Huayu 1992: Starting with the CCTV Young Singers Competition

Chapter 97 China in the Hard-Seat Carriage

"Make way, make way, the car is about to leave."

The staff on the platform were shouting through a metal megaphone.

20:40pm.

The lights in the plaza of Beijing Railway Station were dim and yellowish.

Lin Hanjiang squeezed into the crowd, clutching his train ticket tightly in one hand and protecting his canvas bag on his chest with the other.

Sweat had soaked through his shirt.

Lin Hanjiang reached for his canvas bag for the third time.

This contains important things such as study materials, notebooks, and sheet music.

He hid his bank card and some cash in his sock.

These days, the most dangerous people are the monsters and scoundrels at train stations.

It's alright in Beijing, but it's a different story on the train and at Guangzhou Station.

Lin Hanjiang took another look at the crumpled piece of paper, on which an address was written in pencil.

No. 331 Huanshi East Road, Yuexiu District, Guangzhou, Guangdong TV Station.

"Tickets for train number 15 bound for Guangzhou are now being checked."

The female announcer's clear and articulate voice on the radio was instantly drowned out by the clamor of the crowd.

The crowd surged toward the ticket gate like a floodgate being opened, and Lin Hanjiang was swept up in it, his feet almost leaving the ground.

He clutched the canvas bag tightly to his chest.

"Don't push, tickets, take out your tickets."

The ticket inspector shouted at the top of his lungs.

A middle-aged man in faded overalls lost his shoe in the crowd. He hopped on one foot to pick it up, but was swept further away by the flow of people.

"My shoe, ouch, it stepped on my foot."

Lin Hanjiang finally got through the ticket gate, and the platform was even more chaotic.

The green train lay sprawled on the tracks, with people peering out of every window, watching the passengers on the platform.

"Go in through the window, quick!" someone shouted.

Lin Hanjiang saw several lean men actually climbing into the car through the windows, with people outside supporting their buttocks as they were pushed up.

A young man in a floral shirt was the quickest to move, and as he climbed into the window, he waved triumphantly down below.

"Carriage 14, it's here."

Lin Hanjiang found his carriage number; the carriage door was packed with people.

"Young man, are you going to get on?" An older woman nudged his back with a woven bag from behind.

Lin Hanjiang gritted his teeth and squeezed in from the side.

"Excuse me, excuse me, my seat is inside."

It took me a full ten minutes to squeeze into my seat.

The hard seat by the window was one that Lin Hanjiang had specially queued up for three days in advance to buy.

If I had the money to buy a car right now, I wouldn't be in such a sorry state.

"Going to Guangzhou?" the person next to me asked.

Lin Hanjiang turned his head and was a man in his forties with skin as dark as the earth after the autumn harvest and deep wrinkles around his eyes that could hold a coin.

Beside him lay a bulging snakeskin bag, tightly tied with hemp rope.

"Um.

""

Lin Hanjiang nodded.

"work to earn a living?"

The man took out his crumpled cigarette pack, thought for a moment, and then put it back in; the smell of cigarettes was too strong.

"Let's take a look first."

"What are you looking at? Money is everywhere in the South."

A young face suddenly appeared in the back row.

It was that young man in the floral shirt who climbed in through the car window. His hair was slicked back and shiny, with a curled strand in front, giving him a resemblance to Mark Gor from Hong Kong movies.

"My cousin works in an electronics factory in Dongguan. He earns 300 yuan a month, with room and board provided, and he also gets a year-end bonus."

These words were like a spark falling into a haystack, instantly igniting a fire around them.

Three hundred? Really that many?

A young man wearing glasses sat opposite me, his face full of disbelief.

"I'd be a fool to lie to you."

The young man in the floral shirt raised his voice.

"My cousin wrote in a letter that their factory produces that—what's it called again? Pagers! Yes, pagers! Now, rich people in Guangdong wear them on their belts, and when they beep, it's so cool."

"My second uncle works at a ceramics factory in Foshan, earning 280 yuan a month."

A middle-aged woman in a gray cloth shirt, diagonally opposite, answered the conversation, clutching a printed bundle tightly in her hands.

"When I went home last year, I brought my child a new set of clothes, made of polyester."

"The South is still the best."

The dark-skinned man sighed.

"More than 20 young and middle-aged men left our village this year. They all went south to make a living by farming. They don't have much money left at the end of the year. My wife is hospitalized with lung disease and we are heavily in debt. We have no choice but to go."

He spoke in a low voice, but several people around him heard him.

The carriage was silent for a moment.

"Uncle, don't worry."

The young man in the floral shirt patted his chest.

"If you go to the south, you can definitely make money as long as you are willing to work hard. My cousin said that the area is developing and they need people everywhere. The wages are even higher in Shenzhen. Some construction sites can pay 500 yuan a month."

"500？"

Several people gasped at the same time.

Lin Hanjiang listened silently, his fingers unconsciously stroking the edge of the canvas bag.

He seemed to have become detached from the masses; there was only 2 yuan lying coldly in his bank account.

At 21 p.m. sharp, the train suddenly jolted.

It started up slowly with a clanging sound.

The platform lights slid backward, and the outline of Beijing gradually sank into the night.

"I'm gone."

The dark-skinned man looked out the window and said softly.

After the train left the city, the salesperson appeared for the first time, pushing a cart.

"Sunflower seeds, beer, peanuts, and tuck your legs in."

Lin Hanjiang looked at the vendors and felt a bit hungry, so he took out a flatbread from his canvas bag.

The pancake had already been crushed, so he carefully broke off a piece and ate it slowly with the boiled water from his military canteen.

He spent a long time wandering around Wangfujing today, thinking he would buy some snacks to eat on the train.

But thinking that it would be better not to get targeted, I decided to just bear with it.

"Dude, is this all you're eating?"

The young man in the floral shirt came closer, waving a bag of amber peach kernels in his hand.

"Want some? I bought it at Wangfujing, it's expensive."

"Thank you, no need."

"Don't be so polite, let's be friends. My name is Wang Dali, and I'm from Baoding, Hebei."

The young man, as if they were old friends, grabbed a handful of peach kernels and placed them on the small table in front of Lin Hanjiang.

"And you?"

"Kobayashi, a native of the capital."

"A person from the capital?"

Wang Dali looked at him with a puzzled expression.

"The capital is so great, why run south?"

Lin Hanjiang has been asked this question three times today.

He smiled but didn't answer.

The dark-skinned man opposite him came to his rescue: "The capital is good, but there aren't many opportunities. I've heard that there are opportunities everywhere in the south now."

"Uncle is right."

Wang Dali slapped his thigh.

"My cousin said in his letter that there are tons of karaoke bars and nightclubs where he lives now, and even things like 'touch-the-singing' and 'concubine selection,' and he said he'd take me to see them. Oh, and there are record companies that specialize in promoting singers, like Mao Ning and Yang Yuying, you know them?"

Lin Hanjiang looked at the kid; he seemed to know quite a lot.

Looks like I'll become an experienced driver someday.

"There's a powerful figure behind Mao Ning named Chen Xiaoqi," Lin Hanjiang said softly.

Wang Dali's eyes widened: "You know Chen Xiaoqi?"

"I read in a music magazine that he established the first singer planning department in China this year in Guangzhou."

The Guangzhou branch of China Record Corporation established a planning department and signed singers such as Gan Ping, Li Chunbo, Chen Ming, and Zhang Mengmeng.

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