Chapter 5 Newcomers join the team
Although Liu Jun is usually only responsible for pulling carts and moving goods in the brigade, in fact, he also does a lot of other work.

It is the short slack season during farming. Usually at this time, Liu Jun would go out to find some odd jobs. In addition to pulling a cart, he has also learned a lot of skills over the years. He can do some carpentry and bricklaying, but he is not proficient in the skills and can only help others. It is also relying on these skills that Liu Jun has been able to earn some extra money in recent years and enjoy good food and wine.

To build a house in the village, one needs to obtain land, but this is a deserted mountain area with no one to take care of it. Xu Qiang obviously wants to turn this place into his own "base" for starting a business.

"how much time is required?"

“Three or four days at most!”

"Very good!" Xu Qiang nodded in satisfaction and said, "Tell me if you need any tools. I will report to the factory in three days. I am a little worried if you are alone here. Is there anyone else in our team that we can trust? You can bring them over to work with us."

"Zhao Gui and Wang Xigui are pretty good. They are the only two I am close to in the team."

"Zhao Gui? No, no..." Xu Qiang shook his head like a rattle and said, "He's not bad, but he has no manners when he's drunk and he says whatever he wants. I think we should go with Wang Xigui. This guy is honest and doesn't talk much. You can ask him to come and see if he's willing to work. If he is, I'll pay him 15 yuan a month... But I mean we'd better find someone from another village. I don't want the villagers to know about our business."

Xu Qiang had impressions of the two people Liu Jun mentioned. To be honest, Zhao Gui and Wang Xichun were both pretty good and good at their jobs. However, Xu Qiang did not want outsiders to know about his business. After all, speculation was a serious crime these days. So Zhao Gui, who often spoke without restraint after drinking, was obviously not suitable to be brought in now.

"Okay, I'll find someone reliable later."

"Anyway, you should build the mud house this week. Also, if I haven't come back this week, you can dig some more mud bricks and put them on this vacant land. You can do any work in the village first and don't let others know about our affairs." Xu Qiang said after a moment of hesitation.

"Don't worry, I know what I'm doing." Liu Jun immediately understood.

In fact, Liu Jun also knew that doing business these days was risky. If he didn't want to make money to marry a wife, he probably wouldn't dare to follow Xu Qiang.

Having lived for so long, Liu Jun seems to have seen through many problems. Hard work can only provide a living, and if you want to get rich, you have to find other ways.

After explaining everything, the two began to work.

Nowadays, most of the houses in rural areas are made of adobe. In normal times, when farm work is not busy, you can make adobe by yourself, which basically completes the materials for building a house. When the farming season is slack, you can find a few people and build three or four houses in a few days.

In order to save time and effort, Xu Qiang did not even use adobe bricks, but directly used the "dry-ramming" method to build the house. When building the house, he used wooden boards to fix the thickness of the wall, filled it with moist soil, and used bamboo strips instead of steel bars. Layers of soil were compacted, and after they were dry, they were considered to be formed.

Xu Qiang's father is an old bricklayer, and he has learned a lot of "true skills". He also has such dry-rammed earth tools at home, which he has brought here, so this kind of work is easy for him to do.

At noon, the two of them had a simple meal of steamed buns made of rice and pickles. By the evening, a mud house of only a dozen square meters had basically taken shape, and all that was left was a simple roof made of wooden sticks and hay.

Looking at the setting sun, Xu Qiang breathed a sigh of relief. Although he was a little tired, he was still a little excited when he saw the mud house was about to be completed.

In any case, this was already the first "base" he had established after his rebirth. From now on, this was the starting point of his future career, and it was a big step towards his future listing...

Liu Jun on the side put all the tools into the carriage. Although he still didn't understand why Xu Qiang wanted to build such a house in this remote place, Xu Qiang had already paid him the wages. As for how to do it, whatever Xu Qiang said was the final decision.

After finishing work, they walked for nearly an hour before they finally returned to the team.

"You should wear this new suit next week. People in the factory are all worldly-wise. We should not embarrass ourselves..."

