Rebirth of Bayi Fishing and Hunting in the Northwest

"I'm in Wucheng." Yusup said with a smile, "Adasi, I remember you said last time that as long as I find good small seed materials, I can come to you, is that true?"

"Of course." Li Long said with a smile, "Sure, sure. When will you come over?"

"I'm going to the jade factory today to sell some big pieces. Can I take a bus to see you tomorrow morning? By the way, aren't you coming over?"

"No, I don't have any good stuff here." Li Long thought it would be better to stay in the county. After all, Ma County is his territory, so he doesn't worry about being cheated. Although people these days are relatively "simple" compared to later generations, it is not ruled out that there will be things like honey traps.

"Well, I'll take a bus to see you tomorrow morning. Should I go to the supply and marketing cooperative to see you?"

"Sure. When you arrive, just come here to find me." Li Long agreed.

After hanging up the phone, Li Xiangqian asked curiously:

"Have you contacted a jade seller?"

"Yes, he is from southern Xinjiang and sells Hetian jade." Li Long said, "The last time I went to Wucheng to sell jasper, I happened to run into him selling Hetian jade. He bought a lot of small pieces of Hetian jade seeds, but the jade factory refused to accept them because they were too small. So I told him to sell them to me and let him sell me some if he has them in the future."

"How big?"

Li Long gestured the size of a pigeon egg.

"What's the point?" Li Xiangqian glanced at it with disdain. "If you want to buy, buy a big piece, buy the finished material. Isn't the bracelet good? Isn't the jade pendant good? Isn't the pendant good? Why do you have to make a small stone egg? What can such a small thing do?"

"Let's make a bracelet or something." Li Long said with a smile, "We don't have money."

"You can even buy a bracelet for a small amount of money. Oh, you have a girlfriend now, so you should buy her a jade bracelet. Gold bracelets look a bit tacky on young people, but jade ones are fine."

After he said that, Li Long was really moved.

Why not go to a jade factory? We don't need top-grade materials or top-grade carving, just average ones will do. Of course, the average nowadays is the same as the "average" mentioned by Li Tianwang in the Four Heavenly Kings. If it is put in the future, it is also a heavenly king-level existence.

After all, Li Long has been watching short videos for a long time and knows the development of this industry. The best materials will be mined by the next century. So some not-so-good materials are gradually becoming popular.

For example, the famous jadeite, at the beginning of the 21st century, was a brick material that was not even worth mentioning, with no water quality at all and only green, the so-called Iron Dragon Jade. Twenty years later, it became a new product and very expensive.

But at the beginning of the century, such materials were despised.

In the early 1990s, a truckload of Qinghai materials cost only a few thousand yuan, but 20 years later, a piece of material cost several thousand or even tens of thousands of yuan...

Li Long didn't think about hoarding to get rich, at least he would buy some for his family when he could afford it, and when the price went up, at least others would have some, and his family would have some too. That would be enough.

"Will you come tomorrow?" Li Xiangqian asked when he saw Li Long was silent.

"Come on. I'll come over to pick him up tomorrow. If he has good material, I'll buy it and keep it for now. I'll treat him to a meal, send him off, and then do my own things."

"Okay, come over tomorrow and wait in my office." Li Xiangqian said, "I don't have anything to do anyway."

Li Long rode his bike back, and when he finished cooking, Gu Xiaoxia came back.

Li Long told her about his plan to buy a jade bracelet.

"No, no!" Gu Xiaoxia said in a very serious tone, "No need to buy it for me! You... just buy it for Auntie. I have a watch to wear. Nowadays, people don't wear these accessories to work. Everyone thinks it's inappropriate."

Li Long came to his senses. Although the reform and opening up had already begun, people's thinking had not yet come out of that era. Wearing something so traditional would lead to some strange looks.

"Okay, I'll buy some for me and the others. This stuff will definitely become less and less in the future, so it's okay to buy some and keep it around."

"Yeah." Gu Xiaoxia had no objection. "Deputy Director Wang praised me again today and said that he would see if he could help me get a permanent job in the fall if there were any indicators."

"That's great." Li Long smiled. "It's great... But don't have too high expectations. After all, it's still hard to say whether it will work out. Some people may not be able to get a permanent job even after being seconded for several years..."

"I know." Gu Xiaoxia didn't think Li Long was being long-winded. She knew he was doing it for her own good. "Just do your job well."

"You should report your thoughts to your leaders more often, and report any confusions you have. If there are any gossips in the office, you should also tell your leaders. Since the leaders have seconded you, they think highly of you, so it's not just about work. Don't tell tales, but don't let yourself be wronged either."

After Li Long said this, Gu Xiaoxia thought about it for a while and nodded slowly.

This is quite different from the education she received.

"I've heard a saying, 'Even if you keep your head down while pulling a cart, you still need to look up at the road.' If you only know how to work, you won't get far or far."

Gu Xiaoxia kept thinking about Li Long's words until she went to work.

Li Long rested in the house for a while, then rode his bike to the free market.

