Back to my 1980s

Fortunately, the credit union wasn't too far away; like the brick factory, it was located on the edge of the town.

Logically speaking, credit unions, which are equivalent to banks in later generations, should at least be located on a street-facing location, if not in a bustling market, to make it convenient for villagers to deposit and withdraw money.

However, their township doesn't have one. Their township is located near the township government, so compared to the bustling market, this place is considered remote.

Zhao Hua went to the credit union to collect the money, then returned to the finance office and handed the receipt to the accountant. After verifying it, the accountant issued him a delivery order and then pointed to another room, saying to Zhao Hua, "Okay, take this slip over there to register, and someone will take you to collect the bricks."

Zhao Hua thanked him, clutched the delivery slip, and walked out of the finance office. Reaching the door, he held up the slip and examined it carefully, then sighed softly, "Moving bricks is really tough..."

He ran back to the small room the accountant had shown him earlier. This time, a middle-aged man was there. He handed the slip of paper the accountant had written to the middle-aged man.

After nearly half an hour of back and forth, Zhao Hua was finally able to call the tractor driver to come in and haul the bricks.

These days, you have to load the bricks yourself. Although it's just a brick factory, and later there were private brick kilns everywhere, it's now a real public institution. Although there are loaders and unloaders, they are only responsible for unloading bricks from the kiln and stacking them in the factory.

They weren't going to help you load and unload bricks, unlike the small brick kilns that popped up later, which offered door-to-door delivery. So Zhao Hua had to go out again to find those middle-aged men waiting for work at the door.

They called two people in total, charging three cents per person per trip. The gatekeeper didn't stop them from entering, clearly used to it.

The tractor can only carry about two thousand bricks per trip. During the loading process, Zhao Hua chatted with the warehouse keeper and learned that if he couldn't finish loading in one trip, the warehouse keeper would record how many bricks he had loaded and how many were left. So there was no need to worry about not finishing in one trip and having to get a new slip and go through the process again next time.

He spent the entire morning hauling bricks, making five trips in total. Each trip earned him two yuan, so five trips would earn him ten yuan. Zhao Hua calculated that although this job wasn't available every day, the income was indeed quite good, especially considering that there was work to do every day during the busy farming season.

However, farm work probably wouldn't be so expensive. Not many people would be willing to spend money to hire a tractor, and most families have handcarts, so they probably wouldn't hire a tractor for serious harvesting of wheat or soybeans.

Tractors are only used when hauling farmyard manure because flatbed carts are difficult to pull, or to prevent too much leakage on the road. After all, that stuff is runny, and tractors have baffles, so they can haul a lot in one trip without worrying about leakage...

After finishing the last trip, they had almost finished digging the foundation. Zhao Hua looked it over and found that it met his requirements. It was similar to an earthen house, with two side rooms and one main room. The kitchen was also extended by an additional side room as he requested.

Similar to ordinary bungalows in later times, this way one could go to the roof of the kitchen to enjoy the breeze in the summer. Actually, it was a bit incongruous, because cement was now harder to obtain than bricks, with smaller production volumes and stricter controls. He couldn't very well make cement by hand...

The key issue is that even if it were to be handmade, he wouldn't know the recipe! So now there are no cement floors, so they can only use wooden planks for the roof.

The main house should definitely have a tiled roof, but the kitchen doesn't matter. As for whether using wooden planks for the kitchen roof poses a safety hazard, well...

Of course there are, but there are still many places with pure wooden houses that are still in good working order. Just be careful and replace them with concrete floors later.

Otherwise, without air conditioning or fans, in the summer, the bricks would be baked by the sun all day, making the room even more unbearable than a heated kang bed.

He couldn't very well do what Song Zhiqiang did and move his whole family to sleep outside the front door...

Having a roof over a bungalow would be much more comfortable. Not only is it windy up high, but it also offers better privacy. You can't see clearly from a distance, and you can't see anything up close.

"The foundation is almost finished, and the bricks have all been delivered. We can start working this afternoon. But... tsk, where's your yellow sand? I've looked around several times and can't find it. Hasn't it been delivered yet?" Master Zhao scratched his head as he walked towards Zhao Hua.

Zhao Hua stood with his hands behind his back, looking at the newly dug trench. The fresh yellow soil evoked memories of his childhood. Hearing this, he turned to look at Master Zhao, blinked, and said, "Didn't I say that?"

Master Zhao tilted his head, his mouth slightly open, and said, "What did you say?"

Zhao Hua stared in disbelief and said, "Didn't I tell you? After they finish digging the foundation, they still need to dig up yellow sand. I didn't prepare any yellow sand."

Master Zhao bent down and shouted, "Damn it! When did you say that?" He thought for a moment and then said, "You did tell me your family wouldn't get involved. Sigh, I figured you weren't going to get involved in the work, so I prepared all the materials."

Zhao Hua smiled and said, "Let's get some people to dig them up this afternoon, and I'll call a tractor to haul them away. Anyway, those things aren't worth much; they're everywhere in the village and along the river."

Master Zhao nodded and said, "Okay, I'll have them dig this afternoon. It'll be much faster with a tractor. They can dig over there and unload over here. Two truckloads should be enough. We can deal with any other needs later. We can't pile up too many anyway." He turned and glanced at the open space. There were already quite a few bricks piled up there, new and old, not together, taking up a lot of space.

After receiving confirmation, Master Zhao immediately planned to tell the person and go dig loess that afternoon. Zhao Hua stopped him and said with a smile, "Tell me first what you need and what you need to prepare. I'll prepare everything so you won't be anxious later if you don't have anything."

Master Zhao nodded and blurted out, "We have the bricks here. We also need to prepare yellow sand. If it's hard to get yellow mud, that will do. We also need to get some quicklime. You also need to prepare the planks in advance. Your father is a carpenter, so you can ask him to prepare the roof beams."

How much lime should we prepare?

Master Zhao was silent for a while, probably calculating how much lime he needed. After a moment, he said, "We sell it now at 100 jin per basket. Your house will probably need 12 baskets, plus the courtyard wall, so 15 baskets should be enough. If you're not comfortable with that, you can get one or two more baskets."

After saying that, he walked towards the group of laborers, but after taking only a few steps, he turned back and said, "There's still water, but I can have someone fetch it for me." Then he left.

Zhao Hua was speechless. Why bring it up when you could let someone else choose? Was he trying to take credit? The old man was so cunning.

He shook his head, thought for a moment, and realized that sand was easy to get. Shuanghuai Village was right next to the river, and there was plenty of river sand. If that wasn't enough, they could use yellow mud instead.

He had to buy lime, but it was easy to buy and not expensive, only a basket costing one or two yuan. He had originally thought that Master Zhao could mention some small items he had overlooked, and thinking about it, it made sense. Wood could build a house, and besides, he was a professional, so he should have most of the small items.