The old things I repaired have become fine

Chapter 70: Little Oil Lamp: I don’t want to leave! They can’t leave me! (Subscribe)

At the entrance of the village, the old electrician strode towards Guoqing. He fanned himself with an old-fashioned electrician's hat made of bamboo and rattan, and his canvas bag drooped on his shoulder. The stitches on the bag strap were broken and sewn, and then broken again.

The elderly farm electrician stood side by side with the young electrician from Zhuxi Town. Just looking at the equipment they were wearing, it seemed as if they were separated by decades of time.

However, Shen Le had been working with them these past few days, and had seen with his own eyes the tools used by the father and son. Most of them were not much different in generation.

Aside from the most advanced equipment, such as drones, they all look similar. The son uses a small LCD multimeter, while the father's multimeter is only slightly larger.
The low-voltage tester used by the son can read the reading by pressing down, while the tester used by the father is at least not the old type that can only light up to show whether there is power or not;

The infrared thermometer used by the son has built-in thermal imaging, while the infrared thermometer used by the father can at least display the temperature, and looks like a forehead thermometer...

Over the years, the power system has been organizing training for rural electricians and rotating instruments. There are indicators for replacing tools and equipment every year.

Maybe a little slower, but not too much. In particular, Binhai City, where Xiangyang works, is adjacent to the province where his hometown is located, and the economic conditions of the two provinces are not much different.

We will try our best to take care of whatever we can.

"How could I not come!" Xiang Guoqing fanned himself with his electrician's hat, then put it on again and tucked his wet hair under the hat.

He opened the tool bag, took out the insulation tester, and skillfully connected it to the device to be tested. He took a deep breath and shook it steadily and quickly, his arm almost leaving an afterimage:
“That’s not a problem…”

"Dad, stop busying yourself." Xiangyang and his father were back to back, doing an examination at another location, but he couldn't help but mutter:
"You are already this old, come with me to Zhuxi. Look at these new instruments, you don't know how to use them even if I give them to you, and you insist on using the old ones.

As for this insulation meter, it’s new and only needs to be turned on with one press, but you still need to crank it manually…”

This thing is so tiring to shake!

120 revolutions per minute, two revolutions per second, and you need to shake it at a constant speed for a full minute!

My hands are almost broken from shaking!

"What do you know, kid?" The old electrician leaned forward slightly and shook the handle hard, sweat streaming down his cheeks.

He let out a sigh of relief only after seeing the reading on the shake meter. He pushed away his son's hand that was handing him the new instrument.
"You work in a big city and can drive everywhere, so of course you find the new instrument convenient. Your father wants to carry this thing up the mountain!
Look at your shaking watch, it's a circle bigger and twice as heavy as the hand-cranked one. You want me to carry it and crawl around, across so many hills between two villages?"

"Uh……"

Xiangyang was speechless for a moment. He looked left and right, and silently put the megohmmeter back. Still not giving up, he continued to persuade:

"Dad, my place is close to the big city after all, so everything is convenient. It only takes half an hour to drive to a Class 3 hospital. You didn't have to lie down for two months because of your back pain last time!"

"No, no! I won't go!"

The old man waved his hands impatiently:
"This village can't do without me! Look, here alone, I, an electrician, have to take care of two villages. If I leave, where can I find another electrician?"

He pulled out a low-voltage electric pen from his ear, stood up straight, and drew a big circle with the electric pen:
"Look at this village, old and young, the old are in their 50s and 60s, the young are 2, 3, 7 or 8 years old. All the young people who can do something have left...

Recruiting young electricians? Young people don’t like to come to such a remote place! "

Shen Le sighed silently. This is indeed the case in rural areas nowadays. The more remote the rural area, the more young people leave.

In the village, there are fewer and fewer people, and more and more houses are empty. Only a few elderly people and children are left, guarding the old houses and watching the fields slowly become barren...

In this village settlement, there are about 50 households in total, and there are less than ten people over 18 years old and under 50 years old.

Among these ten, there are some with a lame leg, some who are deaf, and some who are not very smart...

In this case, let alone whether we can train an electrician, even if someone has mastered the electrician skills, he does not meet the qualifications to compete for the position of agricultural electrician!
Xiangyang tilted his head slightly, a hint of sadness flashing across his eyes.

That's how it is. People will instinctively move towards a better life. As long as they have the ability and can survive in a better place, they will definitely go there.
Just like him, he went to elementary school in the village, junior high school in the town, and was admitted to high school in the county.

I was admitted to a university in Binhai and stayed in Zhuxi Town for work. Even though it was a town, it was still Zhuxi Town in Binhai. It was only 60 kilometers away from the center of Binhai City by car and only took two subways to get there...

He will never come back, he will never come back. Some of his friends from his childhood went to the town, some went to the county, and some went to even more distant places in the far north and south.

Like him, they will not return.

They will come to visit their families during festivals, bring their spouses and children to meet their families, and perhaps come back to pay homage to their ancestors' graves, but they will not regard this village as a place where they can settle down.

But I don't care about these - not now. Xiangyang thought calmly, now, I only care about my father, I just want him to live a better life...

"No, someone will definitely come!" He still took a step forward and held his father:

"Dad, look at them, they are repairing the old house here, doesn't that mean someone is coming?"

He pointed at Shen Le:
“Once the old house is repaired, we can develop tourism. The big house on the hill can attract people to visit, and the small house can be renovated into a bed and breakfast.

