Back to the 80s Machinery Factory

Chapter 384 A letter from home

Nowadays, Chen Dazhi and Feng Jiuxiang are considered celebrities in the provincial machinery factory.

His own son is a workshop director, a senior engineer, and a senior technical translator. He was admitted to Peking University and became the head of the provincial machinery factory's repair and maintenance center in Pian'ercheng.
Countless people envy them and come to ask them how they raise their children.

In the cafeteria,
Feng Jiuxiang was preparing the dishes when someone suddenly ran in and shouted:

"Jiuxiang, the mailroom called to say there's a letter for you, it seems to be from your second son!"

Upon hearing that her son had sent a letter, Feng Jiuxiang's eyes lit up instantly.

After quickly untying her apron, Feng Jiuxiang wiped her hands and strode off to the mailroom.

"Hisaka~ Your son wrote a letter!"

Old Tian, ​​who was in the mailroom, was standing in the sun at the factory gate when he saw Feng Jiuxiang running over and waving a large envelope in his hand.

"Wow, such a thick envelope, that must have cost a lot of money!"

When Feng Jiuxiang saw the thick envelope, she couldn't help but smile.

She opened it and found a thick stack of newspapers inside.

What newspaper is this?

Curious, Chen's mother took out a newspaper, opened it, and then excitedly held it up, pointing to the photos on it and shouting:
"Old Tian! Look, my second son is in the newspaper!"

Old Tian quickly put his glasses on: "Where?"

Chen's mother pointed to the photo in the newspaper: "Here it is, can you see my son?"

"I saw it."

Old Tian nodded: "I see Zhang Guoqiang."

"Go to hell! What kind of eyes do you have?!" Chen's mother snapped, pointing at the small figure behind the newspaper. "My son is right here!"

Old Tian leaned forward, craning his neck to look ahead.

"Oh my, it really is Director Chen. Why does he look so small in this photo?"

"You can't see it at all unless you look closely!"

Chen's mother didn't care whether he could see it clearly or not, and happily said, "I'll go take a look at my old man!"

Old Tian called out to her, "Don't go yet! Director Lu still mailed you a letter!"

"Lu Quanyou mailed me a letter? What kind of letter did he write to me?" Chen's mother asked suspiciously.

They all work at the same factory; Lao Lu has his own husband, and Lao Lu has his wife.

Suddenly, Lao Lu wrote me a letter. If this gets out, it will sound terrible!

Old Tian took out another thick letter from the table next to him and handed it directly to Feng Jiuxiang.

As he handed it over, he quipped, "Such a thick letter, could it be that Old Lu sent you his own salary?"

"Shut up!" Feng Jiuxiang glared fiercely at Old Tian.

"What is this? It's really thick."

Feng Jiuxiang opened the envelope and took a look!
Inside was a thick stack of newspapers, exactly the same as the ones Chen Luyang had mailed to him!
"Well! I thought it was something else, but it's just a newspaper."

Old Tian looked uninterested, with a bored expression as if he hadn't gotten any big gossip.

Feng Jiuxiang couldn't help but retort, "No matter how old you are, you're still not good enough for me!"

Although she was supposed to show it to Chen Dazhi, Feng Jiuxiang forced herself to suppress her excitement and waited until lunch break before finally finding Chen Dazhi.

"The second child wrote a letter? What did he write?"

When Chen Dazhi heard that his son had written, his body, which was covered in sweat from exhaustion, trembled with joy.

"I've been waiting for you to watch it together! Let's watch it together."

Feng Jiuxiang quickly unfolded the letter, and the two of them huddled together to look at its contents.

"Mom and Dad, my sister and brother-in-law, Xiaoling and Junjun!"

"I'm in Pian'er City—it's so great!"

“I ate well every day, ran with my roommates on the Peking University campus in the morning, and then read books by the lake. I studied very hard. Now I really regret it. If I had studied like this earlier, I wouldn’t have gotten into Peking University, I would be in heaven by now.”

"I ate three steamed buns and drank a big bowl of soy milk this morning. The school cafeteria is great; they have everything you want to eat. I ate fried dough sticks every day for the past few days, and I also drank soy milk. The taste... I feel like my stomach is full of that greasy taste now...!"

"Apart from douzhi (fermented mung bean juice), everything I've eaten is fine... No, the zhajiangmian (noodles with soybean paste) here isn't good, it's not as fragrant as my mom's. I've been dreaming about my mom's zhajiangmian these past few days. When I go home for winter vacation, I'll eat it every day."

