In 1992, a small village owner became the richest man in the village by owning a car.

Chapter 110 Buying Watermelons

"Watermelons for sale!"

"Freshly picked Dadi Qilin watermelons, six cents a pound!"

Outside the courtyard, on the main street, someone was driving a four-wheeled vehicle, hawking their wares. The truck bed was filled with a full basket of Qilin watermelons.

Yu Dawei, holding Xiao Muyu, glanced out the window. The old four-wheeled vehicle was parked in front of Old Jiang's courtyard across the street. "Everyone's sharing watermelons. Mom and Dad, should we buy some too?"

"Buy it, I'll go get the money." Hearing the price being called out outside, Zhang Yunqin, the mother, immediately went to the cabinet in the inner room without hesitation to get the money to buy the watermelon.

"No need, I'll go buy it. You guys wait at home." Yu Dawei was quite well-off these days, and he opened the door and walked towards the gate.

"Big brother, wait for me, let's go too!" Er Yan and Xiao Fang quickly followed, thinking they could join in the fun.

The group approached the vendor. Yu Dawei glanced at the vendor and felt he looked familiar; he seemed to be from Xinglongtun.

The other person also saw Yu Dawei and seemed to recognize him, greeting him with a smile: "Brother Dawei, you're here to buy watermelons? How many do you want? If you buy a lot, I'll give you another one for free."

Nowadays, every household in the village has a large population, and when they buy watermelons, they buy at least ten or so at a time, and some even buy twenty or so, all of which are placed in the shady spot in the yard.

When we want to eat watermelon, we put it in a bucket of water in the well beforehand to loosen it, and then take it out to eat. It tastes almost the same as watermelon from the refrigerator.

Yu Dawei looked at the round and plump Qilin watermelons and couldn't help but swallow.

Nowadays, Kirin watermelons are still very cheap and affordable for every household. Unlike in the future, after other watermelon varieties are introduced, Yu Dawei will no longer be able to afford Kirin watermelons.

It went from three or four yuan in the summer to four or five yuan, and by the time I got old, it had risen to over twenty yuan! It's insane!
He hasn't eaten a Kirin watermelon since he was almost in his thirties. There's no other reason than that it's too expensive and he can't afford it.

Other watermelons are cheaper, only one or two yuan each. Although they taste watery, they're still edible, better than the Koreans eating watermelon rinds.

Yu Dawei stared at the Qilin watermelons in the truck bed for a long time, feeling deeply moved: "Give me thirty."

"Thirty?! Okay, I'll give you three more!" The vendor was taken aback at first, but then he was overjoyed. He hadn't expected Yu Dawei to be such a wealthy man, with a considerable number of family members.

It's not uncommon for families to have more than thirty watermelons; these are usually families with brothers living with their parents, and more than ten kids waiting to eat watermelons.

You'd need at least two or three watermelons to share at one time.

The Qilin watermelon isn't big, only about ten pounds each. Compared to those big idiots of the future, it's far from being a match.

But the Kirin watermelon is very sweet, not in an unpleasantly cloying way, but rather a very natural sweetness.

In the world of watermelons, Yu Dawei would absolutely call the Qilin watermelon the best-tasting, bar none.

"I'll drive it to your yard for you later, so you don't have to put it in a sack." The vendor was about to put the watermelons in a sack when he glanced at Yu Dawei's backyard and asked for his opinion.

"Okay, but you keep fifteen watermelons and send them to the third house from the west end, Yu Chen's house. Just say they're from Yu Dawei at the east end." After giving the instructions, Yu Dawei went home first. The watermelons would be brought over later and weighed, and he could pay for them then.

The vendor readily agreed and then started packing watermelons into sacks for others. He hadn't expected them to sell so well in Yujiatun. He had just come from the east side of the village and was immediately surrounded as soon as he entered.

More than half an hour passed before the vendor finally had time to go to Yu Dawei's courtyard and place fifteen watermelons under the west wall. The vendor also specially took out three watermelons as a gift.

Including the other fifteen, after weighing them, Yu Dawei only spent twenty-five yuan in total.

On the one hand, this is because the watermelons sold here are the cheapest they've been since July or August, and on the other hand, more and more people in Northeast China are growing Kirin watermelons in recent years.

Knowing that there were two gluttons waiting, Yu Dawei cut two of them first. They were both in good condition. After cutting them open, a watermelon aroma wafted out. The watermelon inside was a very natural and tempting red, and its color was very similar to that of a ripe tomato.

Yu Dawei didn't stand on ceremony. With a few quick strokes, the cleaver fell, splitting the watermelon into six pieces. He then proceeded to cut another watermelon into six pieces as well. The two little ones began to hold the watermelon and squat down in the yard to gnaw on it.

Then Yu Dawei took two watermelons from the yard and went to the well in the garden, preparing to put the watermelons in the well.

The well in the old man's house is quite remarkable; it's the most expensive well in the entire Yujiatun village.

The well opening is 60 centimeters in diameter, and a black iron pulley is supported by two iron frames. A crank extends out from the middle, which is used specifically for drawing water. (Author's note: A pulley, scientifically known as a windlass, is a device used to draw well water and sits at the well opening.)
Whether it's the water-drawing frame, the pulley, or the crank handle, the old man insisted on using the best materials when he was the richest man in the village, so everything is a one-piece design made of black cast iron.

