Courtyard House: The Fisherman Never Goes Sick

In the shade of the willows by the moat, Yan Bugui squatted on a small stool, the tip of his fishing rod almost poking into the water. After a long while, he finally caught two thumb-sized minnows, which clattered as they were thrown into an aluminum lunchbox. These two fish weren't even enough to fill a tooth gap!

He glanced at Yang Wei's fishing rod, which was bent into a bow, and thought to himself, "This kid's luck is too good! He just got here and he's already caught a big fish?"

An old man next to Yang Wei leaned over, stared at the aluminum lunchbox, and scoffed, "Brother, with your haul... shall we go somewhere else?"

"Change what?!" Yan Bugui retorted, "Fishing requires patience; I call this 'waiting for the rabbit to run into the tree stump'!"

As soon as he finished speaking, Yang Wei's fishing rod suddenly sank, and the reel hummed.

"They've taken the bait again!" The old man's eyes widened. "Brother, look at their luck!"

With a flick of his wrist, Yang Wei flung a three-pound carp ashore with a splash, its scales gleaming golden in the sunlight.

Yan Bugui dropped all the earthworms from his hands; three jin of fish!

It's enough to feed his family for three days, and they can even sell it for 50 cents to top up their phone credit!

"Again!" Yang Wei re-baited and cast his line, his movements fluid and graceful.

In less than a minute, the fishing rod bent again.

The old man leaned over and rubbed his hands together: "Young man, can I share some of your luck?"

"Good luck." Yang Wei smiled, and with a flick of his rod, another three-pound crucian carp was pulled out of the water.

The young man next to him couldn't help but gasp, "This...this can't be luck, can it?"

Yan Bugui couldn't stand it any longer. He moved his small stool closer, muttering, "It must be luck. How can it be so accurate every time?"

But he was very worried: he had been squatting there for three hours and the float had barely moved, while Yang Wei had only been there for a short time.

Just as he cast his third line, the fishing rod suddenly shook violently. Yang Wei jerked back, veins bulging on his arm. "Here it comes!"

"Good heavens!" the old man exclaimed, standing up. "This fish is strong; it must weigh at least four pounds!"

Before he finished speaking, a four-pound grass carp was pulled ashore, its tail kicking up dust.

The young man's eyes widened: "Grandpa, this is definitely a master! I've been fishing here for half a year, and the biggest one I've ever caught is only a pound and a half!"

Yan Bugui was completely dumbfounded. The fishing rod in his hand fell to the ground with a "thud". Three big fish in a row, all of them "tonnage" size. How could this be luck?

He glanced at the people next to him and started taking out meat coupons and grain coupons, and his heart was itching: If I could learn this skill, I would give them not only meat coupons, but also grain coupons!

"Young man, teach me!" The old man grabbed Yang Wei's arm, pulled out three meat coupons, and said, "This is the tuition fee!"

"I want to learn too! Is ten jin of grain coupons enough?" The young man followed closely behind, slapping the grain coupons into Yang Wei's hand. "My dad works at the grain store; I'll help you buy rice and flour from now on!"

The people fishing, strolling, and selling popsicles nearby all gathered around, chattering amongst themselves:

"Master Yang, please take me as your apprentice!"

"I'll carry your gas cylinders home!"

Yan Bugui's hands trembled as he watched this scene. He had guarded the moat for half his life, yet he couldn't compare to the glory of someone else's one hour here!

Just as everyone was scrambling to hand over tickets, Yang Wei's fishing rod suddenly made a "buzz" sound, the fishing line became taut and straight, and the tip of the rod almost touched the water surface. This commotion was more intense than the previous four times combined!

"My goodness!" The old man's legs went weak and he almost collapsed to the ground. "This fish... it must weigh at least ten pounds! The moat hasn't seen a fish this big in years!"

Everyone stared intently at Yang Wei's fishing rod. Even Yan Bugui forgot his jealousy, his mouth agape. Yang Wei gripped the rod handle firmly, his arm muscles bulging, and a faint smile played on his lips: "Don't rush, the best is yet to come."

