Rebirth of Rural Literary Life

Chapter 61 Building a House

On the 25th day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar, it is the [-]th day of the tenth month according to the Gregorian calendar.

In the early morning of this day, the two small earthen houses of He Ping's house were already full of men, women and children from the production team, at least there were more than 30 people.

He Ping is not a heartthrob. Naturally, it is impossible for the entire production team to come and help him build a house, but three, no. 40 people, are definitely more than enough to build a small rural courtyard.

As soon as construction started here, Zhang Guoqiang came, followed by two donkey carts, pulling building materials.

He Ping was overjoyed when he saw it, "Guoqiang is here."

"I'm here to bring you building materials." Zhang Guoqiang didn't show any politeness to He Ping, and started unloading the truck as soon as he greeted him.

"It's hard work, thank you so much, you helped me solve such a big problem!" He Ping said with a smile.

"Don't say such out-of-the-ordinary words, we are all friends."

After unloading the car, He Ping discovered that what Zhang Guoqiang sent this time was not only the cement, radiators, and heating pipes he needed, but also a few logs and wires.

"Guoqiang, what is this?" He Ping asked, pointing at the log.

"Hey, Warehouse Bottom, I'll pull them all over for you along the way."

Please be a man of Zhang Guoqiang's level, which can be regarded as sending Buddha to the West.

He Ping was very happy, Yuanmu said that this wire is a good thing.

Zhang Guoqiang deliberately took off his clothes for fear of getting his clothes dirty, and he wanted to help with the work after unloading the car. He Ping quickly stopped him, "I don't dare to trouble you, just watch here. Is the commune busy?"

"I asked Director Mao for a good vacation, so I won't delay the matter."

"That's good, eat here at noon."

"That's necessary. I didn't plan to go back on an empty stomach when I came here." Zhang Guoqiang joked.

Uncle Liu is an old hand at building houses. It was a wise choice for He Ping to invite him over. He didn't need He Ping's help at all. Uncle Liu had been doing this kind of work all his life, so he didn't need He Ping's help.

So He Ping became a ramming worker gloriously.

The address of the new house was chosen on the west side of the old house. Uncle Liu asked He Ping if he wanted to demolish the old house, but He Ping refused.

After all, this old house was left by the predecessors. As a time traveler, I have borrowed it. I have lived there for the past six months. After all, I have some feelings. I will use it as a utility room in the future.

Uncle Liu has been doing it for years. He used a compass to measure the direction, and then used white ash to lay the line on the ground. This is the outer wall of the house. The people who came to help skillfully started leveling the site with shovels.

Not to mention the strength of a large number of people, the building area of ​​more than 100 square meters was flattened out in less than two hours with the efforts of everyone.

The next step is to lay a solid foundation. Uncle Liu has long been optimistic. The location of He Ping's house is close to the West Mountain. The ground is full of stones, and only the surface layer is less than one meter of topsoil.In this way, the workload of ramming will be much smaller. Uncle Liu asked everyone to dig out the wall foundation according to the outer wall line that was placed in advance, and then fill it with notoginseng lime soil.

He Ping mingled with the crowd, except for He Ping, who was used to doing farm work. He had done a lot of work in building reservoirs and digging ditches in the past.

The commune members working around chatted with He Ping, "He Ping, is your friend from the commune?"

"Yes, Director Mao's correspondent asked him to get some building materials." He Ping explained.

"I said, you cultural people are capable, and the friends I know are also so capable. You can get cement and radiators for building a house."

He Ping smiled, and didn't know what to say. In this era of rural areas, the commune is already a very distant term. After all, many people don't go to the commune once a year. Of course, the more fundamental reason is that the cadres of the commune eat It is food supply, and the people in the team eat rations grown by themselves.

Hukou is like a natural moat these days, stretching between urban and rural areas, and it is extremely difficult to cross it.

It took a whole morning to deal with the wall foundation, and He Ping asked Han Zhaoguo's wife Ma Dongmei to help prepare lunch at ten o'clock in the morning.

There is no such thing as hiring someone to build a house in rural areas these days, let alone wages, just take care of the food.

Everyone volunteered to help, He Ping did not dare to neglect, the pork and vermicelli prepared yesterday came in handy.

He Ping set up a large iron pot in front of the old house. The pot at home is used for cooking, and this pot is used for cooking.

Just one dish, stewed vermicelli with pork and sauerkraut, a famous pig-killing dish in Northeast China.

"Sister-in-law, cut the meat thicker and eat the meat head." He Ping said to Ma Dongmei who was cutting vegetables.

Ma Dongmei looked at the pork in her hand with some distress. They were all good meat with three layers of flowers, and they were cut thicker. How many servings would it be enough for?

But the owner has already spoken, so she can't say anything, "Okay."

The frying pan uses meat oil, that is, lard. Vegetable oil is rarely available in rural areas these days, and lard is already very good.

Once the half-finger-thick pork slices were put into the pot, the aroma of the meat wafted out, and the members of the commune who were working far away could smell the aroma.

"The smell of this meat is so delicious."

"He Ping is fine, I'll eat pork for lunch today."

He Ping said loudly: "It's not too shabby for everyone to come to help. Today's lunch is stewed with pork and sauerkraut vermicelli, enough."

Wuhu~
There was a loud shout from the crowd.

Hearing He Ping's words, everyone is full of energy, and the tractor can drive like a Porsche.

After the wall base is finished, the process is to lay rubble. He Ping's family uses stones from the Western Mountains, mostly granite and marble, which are not particularly particular, and are mixed together.

Thirty to fifty kilograms, or even one hundred and eighty kilograms of stones, use a trowel to smear the mixed cement mortar, squeeze them together seamlessly, and slowly form a one-meter-high skirt wall. .

This is an old way of building houses in rural areas. Rubble is large and heavy, so it is perfect for skirt walls. Even if cement is not used, there is no need to worry about the risk of wall collapse.

After working all morning, the wall base and skirt wall were almost dry, He Ping went to see Dongmei's sister-in-law, and seeing that the vegetables and rice were ready, he came back to greet everyone.

"Don't be busy, everyone, come over for lunch, and take a break after eating."

These days, excluding those who have been stealing, raping and playing tricks like Han Zhaogui all year round, most of them are not lazy and spare no effort in their work. Everyone is sweating profusely. eat.

He Ping saw that there were still people working after saying hello, so he stepped forward and pulled the person over with enthusiasm, "Uncle Yuanchao, don't worry, we will do it after we finish eating."

Dozens of people eat, but He Ping’s family doesn’t have so many bowls and chopsticks. They borrowed them from neighbors. Each person has two big bowls, half a bowl of rice and half a bowl of vegetables. Gao, Dongmei's sister-in-law is in charge of cooking.

"Everyone opens up to eat, and serve it up after eating, it's enough." He Ping said proudly.

"light and spacious!"

(End of this chapter)