Entertainment Era: Starting with Teaching Sister Meng to Sing

After sleeping at home, Wang Xiaozhou didn't stay home on Sunday morning. He took a minibus directly to the provincial capital.

It wasn't that Wang Xiaozhou didn't want to spend more time with his parents, but rather that his mother's love for her son only had an afternoon to last.

From the moment he woke up in the morning, his mother, who was usually all smiles and concern, started to get irritable. When she saw that Wang Xiaozhou hadn't gotten up yet at six in the morning, she started showering him with sweet words.

"You're not even eighteen yet, what are you arguing about with sleep? I've already gone out to shovel snow, and you're still sleeping here."

And do you even know what's in your pocket?

I've had a bad feeling ever since last Chinese New Year when you lit three firecrackers and used up a whole pack of cigarettes. Your dad, that idiot, even said cigarettes burn faster in winter. Now I'm telling you, did you smoke them all? Did you even inhale them?!

If he still couldn't see that something was wrong after this series of moves, he would really be a fool. Wang Xiaozhou quickly stuffed a bowl of porridge down his throat and set off. He arrived in the county town before eight o'clock in the morning.

I sent two messages to Huang Mao but he didn't reply. I figured he stayed up all night again yesterday, so I decided to just go to the internet cafe and catch him.

"One box of white tartare, three bottles of cola, cold."

They went to the front desk to get some food, walked inside, and saw that Huang Mao and his friends were indeed fast asleep in their chairs.

"At the top right corner, around the three o'clock position, there's a young woman in a miniskirt bending over."

The three blond brothers suddenly opened their eyes and looked towards the door.

The third brother, who was the first to react, turned and glared at Wang Xiaozhou: "It's winter now, what kind of stupid young woman would wear a miniskirt?!"

Wang Xiaozhou slammed the Baitashan cigarettes on the table: "Everyone, cheer up! We'll have some cold drinks later. We have important business to attend to."

These days, poor students of this age have to scrape together the money to go online, and they often don't know where their next meal will come from. But now that they see cigarettes, they actually stop sleeping. A puff of cigarette and a sip of cola, and they all become wide awake.

"Sister-in-law, you really advanced again? You're amazing, boss. When did you start writing songs?"

The third brother squinted at Wang Xiaozhou with a hint of admiration. This kid actually had a bit of an artsy streak. When he first entered high school, he clearly had better grades in science subjects, but he insisted on choosing humanities, determined to live his life in an artistic way. Wang Xiaozhou's current state was exactly what he dreamed of.

"Save those flattering words for later. Let's go see how far Wei Bin's family's sand-dredging river is from here."

Huang Mao wrapped his down jacket tighter: "It would only take about twenty minutes by taxi, but it's no use going now. People have stopped digging in the dead of winter. We found out from the people in the village by the river. At first, no one told us, but luckily Lao San knew how to get information out of them."

"I'm not here to go dig sand. Which village is it? Lead the way."

The four of them waited shivering by the roadside for a taxi, but the driver didn't use the meter and charged a flat rate of thirty yuan.

Wang Xiaozhou thought that it was not easy for drivers to work in the dead of winter, so he did not haggle over the price. It was a ten-kilometer journey, and before Huang Mao had said it would take twenty minutes, the taxi driver stopped the car on the side of the road.

"We're here, that's it."

Wang Xiaozhou took out thirty yuan from his pocket and gave it to him, then told the other three to get out of the car. He then whispered to the taxi driver, "Did you check the almanac? Don't put a light bulb in your mouth today."

On the way back, the taxi driver was itching to know what Wang Xiaozhou had said, but he didn't understand why he had said such a vague thing.

There happened to be a light bulb out in the hallway, and the taxi driver, annoyed by the situation, decided to stop the car and buy a light bulb from a roadside shop.

I fiddled with the packaging box for a while in the car and happened to see the instructions on the box.

[WARNING: Do not swallow the light bulb, otherwise it will be impossible to remove.]

"Such a small thing, and you can't even get it out of your mouth?"

The taxi driver lit a cigarette, but couldn't contain his curiosity any longer. He simply threw the cigarette away and roughly tore open the light bulb packaging.

Ignore the warnings and continue accessing!

"Oh my god, waaaaaah~"

......

After getting off the bus, Wang Xiaozhou and his group didn't go directly into the village, but instead went straight to the riverbank for a walk.

On a piece of land that was clearly farmland, there were crooked excavator tracks everywhere.

Wang Xiaozhou pointed in that direction: "Whose land is this? Are they not going to farm it next year? How can they let their excavators wreak havoc like this?"

Huang Mao explained, "When we first came here, Lao San asked us. Wei Bin's family came from this village. They were neighbors with this family a few years ago. It seems that the two sides had a dispute over something like homesteads."

Now that Wei Bin's family has prospered, they're bullying them relentlessly. They won't let anyone farm this land; they just bring in excavators and bulldoze it, and no amount of persuasion will help.

"How arrogant! They're trying to cut off people's livelihoods."

Wang Xiaozhou smiled and shook his head: "Do you know where this family lives?"

The third brother nodded: "I know, but it's no use. This family is a coward. They haven't farmed for two years and they don't dare to work with Wei Bin's family."

"It's alright, take me there."

A group of four young men entered the village, wandered around, and finally stopped in front of a dilapidated mud house.

"This family is not only cowardly, but also quite lazy. Look at the state of this house, they don't even bother to fix it."

Wang Xiaozhou sighed when he saw the house. These days, rural areas in Northeast China are not actually poor, they just can't save money. They can still afford basic necessities. It's really their own fault that this family is living like this.