Under the willows by the moat, Yang Wei flicked his wrist, and the fishing line taut. The people who had been expecting a big fish gasped in surprise when they saw the arc the fishing rod curved: This wasn't a fish at all! It was a giant turtle the size of a millstone!

"Holy crap! A soft-shelled turtle!" The ice cream vendor's box fell to the ground with a thud. "This must weigh at least thirty pounds! We haven't seen one like this in the moat for ten years!"

Grandpa Wang rubbed his hands together and leaned closer, his reading glasses sliding down to the tip of his nose: "Brother, I've been fishing for forty years. Turtles are the smartest; they bite the hook and then escape. You... how did you catch one?"

"Just lucky." Yang Wei said casually, flicking his finger and the turtle "plop" into the aluminum basin, splashing water that wet the trouser legs of the onlookers.

As Yan Bugui squeezed to the front of the crowd, seeing the commotion, he slammed his stool down on his foot with a clatter: "This...this turtle must be a spirit!"

"Fishing King! Absolutely the Fishing King!" The young man pushed his way forward, waving his food coupons. "My dad said that to catch a turtle, you need to be 'steady, accurate, and ruthless,' and you've got all three!"

"More than just a fishing king!" Aunt Zhang, who sells vegetables, came over with a half-basket of greens. "No one within a hundred miles has this skill! Even if the Xia Kingdom's fishing competition champion came, he probably wouldn't be able to catch this many!"

Yang Wei blushed at the praise and waved his hand, laughing, "It was just luck. If you really want to learn, I'll teach you all. I can't just let you sit here staring blankly."

"Teach? Really?" Old Wang's eyes lit up like light bulbs, and his hand almost blurred as he reached into his pocket for meat coupons. "I have three jin of meat coupons here, as tuition!"

"Sir, you mustn't!" Yang Wei pressed his hand down. "Teaching you the technique is fate, exchanging fish for tickets is a token of our appreciation. With my skills, I can catch enough fish to share. It's fair that everyone exchanges fish for tickets."

Yang Wei picked up a fishing rod and demonstrated as he spoke: "To catch turtles, you need to use pig liver, cut it into small pieces, hook it, let it sink to the bottom and wait for it to bite; to catch carp, you need to use fermented rice to bait the area, and when the float 'nods' three times, then lift the rod..." He explained it in simple terms, and Grandpa Wang took notes in his notebook, while Yan Bugui stood at the back of the crowd, craning his neck as if afraid of missing a single word.

"Watch this!" Yang Wei cast his line, and the line "whooshed" into the water. In less than two minutes, the float "swished" to the bottom. He lifted the rod, and a three-pound carp broke out of the water.

"Great!" the crowd erupted in cheers. Aunt Zhang, holding up her vegetables, shouted, "Master Yang, I'll trade you my eggs for your fish!"

Yang Wei smiled and shook his head: "Don't rush, we'll exchange them all together when we catch more." He was like a precise fishing machine, teaching a couple of times and catching a fish. The fish in the aluminum basin were piled up like a small mountain, including carp, crucian carp, and grass carp, all of them lively and jumping around.

After catching about twenty fish, Yang Wei suddenly stopped: "There aren't enough fish anymore, let's move to another spot." He pointed to the willow grove downstream, "There's plenty of aquatic vegetation there, so the fish haven't been startled."

The crowd moved to a different spot with some skepticism. As soon as Yang Wei cast his line, the float started to "dance," catching one fish every three minutes and two more every five minutes, even faster than before!

Grandpa Wang slapped his thigh and laughed, "Master Yang, are your eyes radar-like? You can spot schools of fish in a second!"

"That's about enough fishing." Yang Wei put away his line; there were enough fish in the aluminum basin to go around. "Fishing is all about practice; just listening without actually fishing is useless."

Grandpa Wang was the first to rush forward, slapping three jin of meat coupons into Yang Wei's hand, then grabbing a three-jin carp and heading off: "My little grandson is growing, this fish will make nourishing soup!"

