Tibet.

Chapter 1388 Arrival at Gaochang
After Li Ye returned to the capital after his inspection, the weather in Chang'an became warmer day by day.

The hearts of Li Ye's daughters also grew wings and flew to the distant Jiangnan.

The study tour plan had been arranged long ago, and the departure date was set for the last day of February.

Since ancient times, sages have taught the younger generations to read thousands of books, travel thousands of miles, go out more and see more to broaden their horizons.

Therefore, studying abroad has always been an important part of the student career. Generally, a few friends would get together to travel, hire a car or a boat, take some money and go out.

When you go out, you usually spend money on three things: food, lodging and transportation.

However, the imperial court encouraged studying abroad and would take some measures to help students who went abroad to study. It would require various places to build dormitories to provide food and accommodation for students who went abroad to study. Generally, as long as the students had a study abroad permit and a student ID card, the local education department would arrange food and accommodation for them.

Accommodation is free, and they only charge a small amount for rice and vegetables, which is much cheaper than eating out. A bowl of noodles at a stall outside costs twenty cents, but in the dormitory, only a few cents are enough.

This arrangement is to reduce the burden on students, but of course, the conditions are definitely more difficult.

If the children are from a wealthy and powerful family, the travel will be different. They will be accompanied by old servants and boy servants, and they will ride on a big ship, stay in inns, and eat in restaurants. Some wealthy families are afraid that their children will be kidnapped, so they will also have guards following them.

This is all very normal. If you have the conditions, you can be more comfortable; if you don't have the conditions, you can suffer more. However, there are also wealthy families who, in order to train their children, send their children to travel with students from ordinary families, so that they can go out to suffer and temper their will. This kind of situation is not uncommon.

Even for the hundreds of noble students of the Hongwenguan, the trip was very arduous, including the Crown Prince Li Tan. They all went there to suffer. They first took a boat to Longyou, then rode on horseback, made their own fires and cooked, and slept in tents at night. After arriving in Longyou, they had to go to the fields to farm, visit mines to see mining, experience the military camp, and stay at the Chiling Garrison for a few days to experience the soldiers guarding the border. Then they went through the Dadouba Valley to travel to Hexi.

Of course, someone will take care of them. Although the conditions are difficult, they will not be exhausted. After all, they are only teenagers. They are just allowed to visit and experience. They will not be allowed to mine personally, nor will they train with the soldiers.

When they are seventeen or eighteen years old, they will go out to study, and then they will really experience hard work and training.

But even so, it took two or three months to complete a circle, and all the noble children became darker and thinner, but each of them was tempered, gained more knowledge, became more resolute in character, and had more team spirit.

But the travel of the female students of Hongwenguan Girls' School was completely different. They were all the precious girls of third-rank high-ranking officials, all teenage girls, especially three princesses, a total of 48 people. They did not go out to suffer on their study tour, but to be precise, they went to enjoy the mountains and rivers, to broaden their horizons and gain experience.

Therefore, their trip alarmed multiple departments and many counties along the Yangtze River and Han River. The Internal Security Bureau specially dispatched a thousand people to go to the eight counties where they planned to disembark for the trip in advance to set up control. Not only the female professors accompanied them, but also several maids and dozens of female guards.

They basically took the boat for the whole journey, first taking ten 1,000-stone passenger ships to Shangluo County, then playing in Shangluo County for a day, and then changing to five 3,000-stone passenger ships to Xiangyang, playing in Xiangyang for three days.

Finally, we set off on the emperor's 30,000-stone Shuguang ship, and disembarked for sightseeing in six places along the way: Jiangxia, Qiupu, Yangzhou, Jiangning, Suzhou, and Hangzhou.

The ultimate destination is Hangzhou, and there is also a chance to go out to Hangzhou Bay to see the sea. The whole journey takes three to four months, and it will be summer when we return.

This is the difference between boys and girls. Boys have to shoulder the heavy responsibility of governing the country and maintaining the society in the future, so they must be hard-working and experience the people's livelihood.

The young ladies will get married in five or six years, and traveling now is a kind of compensation for them. The conditions are very comfortable and safety is guaranteed, so their families can rest assured.

Li Ye's three daughters were so excited that they did not sleep well all night. Before dawn, the three of them gathered at the Hongwenguan School. All 48 female students were there.