When tourism develops, young people will come here, and people in the village can also make money at home..."

Shen Le was inexplicably cueed, and was stunned for a moment, then quickly put on a smile and nodded to the old man. He was madly complaining in his heart:
How can it be so easy?

This big house on the mountain took only two or three years from survey to project establishment, then to project approval, funding approval, and restoration to its original state.

After the instructor took them through the survey, they had to go back and write papers and reports and submit them to the project's sponsor - I don't know if it was the school or some project fund - to complete the project.

After the project is concluded, if you feel that the house is worth building, you can then strive for official project funding.

Nowadays, every place has funds for the protection of ancient buildings every year. It is said that an ancient village in southwestern Zhejiang applied for 220 million yuan in protection funds two years ago to repair six houses.

Of course, for the government, this is important, that is important, and many ancient buildings are important. The more things that need to be protected, the longer the review period, and the longer the payment period...

As for turning the small houses into B&Bs, let alone these small houses, they are old, dilapidated, and not ancient. Unless they are completely integrated into tourist resources, there is no value in repairing them.

But, integrating tourism resources? No way without big capital.

This is a remote place with no particularly good scenery, and the big house on the top of the mountain is not a very prominent protected building. What's wrong with the capitalists who came here to build homestays and develop tourism?

Wouldn’t it be nice to rent a few ready-made houses?
He tried hard to control his expression, not daring to show any emotion. Seeing that he did not refute, Xiangyang continued to persuade his father:
"Besides, hasn't the village been developing over the years? The roads have been built and the telecommunications network has been connected..."

"Since things are getting better, why are you still dragging me to the city?" The old man said with a gloomy face, throwing his hands:

"Your father is not too old to move! I can help here. The villagers can't leave without me, so I can't leave!"

"dad……"

Before the father and son could figure out what was going on, there was a loud snap and all the lights in the village went out again. For a moment, there were cries of grief, mixed with the old electrician's muffled sigh:

"Look at this. What will happen to the villagers if I leave?"

Xiangyang quickly shut up and rushed to the transformer to check the relay protection on it.

Shen Le also quickly turned his head to look at the small oil lamp, only to see that the light on the small oil lamp was dim, and the silver-white light was tightly attached to the surface, as if it had shrunk:
is it you?
Did you do this?
Are you being naughty again?
The light of the small oil lamp grew stronger, then shrank back. Shen Le raised an eyebrow:

Yo?
Is it really you?

Judging from the way you look, you seem to be very confident about this?
[I... I don't know...]

[I was just a little tired and sad...]

The sound of the small oil lamp is inaudible to ordinary people, and its light is invisible to ordinary people. However, in Shen Le's spiritual eyes and heart, the light is dazzling and the sound is simply deafening.

Shen Le sighed, carried it back to the room, put it on the table, and touched it gently:
"You are tired and sad. Is the voltage unstable and it is about to trip?"

[I don't know...what is voltage? ]

Well, it might be a bit difficult to explain voltage to a spirit. Shen Leping calmed down and changed his communication method:
"You are tired and sad, will the light in the village go out? Will they light you up?"

[No...very rarely...very rarely...]

The light of the small oil lamp trembled slightly, shrinking a little, and then shrinking again. Shen Le scratched his head helplessly:
This little spirit may not be very powerful when it is first born. It may be because it is in a bad mood, aggrieved, sad, or irritable, and it will affect the power supply of the village once or twice, right?

Of course, its power has become stronger recently, and its impact on power supply has become more frequent.

Maybe it was because he was closer to the copper plate, or maybe his restoration work was making progress, and the power of the small oil lamp became stronger?
"You see, the electricians in the village are so busy. They have to do all kinds of things, such as daily maintenance, inspection, meter reading, and collecting money."

An agricultural electrician is in charge of one or two villages, covering an area of more than ten kilometers in radius.

Maintenance of the village power grid, repair of home circuits, daily meter reading and payment, maintenance of stable power supply during busy farming season, typhoons, heavy snow, broken wires...

He heard from Xiangyang that old electricians rarely have time to catch their breath throughout the year.

"They are already very busy... Be good and don't cause them any trouble..."

The light of the oil lamp shrank back a circle. In the center of the glass cover, on the unlit wick, a small ball of white light gathered and flickered.

Through the glass cover, Shen Le seemed to be able to sense the mood of the small oil lamp:

[I didn’t mean to…]

[I am no longer sad... I am no longer sad... I am going to sleep, I am going to sleep...]

Poor child. Poor, lonely little oil lamp.

You can control yourself from getting angry, and you can control yourself from making a fuss, but how can you control yourself from being sad?
As a result, I just fell asleep in the darkness, and kept sleeping...

Shen Le stretched out his finger and touched its glass cover:

"Be good, I'll take you, talk to you, and light you up. During this time, you sleep in the light, okay?"

The white light rose a little, and circled around Shen Le's fingers, then circled again, like a little animal rubbing his fingers.

The thin electric current burned Shen Le's fingertips, making them tingle and numb, as if they were getting close to him. Between breaths, the white light became brighter.

The electric snake slithered and coiled around, engulfing Shen Le's entire body. Between the flashes of lightning, Shen Le's eyes dimmed and brightened, and he was dragged into another memory.

　Thanks to @一碗排骨藕汤 for the 500 starting coins

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(End of this chapter)