My Gold Rush Career Begins in 1984

Chapter 98 Being a tightwad is fine!

The rescue was just a small episode in the otherwise monotonous life of gold mining.

In fact, Zhou Jingming didn't take this matter to heart.

What he cared more about was that the asafoetida he had been soaking for several days should be fermented enough.

That evening, after returning from training in the fir forest, Zhou Jingming took out the bottle and looked at it. He found that the juice inside had turned yellowish-brown. When he opened the lid, a foul, rotten smell forced him to quickly put the lid back on.

Before it got dark, he found some cornmeal, added boiling water and mixed it until there was no dry powder left in the basin. He kneaded it into a small, round shape and steamed it in an iron pot on the earthen stove.

After steaming for about half an hour, the cornbread was cooked.

He took the cornbread out to cool, then poured some fermented asafoetida juice on top of it, put it in a basin, covered it with a pot lid, and let it simmer for more than half an hour.

Having been exposed to the stench for some time, those cornbread buns have also developed an unpleasant, foul odor.

However, quite a few fish seem to like this taste.

It's not uncommon for anglers to mix Chinese medicine into their bait. In his previous life, Zhou Jingming even heard of someone mixing musk into their bait for groundbaiting, which was quite extravagant.

As it was getting dark, he carried the fish trap and some steamed buns to a spot on the riverbank where the current was relatively calm. He put three steamed buns into the fish trap, then threw the trap into the water. He then tied the rope to a nearby bush to secure it and prevent it from being washed away.

Without sufficient ingredients, the asafoetida bait couldn't be made as finely as possible, but he believed that such bait would still attract some fish.

After a good night's sleep, Zhou Jingming went for his daily training with Wu Yang the next morning. When he returned, he didn't rush to eat breakfast, but instead carried a bucket to check on the fish basket with great anticipation.

When he reached the riverbank where the fish trap had been thrown into the water, he pulled on the rope securing the trap and dragged the fish basket out of the water.

The fish basket had barely emerged halfway out of the water when you could see water splashing everywhere inside.

exploded!

He excitedly pulled the fish trap up completely and saw more than twenty fish of all sizes inside, including blackfin bream, whitefin bream, nine-striped blackfin bream, and pike. They were all crammed into the trap, constantly wriggling their bodies and slapping their tail fins against it, making a crackling sound.

He took the fish out of the fish cage one by one, put them in a bucket, and threw the smaller ones to Jinwang who had come with him.

After he finished tidying up, he carried the harvest from the bucket back to his dugout.

Seeing Zhou Jingming return with the bucket, Wu Yang, who was already eating with his bowl, came out and glanced at it, exclaiming, "Wow... this is great! You caught so many fish!"

His voice drew Peng Yuanchao and others out to see what was happening.

There are so many fish that you can cook a good pot of them at noon and in the evening, and everyone has a smile on their face.

Strangely enough, despite the river being full of mud and murky, these fish didn't have a strong muddy smell, and even with simple ingredients, they mostly tasted delicious.

From then on, the fish trap became a treasure in the camp.

Whenever someone wants to eat fish, they will naturally carry a fish trap, stuff it with two steamed buns that have absorbed the stench of asafoetida, and put it in the water. The next morning, they will have caught something, more or less.

Ten days passed in the blink of an eye. On this day, a flock of sheep came to the barren grass slope above the fir forest behind the camp. Each sheep looked like a soft, fluffy white cloud, scattered across the large barren grass slope.

A herdsman rode behind the flock of sheep, occasionally shouting, which prompted Jinwang to bark towards the hillside from time to time.

On the small peninsula, while Wu Yang was taking a break to smoke, he joked with Peng Yuanchao: "I heard someone say that when a herdsman passes by, you should buy sheep to have a feast. Now that the sheep have arrived, why is there no sign of them?"

Peng Yuanchao was busy shoveling mud and sand into the tin chute when he heard this. He turned to look at the sheep wandering around on the hillside, threw down his shovel, ran to turn off the diesel engine, and then came back to drag Wu Yang: "It's just eating sheep, I keep my word, but you have to do some work too. Come on, let's go drag the sheep! Unlike some people, who have been panning for gold for so long and have gotten the most gold, but they're still stingy and won't give away a single penny!"

Zhou Jingming could easily tell that Peng Yuanchao was mocking him.

He thought about it and realized that he was only focused on accumulating gold. Everyone was a smart person, and with a little comparison, they could figure out how much gold he had.

Not to mention the 666 grams of gold he had hidden in the previous two trips and the 200 grams he had received when he went out to fight as a guerrilla with Wu Yang, he had been working on the water pump for a little over a month now, earning 6 grams a day, sometimes 9 grams, and now he had accumulated more than 200 grams of gold.

That's a number that's quite enviable.

Peng Yuanchao had always provided for his food, drink, and basic needs. Apart from the time when everyone shared the cost of diesel fuel, he hadn't spent any money on himself. He felt it was necessary to curb everyone's enviousness.

However, I'm willing to contribute money, but please refrain from contributing any effort!

Zhou Jingming smiled at Peng Yuanchao and took the opportunity to say a few sarcastic remarks: "Brother Peng, I don't like what you're saying. If you think I'm being given too much gold and it's not worth it, just say so. I'm free to leave anytime."

As the old saying goes, "If this place doesn't want me, there's always another place that will." I'm confident in that; I'm a person who earns a living through my own abilities.

Upon hearing this, Peng Yuanchao froze, then his face turned somewhat panicked. He quickly leaned closer and said, "Brother, I didn't mean that. I was just... just... joking with you!"

He stammered as he said this.

"I...I...I was just joking with you, don't take it seriously..."

Zhou Jingming also stammered, mimicking him, and then grinned, "Brother Peng, look how anxious you are!"