The well rope was also specially made by Yu Laonian. Making well ropes is a skill, and a good well rope can last for decades without breaking, and even becomes stronger with use.

Finally, there's this well, which took a full month to complete. The biggest difference between this well and other people's wells is that the water it produces is from a deep well, a full forty meters deep. At that time, this was something that completely changed the villagers' understanding of the world.

Other people's wells have a maximum depth of ten meters, at most twenty meters.

The well walls were made of cement gravel pipes, but the pipe walls were thickened. So, Yu Lao Nian is a person who knows how to enjoy life at heart. Yu Dawei once learned this extravagant spending habit and always pursued the highest quality in everything.

He was truly both poor and loved to have fun.

Yu Dawei pulled the rubber bucket from the well. Since there was no water in the house, he poured the water from the rubber bucket into the tin bucket, then put two watermelons into the rubber bucket and lowered them into the well along the well rope.

The bottom of the rubber bucket has a movable black rubber piece. When the bucket is placed in water, the round black rubber piece at the bottom will automatically open, and then water will slowly fill in until it submerges the watermelon.

Yu Dawei checked the location of the watermelon and, when he felt the distance was about right, tied the well rope to the frame to prevent the watermelon from floating out of the bucket due to too much water in the well.

After finishing all that, Yu Dawei glanced wistfully at the crank handle on the wheel.

His eldest son, who had been shaking his head, had given him a hard slap on the back of the head when he was a child, and he still has a hard lump on his head that won't go away.

"If it weren't for the old man's sake, I would have dismembered you and sold you for scrap long ago," Yu Dawei muttered resentfully, then turned and carried the bucket of molten iron into the house.

Finally, he could enjoy the delicious watermelon. When the Kirin watermelon entered his mouth, Yu Dawei was momentarily stunned. The sweet taste of the Kirin watermelon seemed to have come back to him after a century.

"So sweet." Yu Dawei grinned as he ate, revealing a憨憨憨傻笑 (a simple, honest smile) with thick eyebrows and big eyes.

After sitting with the landlord for a while, Yu Dawei thought of Dafeng again. When Dafeng was very young, she injured herself while eating watermelon, and ever since then, she has never eaten a single bite of watermelon in her entire life.

In the summer, all we can eat are cantaloupes and persimmons, which is really a pity. It's such a waste of such delicious Kirin watermelons.

"Sigh, I wonder how Dafeng is doing in Hohhot, and whether she managed to borrow that five hundred yuan." Yu Dawei sat in his chair, chewing on watermelon, his mind wandering.

If Dafeng leaves now, he can still give her more money, hoping she can establish herself in Hohhot. If she comes back, she will definitely be set up for arranged marriages in the village and then get married, making it very difficult for her to have any more opportunities to leave.

I hope everyone around me is doing well. After all, rural life with watermelons is sweet, and everyone has the opportunity to taste that sweetness.

----

A few days later, Yu Dawei was also busy at home, helping Han Jingfan take care of the chickens, ducks, geese, dogs, and pigs. It is worth mentioning that the ducks at home actually laid eggs. According to the months, these ducks can be considered precocious.

He cooked two, and they tasted alright, but salted duck eggs are still tastier, especially in winter. You can collect seventy or eighty duck eggs, put them in a jar to pickle, and have salted duck eggs in winter, and life will have a different flavor.

Han Jingfan shared the same idea, and the couple began to hope that the ducks would lay more eggs so they could have salted duck eggs to eat in the winter.

A few days later, Yu Dawei, as usual, strolled around the various sites and finally "checked in" at his third uncle's project site. Normally, if there was nothing else to do, he could prepare to go home.

When we go to town again, it will be next week or in three to five days.

The benefits of owning a car are gradually becoming apparent.

If your car is fine, your job is fine, and your driver doesn't cause you any problems, then you can go wherever you want and just wait to collect your money.

Yu Dawei was also taking care of maintaining the two excavators from the Volvo Ackermann. If it weren't for those two vehicles, he wouldn't even have planned to go to the site, since he didn't have anything to do there, and going too often would be counterproductive.

Some bosses visit the site so frequently that it can even cause dissatisfaction among drivers. After all, if the boss goes there every day, it means he doesn't treat the driver like one of his own.

And so, as September was approaching, my third uncle suddenly came to him with something.

Yu Dawei drove his four-wheeled vehicle and quickly passed by.

Nowadays, there are very few people in the project site. Everyone has gone to the village. It's only lively in the evenings. The canteen staff has also changed from cooking lunch and dinner to only cooking dinner.

As for lunch, everyone took care of their own meals in the village.

Huang Man goes back to the old village chief's house for lunch every day, and the same goes for dinner.

Yu Dawei secretly slipped some money to the old village chief. Manzi was also a very sensible person and initially intended to give money as well, but the old village chief refused to accept it.

Helpless, Huang Man told Yu Dawei about this, and Yu Dawei gave him a suggestion: every now and then, he should go to the supply and marketing cooperative to buy some rice, flour, cooking oil, and other necessities and deliver them to the old village chief's house.

This was also an unspoken payment for food. Huang Man's eyes lit up. Things went very smoothly, and Huang Man finally felt more at ease staying at the old village chief's house.

However, after the second team finished working in Shanwopeng Village, the construction team was about to install utility poles along the road to the south to reach the school and the village committee. Yu Dawei thought that it would be more convenient for Manzi to stay at the village committee if he did his work.

(End of this chapter)