"Oh, right! I was also chosen by the teacher as the class's arts and culture representative. In a few days, we'll be organizing our classmates to participate in the freshman welcome party. Although there aren't many students in the class with artistic talent, who am I? It's always good to have many skills. If all else fails, I'll go on stage and play the harmonica for them, and sing a piece like 'Moscow Nights,' so they can experience the beautiful melodies!"

"(Mom, cut this part out so Xiaoling and Junjun don't hear it.) The repair shop officially opened! Something really interesting happened on opening day. That taxi driver, the one in the news, actually only charged 9 yuan for the repair, but he wanted me to give him an extra 10 yuan on the receipt. I didn't dare. But I tried to find a way, because I couldn't just turn away customers I'd worked so hard to attract!"

"Also, I'm currently living in room 421 of building 24 at Peking University. There are six of us in the dorm, and they're all older brothers who take good care of me. The eldest of our dorms is a secretary of a people's commune. He has difficulty walking and took my lower bunk, but he still treats me to meals whenever he has free time. We've eaten at Quanjude several times."

"Although roast duck is delicious, I still crave my mom's Zhajiangmian (noodles with soybean paste). Just looking at the words 'Zhajiangmian' makes my mouth water."

Mr. Chen couldn't stand it anymore.

"Is our second son some kind of reincarnation of a starving ghost? He didn't write anything in the letter, just a bunch of stuff about noodles with soybean paste!"

Chen's mother glared fiercely at her husband: "What do you know?! Did our son want to eat zha jiang mian (noodles with soybean paste)? He wanted to eat the zha jiang mian I made!!!"

"Did you see that?!"

Chen's mother reached out and pressed the words "My mom's fried noodles" on Chen Luyang's letter, saying with a happy smile:

"My son misses me."

Mr. Chen's face twitched a few times, and he gave Mrs. Chen a bad look.

"You know, that eldest guy in their dorm is something else. You, the Party Secretary, are supposed to love the people, so why is he taking our second oldest's bed? He's so inconsiderate."

Mr. Chen frowned, his dissatisfaction even stronger than when his son only wanted to eat noodles with soybean paste and didn't mention scallion pancakes at all.

"That's right. Those six people in the dorm must have taken advantage of our child's quiet nature and young age to steal his bed." Chen's mother wasn't too happy either.

The elderly couple continued reading the letter.

"By the way, Mom and Dad, the third roommate in our dorm is the village secretary, and he and the eldest roommate are both interested in the cars from our factory. I've already talked to them, and I'll take them to our auto repair center during the National Day holiday. If things go well, I'll try to get them to buy a few cars."

"Anyway, I'm doing fine in Pian'er City, it's just that I feel uneasy every day without my dad scolding me, like something's missing. Dad, are you feeling uneasy now that no one's scolding you? Let's save it up! When I come home for winter break, we'll have a good time together!"

When Chen's father saw this, his eyebrows shot up.

"That little brat! He doesn't remember a single good thing I did for him! He only remembers me scolding him!"

Chen's mother continued reading, and the letter read:

“Mom, I’ve just arrived in Pian’er Town, and I have to start all over again. I didn’t even make the front page of the newspaper, only the third page, and the photo is small. But I have a feeling that things will get better. I mailed 10 copies of the daily newspaper home, so let’s not bother Uncle Tian anymore. 10 copies are enough to wallpaper the wall.” Chen’s mother said helplessly, “You know, this child! If we had a big photo of him, mailing 10 copies back to put on the door would be fine.”

"That photo is unmistakably Zhang Guoqiang; anyone who didn't know better would think he was from our family."

This can't be pasted on the door either.

Just as the elderly couple were huddled together reading the letter, Director Lu's newspaper and letters also flew into Wang Qingzhou's hands immediately.

Factory Director's Office

Wang Qingzhou looked at the small third page of the Pian'ercheng Daily and a relieved smile appeared on his face.

"This young Chen is alright, I suppose."

Across from him at the desk, Yu Anshan was reading a newspaper, smiling and saying the opposite of what he meant:
"I think he's clearly slacking off!"

“Chen Luyang has been in Piancheng for almost half a month and only just opened a repair center. He only made it to the third page of the newspaper. His salary should be docked to teach him a lesson.”

Wang Qingzhou glanced at Yu Anshan and laughed, "You're even more ruthless."

Saying,

Wang Qingzhou made a phone call inside the house and summoned Director Niu from the office.

"Old Niu, put this newspaper on the bulletin board so everyone can see it."

Wang Qingzhou handed the Pian'ercheng Daily to Director Niu and gave him instructions.

Director Niu quickly glanced at the headlines and contents of the newspaper and asked:
"Factory manager, do you think we should submit an article to the provincial newspaper and get some publicity from the province?"

Wang Qingzhou nodded: "Let's do one. You can handle the manuscript and everything else."