"You scared me!" Peng Yuanchao's breathing became a little rapid.

Zhou Jingming looked at him seriously and said, "Alright, since there are herdsmen passing by, it is indeed an opportunity to eat meat. The conditions in the mountains are too harsh. Let everyone take a day off today. You go and haul the sheep back, and I will pay for it. I will also treat everyone to a roasted lamb meal. I have been craving it for a long time."

Any leftovers should be dried and stored away for later. Eating well will give everyone the energy to work harder!

Peng Yuanchao was still worried about misunderstandings: "I'll pay."

Zhou Jingming frowned: "Brother Peng, why are you so reserved? I know you're a very honest person. I know what you've done for everyone during your time in the mountains."

Putting everything else aside, just the fact that you went out and remembered to bring back a plate of braised chicken for me and Wuyang makes me feel obligated to reciprocate.

Having spent so much time together, you should know what kind of person I am.

At this moment, Wu Yang, who had started the conversation, felt a little uncomfortable: "How about I pay this time?"

Zhou Jingming stared at him blankly: "What's there to argue about? Let me tell you, my lamb kebab skills are absolutely authentic... Go on, hurry up."

Seeing that Zhou Jingming was indeed not angry, Peng Yuanchao was completely relieved. He turned around and shouted for everyone to pack up their tools and return to the camp. He then called a few people to go up to the barren hillside to find the herdsmen.

Not long after, Peng Yuanchao led a few people down the hillside by pulling on the sheep's horns and forcibly dragging down five Altay fat-tailed sheep.

In fact, local herders are usually very reluctant to go near the crowded gold rush valley.

Originally, these gold rush valleys were pastures for herders, but since the influx of gold prospectors, the valley banks have been overturned and the vegetation has been severely damaged, greatly impacting grazing.

In addition, there are many restless gold prospectors in the valley. Many of them are penniless and want to freeload. Whenever herders pass by, many of them will think about stealing a few sheep to satisfy their cravings, which often causes considerable losses to the herders and frequently leads to conflicts.

Therefore, when migrating to summer pastures deep in the mountains, herders try to avoid the gold rush valley.

The reality is that gold prospectors frequent these mountain valleys, and many things are unavoidable.

These things make the herders dislike the gold prospectors, making them difficult to deal with. They usually don't give them a friendly look when they meet.

When herders move their livestock, unless it's a pasture they are very familiar with, they usually go to scout out the pasture conditions beforehand and try to avoid complicated areas.

Now, a herdsman has appeared here with his flock of sheep. He must know the general situation of the valley. Since he has come so close, he must also be planning to sell some sheep. It is much more convenient than him having to travel thousands of miles to take the sheep to the market to sell.

That's probably why Peng Yuanchao and his group were able to buy the sheep without much effort.

In the sixth year of reform and opening up, land was distributed to individual households, and money was slightly easier to earn than when people ate from the same pot in the production team. However, prices also rose considerably.

A few years ago, in northern Xinjiang, a pair of yellow rubber shoes favored by herders could be exchanged for a sheep, and a donkey could be bought for ten or twenty yuan...

But now, delicatessens in the city are displaying signs saying mutton is 1.95 yuan per jin (500g) and a sheep's head is 2 yuan. And in the vegetable market, a jin of raw mutton is 1.6 yuan per jin.

It's long past the days when a pair of rubber shoes costing three yuan could be exchanged for a sheep.

Lamb skewers are mostly made from the best cuts of lamb. The lamb skewers that Wu Yang and Zhou Jingming ate in Altan cost five skewers for one yuan. The two of them ate as much as they wanted, and it wasn't difficult for each of them to eat a hundred or so skewers. It was normal for them to spend forty yuan.

The herders in northern Xinjiang have many sheep, and since they live in the mountains, the prices are much cheaper when buying and selling them. It's impossible to bring a scale to weigh the sheep in the mountains, so the price is estimated for the whole sheep when buying.

Those sheep are standard Altay fat-tailed sheep, a branch of Kazakh sheep, and also the sheep with the best meat quality. With the revival of vegetation, they were released into the mountains and fattened up very quickly. Now they look strong and robust, each weighing about 100 jin (50 catties).

He strongly suspected that Peng Yuanchao was taking advantage of the situation to cut his losses.

No, it definitely is!
Five at once, the estimated cost must be considerable; that's a serious purchase.

As soon as Peng Yuanchao returned to the edge of the dugout, he hurriedly asked, "How much did these five cost?"

Peng Yuanchao chuckled and held up two fingers to him: "Cheap, two hundred... that works out to about forty cents a pound, and that's per pound!"

Zhou Jingming grinned; he'd suddenly had to spend two hundred yuan, which was equivalent to several grams of gold…

But the words have already been spoken, and it would be dishonest to go back on them.

So Zhou Jingming went back to his tent, counted the money he had brought, and handed two hundred to Peng Yuanchao.

Seeing his smug look, Zhou Jingming couldn't help but sigh.

At this moment, he had only one thought in his mind: if you want to do great things, you must first protect your own money. In the future, no matter who is envious, Peng Yuanchao still has to bear the burden himself. Don't pretend to be a big shot.

Being a penny-pincher is fine!

　Regarding the price of mutton, the reference is the price from 1985, which was regulated by the authorities. This was the retail price, and the negotiated price was even higher.

　　In addition, lamb skewers are sold in sets of four or five for one yuan. If you really want to eat as much as you want, you can eat more than a hundred skewers. This is what a lamb skewer owner said in a video I saw. He himself can eat more than a hundred skewers at a time.

　　However, just treat this as fiction, take it with a grain of salt, and don't take it too seriously!
　　
　
(End of this chapter)