"Brother, I'll trade ten jin of grain coupons for two fish!" The young man squeezed through the crowd, stuffing the grain coupons into Yang Wei's pocket. "My mom said that if I eat the fish you caught, I'm guaranteed to get into a junior college this year!"

Yan Bugui clutched the two jin of fish he had just exchanged, his hands trembling. The fish was enough for his family to eat for a week, and he could also sell it for three mao to buy pencils for his son.

Watching Yang Wei's retreating figure, he suddenly realized that this young man was far superior to his own calculating second uncle: "This skill is something I really need to learn..."

..........

"I'll trade you egg coupons and food coupons..."

"I'll trade you my gas coupons..."

"I'll buy yours for two dollars..."

The crowd surrounded Yang Wei, pulling out their coupons and money to exchange for fish. Before long, Yang Wei had almost finished exchanging his fish.

Just then, a familiar figure approached – it was Uncle Yan Bugui, the Third Uncle. Yang Wei had already spotted him.

"Yang Wei, I'll trade you this meat coupon..." Yan Bugui handed over the meat coupon. The shrewd man knew that exchanging meat coupons for fish was more cost-effective than using money or other coupons.

Yang Wei reached out to refuse: "Uncle, Yu Li often comes to help me with housework, how can I accept your money?" He then picked up a fish and handed it to her, "This fish is for you, consider it payment for Yu Li's help."

The fish weighed only two pounds, and it was the smallest of all the fish Yang Wei had caught. It wasn't that he deliberately gave the small one; the bigger ones had already been taken by someone else.

"Yang Wei, thank you so much!" Yan Bugui was incredibly excited. Even if the fish was small, it was free! No tickets, no money, how dignified!

Compared to others, he was much more prestigious. No one in the entire hospital could get fish for free; they all had to pay with tickets or money.

When he takes this fish home, his family will surely exclaim: "He didn't have to spend any money; he was 'shrewd' enough to get it for free by targeting Yang Wei!"

Thinking of his family's flattery, he felt smug: "Yang Wei is indeed generous; I didn't misjudge him! I should ask Yu Li to help him more often in the future, and I should also say good things about him at the hospital-wide meeting!"

After thanking him cheerfully, Yan Bugui left with the fish.

Yang Wei smiled as he watched his retreating figure. He was scheming against him, but wasn't he also scheming against him? What can you do when dumplings are so delicious!

Just as Yang Wei was about to leave, he suddenly noticed a middle-aged man carrying a large bucket of lobsters passing by. A large lobster crawled out of the bucket and fell to the ground.

"Crayfish?" Yang Wei's eyes widened in surprise.

Yang Wei stared wide-eyed at the giant lobster writhing in the aluminum bucket. This thing! In his past life, it was a top-selling item at night market stalls, with mountains of spicy crayfish and garlic crayfish, selling for tens of yuan per pound! But in this era, it's a "dam killer" that everyone avoids like the plague?

He recalled news from his past life: the red swamp crayfish, introduced from North America, was introduced to China in the 30s. Because it burrows quickly and reproduces rapidly, it can leave dikes riddled with holes, making it even more vicious than termites. It can also bite off lotus buds and prey on young fish, causing headaches for farmers. The government even issued an "eradication order" for crayfish.

"If we spread the recipe for cooking shrimp, we can enjoy delicious food and eliminate this pest at the same time—a win-win situation!" Yang Wei swallowed hard. Spicy thirteen-spice, stir-fried shrimp tails, garlic-flavored shrimp... just thinking about it made his mouth water.

"Young man, wait a minute!" Yang Weichong called out to the middle-aged man carrying the bucket.

The man was a vegetable farmer from the neighborhood. His trouser legs were still covered in mud. The large lobsters in the aluminum bucket were making a "crackling" sound as they waved their claws. He had taken the bucket of lobsters home, intending to crush them and feed them to his chickens, but the chickens didn't like the hard shells and the lobsters were about to rot in the corner.

"What's wrong?" The middle-aged man stopped, both wary and curious.