"Every village has a few poor families. There are a few like that in our village too. Maybe they're just unlucky and their harvests aren't good."

The third brother, whose family was also from the countryside, spoke up to offer an explanation.

"Don't go in yet. Huang Mao and Guangwei should find a convenience store and buy some eggs and milk. Having some things will make things easier to talk to."

Wang Xiaozhou and Lao San squatted down by the door and lit cigarettes. After Huang Mao and his companion returned with the goods, they carried them inside together.

The dilapidated mud house was still inhabited by quite a few people: an elderly couple in their seventies, a middle-aged man in his forties, and a little girl around ten years old.

Upon seeing Wang Xiaozhou and the others enter the house, the middle-aged man became very wary, blocking the doorway and asking, "What are you doing here?"

Before anyone else could speak, Wang Xiaozhou said with a smile, "Uncle, we are students from the county's No. 1 Middle School. We went to play by the river today, but it got too late, and we missed the noon bus. We can only go home in the evening, so we thought we could come and mooch a meal."

As he spoke, Wang Xiaozhou gestured for Huang Mao to put the eggs and milk on the stove.

The middle-aged man's expression softened slightly: "Student, it's nothing, just a meal. Why are you bringing anything? Come inside."

It was already noon, and the middle-aged man was cooking before Wang Xiaozhou came in. Now that guests had come, it was just a matter of adding a couple more pairs of chopsticks.

Wang Xiaozhou wanted to go up and help, but the middle-aged man insisted on doing it himself, so he could only lead the group into the house.

The elderly couple on the kang (heated brick bed) inside had already overheard what the group of people had come for, and they warmly invited everyone to sit on the kang to warm up. They even took out several bananas from the cupboard for everyone to eat.

The little girl was doing her homework in the corner with her books. Apart from Wang Xiaozhou, the third brother was the kindest-looking among them, so Wang Xiaozhou told him to go and play with the little girl.

By the time the middle-aged man finished cooking and brought the dishes inside to set the table, everyone was already quite familiar with each other.

The dishes are simple, the most common farm-style dishes: cabbage stewed with potatoes, egg sauce with a few radish strips on the side, and that's a meal.

Everyone sat down around the table. The middle-aged man poured himself a small bowl of loose white liquor from the white liquor barrel. Just as the seventy-year-old woman was about to speak, the middle-aged man spoke first:

"Now that things are like this, just leave me alone, Mom."

He then asked Wang Xiaozhou and the others, "Want some refreshments?"

"all!"

Wang Xiaozhou gave Huang Mao, who had the best alcohol tolerance, a look, telling him to keep the old man company.

Huang Mao was straightforward; he downed a small glass of baijiu in one gulp.

It had been a long time since we'd had any guests, and the older man was enjoying himself immensely, the two of them happily drinking one glass after another.

Ultimately, he was getting old, and the older man couldn't help but go to relieve himself halfway through.

Seeing that the two had almost reached their limit and the time was right, Wang Xiaozhou got up and followed them outside.

In the courtyard, while the two were rinsing the water, Wang Xiaozhou asked, "Uncle, this house is quite old, isn't it? It doesn't block the wind well in winter. Why don't you fix it?"

The old man was clearly drunk, and he slurred, "You saw it all, my parents are over seventy, and my child has just started elementary school. There are so many things we need to spend money on, where would we find the spare money to repair the house?"

Wang Xiaozhou asked, puzzled, "Didn't our harvest go quite well this year? Didn't we save anything?"

Upon hearing this, the middle-aged man, who had drunk too much, immediately pointed towards the river and cursed, "That bastard digs sand by the river every year! My two acres of land near the river haven't been planted for two years. What can we possibly save up?!"

"Didn't you report him?"

"I wanted to sue this year, but my mother got sick and when I went to the county for a checkup, it turned out to be late-stage liver cancer, so I didn't dare to do anything about it. Even if I get the land back, I won't be able to farm it for many more years. What will happen to my two elderly parents and one young child after I'm gone?"

Wang Xiaozhou felt a lump in his throat, unsure of what to say. After a moment of silence, he could only change the subject: "Where's the child's mother?"

The old man had an extremely bitter smile on his face: "Did you think the child's mother ran away because I was sick?"

No! She works as a cleaner at that bastard's company!

Because that beast pays her an extra thousand yuan every month, and she needs to use that thousand yuan to send her child to school!

"I'm so damn useless. I've seen her walk into that beast's office more than once..."

After finishing his conversation, Wang Xiaozhou wasn't as happy as he had imagined. He could only pat the old man's arm and help him into the house.

At the dinner table, the older man and the blond-haired guy started talking about their childhood friends, saying they really envied the guys' age.

Wang Xiaozhou sat on the stool with his head down for a long time. Seeing that the drinking party was about to end, he finally looked up calmly at Huang Mao and spoke as if they were having a casual conversation:

"Hey Huang Mao, how's the situation with your uncle's accidental death at the construction site? Has the compensation been finalized?"

Huang Mao assumed his boss was just chatting with him, so he casually replied, "I'm down. I lost a total of 250,000."

Wang Xiaozhou: "Your uncle isn't a worker on the construction site; he was just passing by. Can he still get compensation?"

Huang Mao: "If anything happens on the construction site, the boss has to take responsibility. You can get your money back no matter where you go to court."

"oh."

Wang Xiaozhou lowered his head again. Sunlight streamed through the windowpane onto everyone, making them feel warm and cozy, except for Wang Xiaozhou, whose face was shrouded in shadow.