoshan, Mom made you some pancakes. Eat them at noon. I'll make you some noodles when I get home in the evening."

While Yang Jun was washing up, Li Xiaohua was busy making pancakes while talking.

The eldest and second sisters also got up. Although the food at home had been harvested, there was still a lot of things to do. Even if they could just find some wild vegetables, that would be great. The cabbages planted at the door had to be made into sauerkraut. They didn't dare to eat them on weekdays, otherwise they were afraid that they would have nothing to eat in winter.

Although he knew that they would eat from the same pot in the future, Yang Jun did not stop his mother from doing so. After all, at the end of the year, each family would probably have to cook their own meals secretly, and it would be difficult to survive without ordering dishes.

"Mom, don't make noodles anymore. Leave the wheat here and go exchange it for something else."

Apart from eating noodles once, my mother has harvested the wheat these days in preparation for paying the public grain tax.

I estimate it will be in the next few days, and then I will have to ask for leave to go home and help. The distance from here to the county grain station is not close, and many families have to push large and small bags on carts.

To reach some remote places, one even has to trek for more than ten kilometers. However, amidst the hardships, one carries the hope of life. Hard struggle is the spiritual mark of this era.

The family has a total of two and a half acres of land, one acre of which is planted with corn, five acres is planted with wheat, and the remaining one acre is planted with sweet potatoes.

The sweet potatoes cannot be harvested until around October, so we have harvested corn and wheat now, and a total of 260 kilograms of grain has been obtained.

Two hundred kilograms of it is corn and sixty kilograms is wheat.

Since there is not much research on crops now and really good seeds have not been bred, this yield is already very good. Sometimes the wheat yield is only 30 to 40 kilograms.

Of this grain, 25% had to be paid as public grain, 15% was purchased by the state, and 60% was left for themselves.

After removing the part left for seeds, the remaining food was actually not enough to eat. Fortunately, there were sweet potatoes. It was no problem to produce several hundred kilograms per acre of land. Combined with cornmeal, this was what we ate for the whole year.

Of course, for a family of four, with 30 kilograms of food per person, this is only enough to feed two people, so cornmeal is usually used to cook corn porridge, which is combined with some wild vegetables, and is barely enough for four people.

Since corn takes longer to store, the first stock to be eaten up every year is sweet potatoes, followed by corn porridge.

From the end of the year to spring and summer, sweet potatoes are almost always eaten as meals.

Even though Yang Jun's family has been eating corn porridge every day recently, that's because the sweet potatoes have not been harvested yet, otherwise they would be eating sweet potato porridge every day.

So, in general, food is precious, and wheat is even more expensive. Every year, my mother sells all of it to the grain station, and the income she earns is not much, so it is difficult to have a meal of noodles.

"What's the big deal? I finally harvested the wheat, and now you're not happy about eating noodles."

Li Xiaohua naturally knew what her son meant, but her love for her child made her hold back her heartache. Wasn't it for the child that she went through so much trouble? She hadn't been able to eat anything good all year, so these few days were like an early New Year's celebration for her family.

"Hey, I was thinking you could go to the grain station to exchange some money and buy yourself some cloth to make some clothes or something."

"Why make clothes? You might as well use that spare money to make some food." said the mother.

Li Xiaohua's clothes had many traces of mending and were covered with patches. She hadn't worn new clothes for a long time.

As for Yang Jun, the clothes he was wearing were made of new cloth that my mother bought for him last year.

It's not a good material, but it's clean and tidy.

I usually don’t want to wear it, I only wear it when I go to school.

I also changed my straw sandals into black cloth shoes with thousand-layer soles. My mother knitted them for me and put a lot of thought into them.

Among the four people in the family, he was the only one who had new clothes to wear. The clothes of his elder and second sisters were altered from the clothes left by their father, and they were almost the same as those of Cheng Xiaoyu's family.

Some of his clothes were too small for him, so his mother gave them to his two sisters to wear, and they actually fit them.

Yang Jun saw all of this and naturally felt bad. The reason his family was in debt was because he devoted himself to studying.

Not to mention clothes and shoes, just the books, pens, notebooks needed for class, and dry food to eat at school all cost money.

A few tortillas might not seem like much, but they're enough to feed three people in a family.

Over the years, Yang Jun alone consumed more resources than the three members of his family.

"Forget it, I'll buy you new clothes later, okay?"

Yang Jun said as he finished the last mouthful of corn porridge.

"Okay, let's go after we finish eating. Today is your first day of school, so you need to be early so you don't get late. It will give the teacher a bad impression."

Since the junior high school he attended was also in the county town, Li Xiaohua was not worried about him going there alone.

"Mom, I'm leaving now."

Yang Jun carried a cloth bag, which contained the pens and notebooks he needed. As for the books, he had to go to school to get them.

"Baby, why are you in such a hurry? Bring the money with you."

My mother stopped him, then took something wrapped in layers of cloth from the side. When she peeled off the layers of protection, she found that there was not much money in the house.

After taking out a Great Unity note, Li Xiaohua thought for a moment, then took out a 50-cent note from a hydropower station and handed it over together.

"Here are the tuition and book fees you told me about. There's also fifty cents for you to keep with you, in case you need it."

The tuition fee is four dollars, and the book fee is one dollar, a total of five dollars.

But these five dollars are already a quarter of what I have. In addition to paying back the money to the village on time, I also have to use the remaining money in case Yang Jun suddenly needs it.

Yang Jun did not refuse and took it calmly. He really had no money on him.

"Go ahead, baby."

Li Xiaohua waved to him, leaned against the door and watched Yang Jun walk away with a smile on her face.

……

Yang Jun did not go into the city alone, but asked Cheng Xiaoyu to go with him.

When I arrived at her door, the little girl was waiting nervously, stamping her feet.

"Brother Xiaoshan!" When she saw Yang Jun coming over, her eyes suddenly became brighter.

"Why are you waiting here?" With the arrival of autumn, the weather is no longer hot, and it is even a little chilly in the morning.

Cheng Xiaoyu's clothes were too thin, and he was worried that she would catch a cold at any time.

"It's okay, I just came out too."

"Okay, let's go then."

Yang Jun took the lead and headed towards the road leading into the city.

Since the distance to school is nearly five kilometers, we need to set off more than an hour in advance. Moreover, today we are going to report, pay fees and attend classes, so we have to leave almost two hours in advance.

Fortunately, they had spent the three years of junior high school like this, so they didn't have any difficulty adapting.

　New books for collection
　　
　
(End of this chapter)