He saw Yang Wei just trade three fish for half a basket of earthworms from someone else. He didn't have the necessary ration coupons and hadn't dared to join in, but now that he'd been called over, his heart pounded: "Trading fish for shrimp? Are you crazy?"

"I'll trade these remaining fish for your bucket of shrimp." Yang Wei shook the fish in his hand; they weighed seven or eight pounds, including two carp and three crucian carp, their scales still glistening with water.

The middle-aged man's eyes lit up instantly, then dimmed again: "Don't joke around... These shrimp are already in the way of feeding the chickens, and you're trading them for fish?"

"Really!" Yang Wei placed the fish on the rim of the bucket. "I'll let you try it another day. These shrimp can be made into something really delicious."

The middle-aged man was skeptical, but looking at the shrimp wriggling in the bucket and then at the fresh fish in Yang Wei's hand, he gritted his teeth and said, "Fine! Trade! You can take the shrimp, and the bucket is yours too!" After all, the shrimp would just go bad anyway, and the fish could be exchanged for half a bag of cornmeal, so it was a good deal!

"Are you crazy? Seven or eight pounds of fish for a bucket of garbage!"

"Those shrimp claws can pinch your hand, and the meat is so tough it hurts your teeth. Trading them for fish would be a huge loss!"

The onlookers were in an uproar. They had just seen Yang Wei catch five big fish in a row and were thinking about how to become his apprentices, but in the blink of an eye, they saw him exchange his "trophies" for a pile of "junk," and they immediately felt sorry for him.

Yang Wei carried the bucket home, the shrimp inside making a "crunching" sound as they bumped against the sides. He patted his belly and laughed, "Just wait, tomorrow I'll show you what it means to go from trash to swan."

The setting sun cast a long shadow over him, and the large lobsters in the bucket shone bright red.

……

In the drafty earthen kitchen of the Jia family, oil sizzled and sparked. Jia Zhangshi, wearing a patched blue apron, was stirring the stinky tofu in the oil pan with chopsticks. She made it according to the old family method: the tofu was cut into pieces, soaked in swill and rotten vegetable leaves for three days, and today it was finally going to be fried.

"It's ready!" Just as Jia Zhangshi picked up a piece, Banggeng eagerly grabbed it from the stove with his dirty little hands. "Hot! Hot!" he grimaced and breathed out, but still took a big bite, his cheeks puffed out like a little hamster.

But after only a couple of chews, Banggeng frowned, spitting the tofu onto the table with a pout: "It's awful! It's nowhere near as good as Yang Wei's!"

"What?" Jia Zhangshi was blowing on her oily hands when she heard this and her eyes widened. "Aren't they all stinky tofu? Why doesn't it taste good?" She looked at the half piece of tofu that Bang Geng had spat out. The golden and crispy outer skin was still steaming. What was wrong with it?

"It doesn't taste right!" Banggeng stamped his feet in frustration, poking at the tofu with his finger. "Yang Wei's stinky tofu smells like...like the dung beetle's hole under the old locust tree at the village entrance!"

He racked his brains for an adjective, "Yes! It's that 'shit smell'! This has no smell at all, it tastes like chewing wood chips!"

Jia Zhangshi slapped her thigh in anger: "You little brat! What nonsense are you spouting!" She grabbed a broom handle as if to hit him, "Stinky tofu is made by covering it with swill, where would the excrement come from? If you keep talking nonsense, Grandma will wipe your mouth with stove ash!"

"He didn't poop!" Banggeng, hiding behind the door with his head in his hands, peeked out and shouted, "Brother Yang Wei must have secretly pooped! Otherwise, why would it smell so good?"

"You...you brat!" Madam Jia trembled with anger, the oil stains on her apron shaking. "When Yang Wei comes, Grandma will definitely ask him for the secret recipe!"

Banggeng stuck out his tongue, and while his grandmother turned away, he secretly picked up half a block of tofu from the table and stuffed it into his mouth. It wasn't actually that bad, but it lacked that "familiar stinky smell," leaving him feeling empty. He gazed out the window towards the moat and muttered to himself, "How exactly does Brother Yang Wei make his stinky tofu...?"