Director Niu nodded: "Yes, Factory Manager."

After saying that, Director Niu took the newspaper, quietly closed the door, and left.

Wang Qingzhou and Yu Anshan were left alone in the office once again.

"Factory manager, how is Old Dong?"

Yu Anshan asked the question.

Dong Jiangchao led the people from the flight workshop to Lan Hai to conduct helicopter tests in the first half of the year, and they haven't returned yet.

I heard that the conditions in Lan Hai are not as good as in the provincial capital, and the environment is very harsh.

I don't know if Dong Jiangchao, with his old arms and legs, can handle it.

"They're still conducting flight tests, supposedly for noise monitoring. I estimate Old Dong will be back this winter."

Yu Anshan asked, "Is Old Dong over there eating, dressing, and traveling well enough? Should we send him some?"

Wang Qingzhou said, "Everything that needs to be sent has been sent. Lao Niu and the others have been keeping an eye on it. They said that the provincial government just called me when they got back. Our factory's toy cars should be able to enter state-owned and foreign trade stores in Pian'ercheng, Hongjin, and Beihe next month."

"Have another meeting with the colleagues in the toy production and assembly workshop in the next few days, and make sure to strictly control the quality! Especially that batch of high-end toy cars, there can be no mistakes."

Yu Anshan said, "Director Wang, don't worry about this! I guarantee the quality of every toy car that leaves the workshop! But..."

"But what?" Wang Qingzhou asked.

"But there aren't enough factory buildings, and there are too few production lines for toy cars."

Yu Anshan frowned and said, "Although the old factory buildings we rebuilt have now been converted into toy processing workshops, the space is still not enough, and we need to expand."

Now we have the products, and we also have sales channels.

However, there weren't enough items.

Wang Qingzhou sighed as he brought up the matter: "You know, Old Liu, why did he have to bring up road construction now of all times?"

Road construction is a major undertaking. Which section of the road to build and its route are all decided by the provincial government through meetings.

We need to consider both urban planning and the travel needs of residents and businesses.

Originally, building a road in front of the provincial machinery factory was a very impressive and excellent thing.

But now it's actually hindering us.

"If the road hadn't been built, several more factory buildings could have been built on that land in front of the factory," Yu Anshan sighed.

"Let's focus on getting the existing production work done first, and we can figure out the rest later." Wang Qingzhou kept his thoughts to himself and smiled.
How's the rubber workshop doing lately?

Yu Anshan rolled his eyes: "This is driving me crazy."

"Chen Luyang has come to the city, and he dumps everything on me. Even who used whose teacup has to come to me to argue! Now, every little thing in their workshop is discussed with me. I feel like I'm almost the workshop team leader."

Wang Qingzhou chuckled: "I didn't see Xiao Chen managing them like this before! Didn't the four of them discuss things and resolve issues democratically?"

Yu Anshan couldn't help but curse, "I think it was Chen Luyang who didn't want me to have any peace and quiet, and he arranged it on purpose! Especially that Dong Mangui, he runs to my office eight hundred times a day."

Wang Qingzhou asked curiously, "Is it Dong Mangui, the one who attended the meeting on behalf of Chen Luyang?"

Yu Anshan cursed, "It's him! I don't know where he gets so many requests for instructions and reports from every day! He even asks me about how to arrange the cleaning route at the workshop entrance. He's so annoying, even when there's nothing wrong with him."

Wang Qingzhou chuckled: "Sure! Since their workshop director isn't here, you'll have to forgive them."

Yu Anshan rolled his eyes inwardly.

It seems that Dong Mangui is annoyed by him, not Wang Qingzhou.

They talk about it without even blinking.

After they finished discussing business, they chatted casually for a while about everyday things.

Yu Anshan then got up and left.

As soon as Yu Anshan stepped out of Wang Qingzhou's office, he saw a figure lingering at the door of his office in the corridor.

"Deputy Factory Director Yu!"

When Dong Mangui saw Yu Anshan, a warm smile immediately appeared on his face.

"What is it now?!" Yu Anshan's face was as long as Changbai Mountain.

As he pushed open the office door, he heard Dong Mangui, who had followed him into the office, say:

"Boss, there really is something."

"A few days ago, we hired some new female workers in our rubber workshop. They said that all the new work gloves were men's sizes. They were like children wearing big boots, and they couldn't hold the rubber knife properly, so they would slip as soon as they cut."

Yu Anshan's temples throbbed, and his eyes widened. "You're coming to me about the gloves too?"

Dong Mangui quickly explained, "I wanted to resolve this too, but they said it was a safety hazard. If I cut my hand, I would have to report it as a work injury and write a statement explaining the situation."

(End of this chapter)