Double-Cut During the War of Resistance: My Wife Came from 1937

"No, so much stuff?"

As Ma Hongwei magically filled the kang (a heated brick bed) to the brim, the leaders present were all stunned.

Of the four of them, three came from very ordinary backgrounds.

Even though Deputy Division Commander Nie came from a relatively well-off family, he was just an impoverished landlord and a small business owner in the countryside.

Because the family owned a small dye shop, it was better than others, but not by much.

Such a large quantity of meat and fruit could probably only be afforded by landlords, warlords, and capitalists.

Commander Liu said, "Comrade Hongwei, you and Xia should keep these for yourselves!"

"Sir, how much can the two of us eat and drink?"

Ma Hongwei quickly said, "Besides, I brought these here especially for you. If you don't eat them, they'll go bad, which would be a waste of food."

"Commander, this is also a token of Hongwei's appreciation. He often tells me that he admires you great heroes the most!"

Xia Weiwei also spoke up.

"We're hardly heroes!"

Hearing this, all four of them felt a little embarrassed.

Deputy Division Commander Xu said, somewhat amused and exasperated, "We were the ones who invited you, so how did it end up with you treating us?"

"Eh!"

Ma Hongwei waved his hand and said, "Without the struggles of our revolutionary predecessors, we descendants wouldn't be enjoying this blessing. Let me treat you!"

"To be honest, I feel like I'm not even really presenting this much!"

In later generations, resources were abundant, and even in county-level cities in inland areas like theirs, all kinds of seafood were readily available.

The reason Ma Hongwei didn't bring his own wasn't because he was stingy with the money, but because he was afraid the leaders wouldn't accept it.

After all, during the Republic of China era, China was still being bullied by Japan, and the people were still suffering.

These Eighth Route Army cadres certainly wouldn't want to eat those delicacies.

As for those like the Kuomintang, during famine years when ordinary people couldn't even afford tree bark to eat, they still had to eat braised carp noodles; those kinds of people should be shot.

"You're not even showing off all this meat?"

Commander He couldn't help but say, "Even those small landlords don't live this extravagantly. I'm not speaking up for them, but the living standards of small landlords are still far from that of large landlords. The living standards of middle-class landlords and large landlords are different."

"Of course, ordinary people lived in even greater hardship. Landlords at least had access to fine grains, but poor people couldn't afford them. They could only survive on coarse grains, sweet potatoes, and wild vegetables, and they couldn't afford meat at all, lacking oil and fat year-round!"

"My family was just tenant farmers, and we could only rent land from landlords to make a living. Every year we had to pay a lot of grain. Later, in order to make a living, I joined a mule caravan at the age of 13 and became a mule driver, specializing in selling salt, tung oil and medicinal herbs. We often had to face bandits and robbers."

The others nodded in agreement.

Even Deputy Division Commander Nie, who came from a relatively good family, never ate so many different kinds of meat in one meal.

Deputy Division Commander Xu said with a sigh, "Comrade Xia told me before how wonderful the future socialist new China will be. I didn't have much of a concept of it before, but now that you've put these meats and fruits in front of me, I suddenly have a concept of it."

"In other words, in the future, everyone will be able to eat better than the landlords, and even the poor will be able to eat this well. Life will definitely be good!"

Ma Hongwei scratched his head, thinking to himself, "If all capitalists were like Brother Donglai from our Central Plains Province, there would be less exploitation, that would be even better."

Commander Liu glanced at his watch and said, "It's still early, why don't we go and store the grain and canned goods first?"

"good!"

Ma Hongwei nodded in agreement.

So everyone stood up and walked outside.

Ma Hongwei was worried that rats would steal the food if no one was watching, and he was also worried that the hot food would cool down, so he put it back into the storage space.

"Creak!"

The gate opened, and a group of six people entered the village.

Ma Hongwei looked around and found that the houses here were mostly made of adobe or stone.

Whether it's the courtyard wall, the pigsty, or the foundation under the house, everything is built with stones.

The houses inside were all made of adobe, with a layer of whitewash on the outside for rain protection.

The roof was thatched.

Only a very small number of wealthy families own brick houses and large courtyards.

However, with the arrival of the Eighth Route Army, those landlords had all been overthrown.

Ma Hongwei followed the group all the way.

He saw eye-catching slogans written in black and white on the surrounding walls.

Down with the landlords who eat our flesh!

Down with the warlords who suck our blood!

Down with the traitors who sold out China to Japan!

[Welcome all anti-Japanese forces to form a united front!]

Long live the Chinese revolution!

Long live the Eighth Route Army of China!

"..."

Ma Hongwei wasn't particularly surprised by these slogans.

After all, he grew up in the new China.

When he was a child, there were also slogans in the village.

However, the slogans were things like, "If one person has an extra child, the whole village will be sterilized," and "Let families with more children than allowed be bankrupted."

Ma Hongwei had heard his family members talk a lot about how strict family planning was in the past in Zhongyuan Province.

One of his aunts would take her son to the mountains every day to avoid family planning inspections.

They had three children, two girls and one boy, so they were fined five thousand yuan.

That was five thousand yuan back then.

At that time, Ma Hongwei's mother only earned 1,000 yuan a month, which was roughly equivalent to half a year's income for her.

When they weren't allowed to have children, they were willing to pay a fine to do so.

But now that the two-child and three-child policy has been relaxed, not many people are getting married and having children anymore.

Of course, family planning was something that happened decades later, and it had nothing to do with the Taihang Mountains 37 years ago.

The primary concern here today is defeating the Japanese invaders and the Kuomintang.

As for having children, we'd love for you to have several!

Soon, they arrived at the landlord's house.

This is a fortified courtyard built against the mountain, with layers of courtyards following the hillside.

In the innermost flat area, a small two-section courtyard house was built.

The outer courtyards were for the clansmen and their servants, while only the innermost courtyard housed the landlord's entire family.

The stone and mud houses of ordinary farmers are nothing compared to this.

Today, the landlord's residence has become the location of the division's confidential headquarters and rear hospital, and many Eighth Route Army soldiers come and go from here.

Many people show curiosity when they see Ma Hongwei.

After all, Ma Hongwei's skin, temperament, and clothing did not resemble those of poor people, and he seemed somewhat out of place among them.

Fortunately, with several leaders around, no one dared to do anything.

If it were just Ma Hongwei himself, he would probably have been arrested as a landlord and capitalist long ago.