By linking my account to the check-in system, I became a leisurely traveler.

Chapter 207 Crystal Radio [First Update!]

The cow's head was naturally cracked open, and the brain inside was taken out and used to tan the hide.

This whole cowhide has a very large surface area, and after tanning, it can be made into a comfortable mattress.

Even if you don't use all the material to make a mattress, the leftover scraps can be made into a comfortable recliner, thus creating a sofa.

Beef cheek and beef tongue are particularly delicious, with extremely chewy and bouncy cuts, full of collagen and fat. They are a great treat to treat yourself occasionally.

Li Younan didn't plan to go out today. After spending some time finishing these tasks, he moved a chair to the yard.

It was already early August, which sounds like a very hot season. However, for the shores of Lake Chirko, which is at a very high latitude and altitude, the summer was already almost over. In another two or three weeks, the temperature would drop.

The good thing about today is that at least it's a sunny day.

The warm sunshine shone down, making one feel drowsy.

Li Younan leaned back in the rocking chair, swaying gently, his eyes narrowed, his mind wandering as he pondered some things.

This warm period won't last much longer this month. After August, the temperature will drop sharply, falling below zero at night and only reaching a high of around ten degrees Celsius during the day.

Even in August, which is relatively warm, the weather is not necessarily very good.

Before coming here, Li Younan checked the historical climate of this area and found that it would rain for at least 16 days on average in August.

Therefore, it will be very inconvenient to look for food this month.

Fortunately, the bison had been successfully acquired beforehand, so the food problem is no longer a concern.

Not to mention that I can go fishing at the lake anytime to change things up, just the food I have at home—beef, butter, ghee, cheese curds, starch, and the sugar I made from berries a few days ago—is enough to feed me for three months straight.

Moreover, before winter officially arrives, one can go into the forest at any time to collect fresh mushrooms, root vegetables, and berries.

Once food is no longer a concern, the next thing to consider is how to make life more comfortable.

Thinking of this, Li Younan turned to look at his small house and began to consider what space he could renovate to make himself more comfortable.

There is a basic general direction, which is that everything is for the purpose of getting through the winter.

Beyond being a disguised form of travel, this place is essentially a competition with winners and losers. Li Younan had originally planned to stay for a month, collect the prize money from Douyin, and then leave... but now that he's already here...

Let's also win another championship while we're at it.

As is well known, the real decisive time is winter.

The biggest problem in winter is the cold.

Moreover, the winds along the lake will become noticeably stronger after September.

However, Li Younan didn't need to worry too much about this—the house had rammed earth walls several tens of centimeters thick and a fireplace, which provided excellent insulation, making it warm as long as he stayed at home.

Thinking about this, Li Younan suddenly realized what he should do next.

After resting for the whole morning, I cut up some beef liver and pan-fried it for lunch.

In the afternoon, he took a nap and then started working.

He cut down some spruce trees and dragged them to the backyard, where he built a wooden shed against the back wall of the shelter to provide shelter from the rain.

The wooden shed is not very large, only about two square meters, and it is not very tall either.

Li Younan was very satisfied with this small change. Next, he planned to fire a batch of bricks, build a multi-stove under the wooden shed, and then do his best to fire a few larger earthenware pots so that he could boil enough water for his bath at once.

Earthenware pots heat up more slowly than metal pots, but they also dissipate heat more slowly. As long as enough firewood is added at once and the water is boiled, hot water will always be available when you return, even if you go out.

Without hesitation, after a two-day leisurely rest, Li Younan began to get busy with his new work.

About a week later, Li Younan fired three large earthenware pots for boiling water and bricks, and then used the bricks to build a stove under the wooden shed according to his previous design.

Of course, he had already taken a bath once before that—that time he boiled five or six pots of water just to get enough.

Although the shower afterwards felt amazing, the preparation process was too much trouble.

With this set of tools specifically designed for boiling water, taking a bath becomes much easier.

……

Once Li Younan's situation stabilized, time flew by.

It rained for many days in a row throughout August, more than in previous years.

When it rained, Li Younan would comfortably stay in the shelter, never needing to use the waterproof clothing provided by the program team.

At first, staying in the shelter feels relaxing and comfortable, but after a while, it can get a bit boring.

That section of communication line hasn't been used yet, but before that, Li Younan found something else to pass the time—wood carving.

The biggest problem with wood carving is the lack of suitable tools.

To carve something exquisite, you need quite a few materials, and the only equipment Li Younan currently has suitable for fine carving is a hunting knife.

Fortunately, this hunting knife is indeed extremely tough and hard. Even if you force it, it is still usable for Li Younan, who has master-level carving skills.

Wood carving is a great way to pass the time.

Li Younan was completely absorbed in the task. He didn't do it to create an exquisite work of art; his purpose was simple: to keep himself from being bored. So, he carved whatever he wanted.

In terms of materials, they start with their own houses, such as pillars, beams, doors and windows, carving flowers, plants, dragons, snakes and mythical beasts without affecting the structural integrity.

This process will naturally be filmed and recorded.

In addition, Li Younan also went to the nearby area to dig up a lot of ores containing colored metallic substances. After crushing these ores, he made them into pigments to color the carved areas.

He played with this skill more and more abstractly, and later he simply put two large wooden stakes at the entrance of the shelter, carved two wooden lions guarding the house, and then directly painted Qin Qiong and Yuchi Gong, the two door gods, on the door with paint and brushes.

He is certainly not a superstitious person; he just did it because he found it interesting.

On rainy days, there are generally only a few things to do.

On sunny days, he can do even more.

On the few sunny days in August, Li Younan would first take a stroll in the forest, because mushrooms tend to grow after rain.

