The Ups and Downs of the Commoners Page #10

This non-fiction novel tells the life of ordinary commoners in the middle of the 20th century in China, from the series of movements such as "Land Reform", "Great Leap Forward", "Cultural Revolution" and "Educated Youth Going to the Countryside" to the early days of Reform and Opening-up. The book has four volumes, and was published by Hong Kong Chinese International Publishing House in 2015. The protagonist of this book, Fang Zhengben, was born into a bankrupt family of landowners. Their family has lived in Taiqing Town for generations. When he was six years old, he left Taiqing Town with his parents and came to Longyun Mountain, where the mountains overlap. From then on, he began an unusual life: their family hard work, but they couldn't eat enough; he yearned for reading, but he has dropped out of school three times before graduating from junior high school; he is diligent and studious, with excellent grades, but the door of colleges is

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Several people put two beds, and put a dining table between them. With half of the space left, they put a loom on the left and a Locker and some sundries on the right. The rest of the sundries are placed in the kitchen and pigsty room. Next, Fang Xinwen religiously hung portraits of Mao Zedong and Zhu De on the front of the back wall. It was a portrait of the two of them in Yan'an, wearing octagonal hats, which Fang Xinwen brought back from Shaanxi.
Seeing that the furniture was placed, Fang Xinwen said: "Today everyone is tired, rest early. About planting crops, we'll do it in tomorrow." So he led everyone around and had a look. Wang Qihui stayed at home to cook.
The older cousins watched the neighborhood for a while, came back for dinner, chatted with each other for a while, and rested separately. Fang Xinwen's family slept in a big bed, the five older cousins slept in another bed horizontally, and the rest slept on the floor. Fang Zhengben sleepy, and soon fell asleep.
As soon as the morning dawned, the older cousins all got up. The eldest cousin Wang Tianhui asked his younger brother Wang Tianliang and said, "Did you sleep well last night?" Wang Tianliang said: "I didn't sleep well. There are so many mosquitoes on this mountain, that a few mosquitoes can make a dish."  Wang Tianhui said: "I don't sleep well either." Zhang Jingru, an elder cousin from the aunt's mother's house, rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand, and then stretched out two palms that had beaten the mosquitoes,  showing them to everyone, and said wittily: "Oops! Last night, the mosquitoes drank a lot of my blood! You see, I also became the executioner with blood on my hands!" Fang Zhengben saw a lot of red spots on the face of his older brother, and then looked at his body and touched his face, only to know that he had been bitten by mosquitoes. Wang Tianliang, an elder cousin, said: "Mosquitoes are most afraid of fumes smoke. Prepare some green grass early today, and in the evening, light the green grass and the smoke will rise, and the mosquitoes will naturally run away.”
When it got dark on this day, Fang Zhengben really learned the power of mosquitoes on this mountain. That is when people stand in a dark place, they can only hear mosquitoes buzzing and screaming, and they hit the body, and keep biting people, and each bite produces a lump. Fortunately, Fang Zhengqing had prepared a pile of green grass during the day. At this time, he lit a large handful of hay, and then he cover the green grass over the hay. A puff of fumes immediately rose from the haystack. As the smoke filled the whole room, the mosquitoes quickly fled, but he himself was coughed, his eyes were red, and tears kept streaming out. After all these toss, they could sleep peacefully this night. But in the morning, when the door opened, mosquitoes swarmed into the house, like bees go home.
With the elder cousins surnamed Wang and Zhang coming to help, the summer sowing was quickly completed, but this does not mean that you can relax a little.
Fang Xinwen and Wang Qihui gratefully sent away their nephews, and then called Fang Zhengqing and Fang Zhengben to the in front of. Wang Qihui said: "Qingyuan, Zhengben, listen, you brothers should have continued to study, but suddenly encountered such a change, the learning is not going to be talked about for the time being. We moved here, which is different from others. Others have food in their homes, pigs in the pigsty, goat in the sheep barn, and manure in the cesspit; but for us, we are like on a slate, we have nothing, and we have to start from scratch. Go to the market tomorrow, your father will buy you two back baskets. Your daily tasks in the future will be collecting firewood, cutting grass, and picking green Artemisia. Firewood is indispensable for cooking every day. Green Artemisia is used to soak for fertilize to corn, and the grass is rotten and used for autumn sowing. As for your schooling, we can only arrange it later. Mom and Dad have no choice but to do so." The two brothers knew that these were the advice of their elder cousins, but they also understood the current situation, and both agreed, "Okay."
Seeing that his father had bought two back baskets and two sickles, the brothers hurried over and tried to put the back baskets to on their backs. Fang Zhengben chose a smaller one, but the back basket was about the same height as him. Put it on his back, the foot of the back basket fell on his calf. Fang Xinwen said: "This is the smallest back basket that can be bought on the market, and you can't buy any smaller than this."
After lunch that day, Fang Zhengqing and Fang Zhengben were grinding their sickles on the stone under the eaves of their porches, but they did not know the correct way to grinding their sickles. Zeng Sanxing stood in front of his house and watched for a while, walked towards them smiling, say to Fang Zhengqing, "You don't grinding knives like this. Give me the sickle and I will teach you grinding it!" He received the sickle from Fang Zhengqing, demonstrated how to sharpen the knives for, and told them how to recognize whether the knives were sharp, and helped them made knife handle.
From then on, as long as it doesn't rain, Fang Zhengqing and Fang Zhengben will inevitably go around the wilderness with a big back basket, collecting firewood and cut the grass.
One day, they grinding their sickles, and went out with their back basket. Fang Zhengqing walked in front, he looked up at the Yueya Ridge, turned his head and said, "Younger brother, look, there seem to two people cutting grass in Yueya Ridge. Let's go up and take a look." He said, pointing at the same time on the mountain. Fang Zhengben followed his elder brother's finger and saw two figures move. They didn't look like adults. He said, "Let's go to." They made a long circle along the curve at the back of the house, and climb to the Yueya Ridge.
There are bushes on the ridge, there are Vitex negundo, Chinese Redbud, Wild jujube... A tall Cypress tree rises not far from the bushes. On the branch of a Cypress tree, a beautiful male magpie is singing proudly. A female magpie returned from searching for food and hid in her nest, possibly feeding her baby. Seeing someone approaching, the male magpie flew to another tree and yelled at them, hoping to use its cries to drive away the two uninvited guests.
Fang Zhengqing and Fang Zhengben walked through the bushes for a long time before they came to the place where they saw two people cut the grass. When they stood on the cliff, see they turned out to be two kids about the same size as them. They all wore blue coarse-cloth pair cardigan, the little boy had a chubby round face, and the big boy looked a little thinner. The cliff they were on was very steep, supported by a row of rocks protruding horizontally into the air. Below the rock was a row of deeply recessed cliff cavities. These voids are formed by the weathering of soft leaf rock layers over many years. Although the grass on the cliff is very dense, people who stand on the cliff and cut the grass are in danger of falling off the cliff. The two brothers were very worried about the two young men who were cutting the grass, but they looked look perfectly calm and were very skilled in cut the grass. Seeing the arrival of the two brothers,  they stopped their work and looked up at the two brothers who had just arrived with curious eyes. "Hello! You just moved here, right?" The big boy smiled and greeted them actively, saying, "I heard from my father that a new family called Fang moved out of the street." Fang Zhengqing stood on the edge of the cliff with his legs trembling and nodded and replied: "Yes, how about you?" "We are also surnamed Fang." The two boys replied while climbing up the cliff and standing in front of Fang Zhengqing and Fang Zhengben. When they climbed up, they are as relaxed as walking on flat ground.

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