After returning home and finishing dinner, Xu Qiang's mother took out a new set of clothes from the cupboard and placed them in front of him. In terms of living conditions, Xu Qiang's family is considered to be among the best in the brigade. After all, his father is a factory worker, and even if he is just a shift worker, his income is far higher than that of ordinary villagers. In addition, his mother is frugal, so he has no problem making ends meet.

In my mother's eyes, the workers in the factory were undoubtedly superior.

Workers, peasants and soldiers, Big Brother is always a worker.

According to the notice sent by the factory to his family, Xu Qiang will report to the factory next Monday, which is three days later. At that time, the factory will take him to go through the handover procedures, and Xu Qiang will officially become a rotation worker in the factory.

As for the issue of regularizing his job, he needs to solve the problem of "converting rural household registration to non-rural" first. This depends on Xu Qiang's own ability and luck. In short, it is not easy to change rural household registration to urban household registration these days. Even for a large factory like Shengli Machinery Factory, the number of vacancies per year is very limited.

"Yeah." Xu Qiang took the clothes and responded.

Looking at the dark and thin mother in front of him, Xu Qiang felt inexplicably sad. Although this was not his biological mother, he could still feel the blood relationship because of the memory of this body.

Through the memories of his previous life, Xu Qiang knew that his mother had suffered a lot over the years, and her contribution to the family was even greater than that of his father. She was usually hardworking and taciturn, a typical housewife. However, her health had been getting worse over the years, and she would often cough in the middle of the night.

As a time traveler, Xu Qiang’s idea for this family is very simple: make more money, share more housework, and continue to be a filial son.

Just as Xu Qiang was trying the clothes on to try on the size, he heard Liu Jun's voice calling him from outside.

"What's the matter?" Xu Qiang walked out of the yard and saw Liu Jun at a glance, and a short and strong young man standing beside him.

"Uncle, didn't you say you wanted to find someone? This is Erhu from my neighboring village. He has a good relationship with me and is also a good worker. Why don't you just hire him?" While Liu Jun was talking, he patted the shoulder of the young man next to him and said to him, "Hurry up and call Uncle Liu!"

"Uncle Liu." The young man named Erhu hesitated for a moment, but then greeted him with a smile on his face.

In fact, this young man was about the same age as Xu Qiang. He seemed to know the relationship between Xu Qiang and Liu Jun, so he simply called Xu Qiang "uncle".

Liu Jun was quite smart. He knew that what he and Xu Qiang were doing should not be known to the villagers, so he specially found someone from another village to help.

Moreover, Erhu is actually a distant relative of Liu Jun. As the saying goes, good things should be kept within the family, so for such a good job, family members should be given priority, which also facilitates communication.

After taking a look at Erhu, Xu Qiang felt somewhat emotional.

I saw that the young man was very strong and it was obvious that he had been doing physical labor all year round. He was wearing an old-fashioned blue people's uniform with patches all over his upper body, a pair of "urea pants" on his lower body, and a pair of tattered cloth shoes on his feet.

The so-called urea pants are from a few years ago when China had just started reform and opening up, the economy was still backward, and the people's living standards were still low. In order to solve the problem of food, China imported a large amount of urea from Japan as fertilizer to increase the yield of crops. These ureas were packed in white nylon bags with words such as "Japan" and "urea" printed on them.

At that time, the country implemented a cloth coupon system. Each person could only receive a small amount of cloth coupons each year, which was not enough to make a pair of pants. It was also difficult to buy cloth on the market, and even if there was cloth, it was very expensive. Therefore, many farmers came up with a solution: wash the used urea bags, dye them blue or black, and then sew them into pants to wear. This is the origin of "urea pants".

What Xu Qiang didn't know was that Erhu had gone through a lot of trouble to get this pair of urea pants. He received three blood transfusions under the arrangement of the president of the supply and marketing cooperative, and only then did he get a canvas urea bag. Then he got this pair of pants, which is also one of Erhu's most valuable possessions.

The production team in the neighboring village where Erhu is located is poorer than Xu Qiang's village. Some people still have difficulty in getting enough food and clothing, and it is even more difficult to find a wife. People from other villages are simply unwilling to marry into the team. Even Liu Jun's current life is a luxury for him.

(End of this chapter)