I was hoping to see if I could find any antique sellers, but I didn't. But the free market seemed to have been reorganized, with the stalls arranged more neatly and in greater numbers. The distances between the stalls were similar, and there was no more messy garbage, which made it look much cleaner. What surprised Li Long was that Meng Zhiqiang was still selling fish - there were still quite a few fish on his stall, some of which were dead, but a few crucian carps were still alive.

Li Long actually admires these wild crucian carps very much. They have such strong vitality.

There are some puddles, deep ditches where water from canals flows in, and puddles of water gathered from watering vegetable gardens near residential areas.

These are originally the water flowing down from the small lake. The water will be stored for quite a long time. Then, if there is no watering for a period of time, the puddle will gradually become dry, and a little mud will remain at the bottom. The surface of the mud may even dry up, and it will be a little damp underneath.

But as long as there is a heavy rain, a lot of water will accumulate in these puddles. After a few hours, you will find crucian carps as big as a palm swimming in the puddles.

It's amazing.

This definitely isn't something that grew from the fish eggs hatched by water. After all, it's impossible for it to grow this big right after it hatches.

It is also impossible that the water would be sucked into the air by a waterspout and then fall down with the rain like in the stories in the story club. After all, there has never been a tornado here - the smaller ones are called whirlwinds locally, not tornadoes.

At this time, everyone is materialistic and knows that it is impossible for it to appear out of thin air, so there is only one explanation. There were fish in the pit, and when there was no water, the crucian carp would burrow into the mud to survive and wait for the water to come before coming out.

Of course, this also requires a favorable environment. The puddles that were washed out under the gates of large canals are not suitable. The soft mud at the bottom of the puddle has been washed away, leaving only hard soil. Without soft mud, crucian carps cannot get in. Finally, when the water is gone, the crucian carps will dry up and become a delicacy for flies and maggots.

Li Long had seen such fish that seemed to "appear suddenly" more than once, and later he slowly analyzed the reason.

The survival ability of crucian carp is also reflected in another aspect.

In his previous life, Li Long caught crucian carp before the winter ice formed more than once. After catching these crucian carp, some weighed more than ten kilograms and were the size of a palm or the length of a chopstick. Of course, there were also small crucian carp less than ten centimeters mixed in. Then he put them in a basket without peeling them and kept them in an idle house.

If you want to eat it, go and get some - the temperature is not yet high enough to freeze, but there are no flies. Then you will make a magical discovery that even after three or four days, there are still some crucian carp alive just by the layer of mucus on their bodies.

The longest one Li Long saw live was a week.

You should not release water at this time. If you release the fish into the water, it will die faster.

Now that they had met, Li Long stopped the car and asked:
"Meng, is it hard to sell this fish today?"

"Yeah." Meng Zhiqiang forced a smile and didn't want to talk.

I thought to myself, if your father and Tao Daqiang hadn’t come here early in the morning with dozens of kilograms of fish to sell and attracted all the customers away, how could I have failed to sell them?

He walked over carrying a bag of urea, while Li Qingxia and the others came on bicycles, so naturally they were faster.

There is a layer of plastic inside the urea bag. Although it is not completely waterproof, water will not leak out so quickly. Therefore, the fish that Li Qingxia and his team get are mostly alive, so customers will definitely like to buy them.

When Meng Zhiqiang carries fish on his back, he also puts some water in the bag, but not too much, otherwise he won’t be able to carry it.

At this time, he really wanted to buy a bicycle - but it was too expensive. Although he had earned a lot of money from fishing, it was still a long way from buying a bicycle. Moreover, when he had money, he would just spend it when there was something going on at home.

I can't save much.

At this time, seeing Li Long still riding a bicycle, he was really envious.

Li Long and Meng Zhiqiang had an average relationship, so he just said hello and left.

It was only then that he noticed that some stall owners, seeing that there were few customers, took out steamed buns, pancakes, and corn bread from their bags and started eating lunch with water from old kettles.

Their water bottles are also varied, the most common ones are cans, there are also old military water bottles, and white wine bottles.

Most of the food they ate was cornmeal cakes and steamed cakes. This made Li Long realize that only a few people could eat meat now.

My family’s living standard has already exceeded that of most Chinese people.

He suddenly thought, if he opened a hot food stall here, could he also make money? After all, eating dry steamed buns, seeing these people swallowing them uncomfortably, and some choking and rushing to wash it off with water, wouldn't hot food be more popular?
This thought only flashed through his mind, and had nothing to do with him. He would definitely not do such a thing, and he would not have the time to do it, so how much money would he make?

When he was almost at the end of the market, Li Long saw someone wearing an armband walking towards him.

It turns out there are managers.

After letting the two people pass, Li Long saw a stall selling fresh potatoes, which were the size of a fist and evenly distributed. Li Long bought two kilograms. There were several stalls selling tomatoes, and he picked the better ones and bought three kilograms. Then he saw some stalls selling tomatoes, so he weighed a few and went back while eating a tomato.

I have to say, the tomatoes at this time are really sweet and sour.

The next day, Li Long went to the supply and marketing cooperative to wait. He didn't expect that Yusup came over with a sack on his back not long after he started work in the morning.

Look at that sack, the stuff inside is quite heavy! (End of this chapter)