He would bring back any edible mushrooms and fungi he collected and dry them.

I originally did this with the mindset that I needed to get some exercise after the rain and go for a walk, but I never expected that I would unknowingly collect a whole vat full of dried fungi.

On sunny days, Li Younan did a few things that gave him a great sense of accomplishment. The first was to expand the house.

Do you remember where his fireplace was? It was originally built with stones. After Li Younan fired the bricks, he dismantled that part of the fireplace and then extended the empty space. He used bricks and an adhesive made from clay, lime, and wood ash to build a larger and more functional stove.

The extended space can be used to store beef, making it easier to smoke.

Li Younan has been making bricks almost constantly during this period.

The fired bricks served many purposes; in addition to building stoves and furnaces, they were also used to pave the ground in the shelter.

This made the shelter's ground level and effectively solved the problem of dampness after rain, truly giving it a homey feel.

As the program has been running for several dozen days, the frequency of physical examinations for the production team has gradually increased from once a week.

In the following five days, I even heard that it would become once every three days after a while.

For a period of time initially, the staff were shocked to varying degrees every time they came to him.

The impression these foreigners give is... that they're rather dull.

Ironically, the staff were most emotionally stable during the initial medical examination after the cattle were first hunted, when they saw the cattle.

Their first real shock came when they saw the enormous bathtub at Li Younan's shelter.

Li Younan still remembers the complicated expressions on the staff's faces when they saw the bathtub.

He certainly understood what this meant for the contestants living alone in the wilderness—after all, he had watched so many episodes of the wilderness survival show.

Although he didn't think it was anything special when he was doing it, if you put yourself in the staff's shoes, it really is a bit inhumane.

It's quite satisfying to shock these foreigners.

What Li Younan didn't know was that... the reason the staff had mixed feelings was that they also didn't have the means to shower while on duty at the camp.

The staff of the show live in conditions worse than the contestants who live alone in the wilderness. Who can they complain to?
"The other players don't know about your situation here... and they don't know whether it's a good thing or a bad thing for them."

Besides that, there's the huge collection of things he carved.

When the foreign children saw those wood carvings, it was as if they had lost their ability to speak.

Of course, in Li Younan's view, English is a language with relatively poor expressive ability. It only has a few words to express feelings over and over again, such as "My God, you are an artist, my God" and so on, which is not very original.

But it's great; being admired is always a very satisfying thing.

He later fired a second batch of porcelain, but that batch was just for fun.

After all, he had everything he needed, including pots, pans, and utensils.

Li Younan put more care into firing that batch of porcelain, not only glazing it but also painting on it with pigments.

He made a special display shelf to put the fired porcelain pieces on it.

Whenever staff came to give him a medical check-up, he would bring the porcelain to the door and show it off.

And the foreigners would indeed praise it every time. One of them even asked Li Younan if he could sell him one of the porcelain pieces when the show ended.

Later, a staff member secretly told Li Younan that, in principle, all the shelters and related furniture should have been demolished and destroyed when the show ended, but it would have been a real shame to destroy his shelter like that.

Li Younan had actually heard about this before, so he didn't feel too regretful.

Later, they simply gave a few porcelain bowls to some of the staff who were very interested in porcelain.

This seemingly unintentional act of kindness brought Li Younan a tremendous convenience.

We must mention the large roll of copper wire he had previously acquired.

Li Younan's initial purpose in actively seeking that roll of copper core wire was certainly not to use copper oxide to make porcelain.

He was a master of radio technology, and for a radio master, building a crystal radio was a piece of cake—all you needed was copper wire to easily hand-twist it.

With his woodworking skills, he could even make this crystal radio look very beautiful.

However, while crystal radios are easy to make, they are still a long way from being able to hear broadcasts from them.

The biggest obstacle is the listening device.

Anyone who frequently assembles crystal radios knows that these things are pretty useless.

Using it for post-apocalyptic survival is theoretically feasible, but if you only have the materials to make a crystal radio, it's basically useless.

You will also need a power amplifier system.

However, if you have an amplifier, you'll likely have a better radio than a crystal radio, such as a real radio.

The basic principle of a crystal radio is to collect amplitude modulation (AM) broadcast signals and convert the electromagnetic wave signals into electric current through a detector.

The crystal radio will only be useful if the electrical signal is converted back into sound that can be heard by the human ear.

However, this current energy is far too small, only a few microwatts of power.

There are only two ways to hear the sound from a crystal radio: one is to connect it to an amplifier, and the other is to use a high-impedance listening device.

The electrical components required for the former could absolutely not be made in wilderness conditions, while the latter, although theoretically possible, is also very difficult.

Headphones that can hear crystal radio sound need an impedance of at least several thousand ohms.

If a moving-coil listening device were made by winding the battery cells, it would require at least tens of thousands of turns, and insulation issues would also need to be considered.

People who frequently use headphones and speakers know very well that the impedance of a typical headphone is around 4 to 12 ohms.

However, whether it's the former or the latter, there's one thing in the equipment provided by the production team that can be disassembled and reassembled using parts... Of course, it's not the camera or satellite phone; the production team would absolutely never let you disassemble those.

It was that piece of equipment that Li Younan had never used once from the beginning until now, yet whose electronic components allowed him to assemble a high-quality crystal radio—a hand-cranked generator.

To be honest, this hand-cranked generator makes little difference to Li Younan.

Removing it probably wouldn't be considered a violation of the show's rules, but it was, after all, a feature the production team used to ensure the contestants' safety...

Therefore, Li Younan dared not act rashly.

But after he became close with the staff... things suddenly took a turn for the better.

(End of this chapter)