Their luggage had been sent away in advance, and each person only carried a small bag. They gathered in groups of three or four to talk and were extremely excited.

At this time, the teacher Xue Wenniang clapped her hands and said with a smile: "Girls, if you need to go to the toilet, go quickly. We will leave immediately."

Xue Wenniang was the daughter of Xue Qian, a great Confucian scholar in Guanzhong. She married the son of Pei Xiangqing, the Minister of Rites, at the age of seventeen. Her husband unfortunately died of illness when she was thirty. She then became a professor in her father's Tongwenguan School, specializing in teaching the daughters of aristocratic families. She was very famous in Chang'an.

She was noticed by Empress Dugu Xinyue, who invited her to be the instructor, or principal, of the Hongwenguan Girls' School.

Ten imperial carriages had already stopped at the gate, and everyone got on the carriages. There were also six female professors, eight maids to take care of daily life, seven cooks, thirty female guards, and the tour manager, the instructor Jiang Wenliang. Amidst a lot of chatter, a full army of 120 women set off in a mighty procession.

Their first target was Guangyuntan outside Dongcheng, from where they could take a boat to Shangzhou.

In early March, the 40,000 Tang troops heading to Suiye arrived at Xizhou. Xizhou was Gaochang, which is today's Turpan Basin. It is also the most populous and commercially developed area in the entire Beiting. The Tang army stationed 5,000 troops here.

The 40,000-strong army will rest here for five days, and then continue to march towards the Yili River Valley. There are two routes to Suiye: the southern route and the northern route. The southern route is to go south from Dunhuang, enter the long Gobi Desert, and then reach Pulehai, also known as Lop Nur, and then follow the Chihe River to Qiuci, the residence of Anxi Jiedufu, and continue along the southern foot of the Tianshan Mountains. After crossing the Tianshan Mountains at Lingshan, you will be not far from Suiye.

The northern route is through Beiting, into the Yili River Valley, and finally to Suiye.

Relatively speaking, the army prefers to take the northern route to Suiye. There are grasslands and lakes along the way, which are very friendly to war horses and camels, especially the Yili River Valley and snow-capped mountain grasslands, which have magnificent scenery.

Caravans prefer to take the southern route, where there are many small countries and Sogdian settlements, so they can do business all the way.

The 40,000-strong army agreed to meet up with the Anxi army in Suiye, so they took the northern route.

The army was going to rest in Xizhou for five days, so they set up camp outside Gaochang City. Immediately, merchants heard the news and came to the camp, setting up stalls in front of the gate of the camp to do business, selling local specialties. It was very lively.

But the best business was still in the red tent area at the edge, which was the brothel area. More than a dozen brothels came there to do business, setting up dozens of red tents, and soldiers lined up in long queues.

Let me say a few more words here.

From ancient times to the present, in order to boost military morale, rulers have always found ways to address the soldiers' physiological needs. The Jiaofangsi was originally used to reward and comfort the army. High-class prostitutes with outstanding looks and good singing and dancing skills were used to reward generals, while ordinary prostitutes were used to reward soldiers. This was a national welfare and the soldiers did not have to pay for it.

The second is local condolences. When the army passes through the border, local officials will pay money from the government and organize a group of prostitutes to reward the army in order to maintain local peace.

The next group is military prostitutes. They basically follow the army from the time they enter the barracks as young people until their death. This is the most common way of life in history, and the fate of military prostitutes is generally tragic.

There are also commercial prostitutes, who do business near military camps. They are second only to military prostitutes.

The last step is to plunder women from enemy countries. Wealth and women have always been hard currency. Soldiers plunder young women from enemy countries not only to satisfy their own needs, but more importantly to sell them for money.

Sometimes we wonder where those captured women went. We didn’t see the soldiers marching with them, so they were actually sold.

If they are lucky, their family will pay money to redeem them. If they are unlucky, they will be sold to human traffickers.

But since Li Ye implemented the abolition of slavery, the Jiaofangsi no longer exists, and the military prostitute system was too inhumane and was also abolished. The only ones left are commercial prostitutes, which are also the most common form of prostitution in the Tang army at present.

There are also two types of merchant prostitutes. One is the garrison merchant prostitutes, which is the situation next to the Gaochang military camp now. No matter where they are stationed, merchants will come when they hear the news.

The other type is commercial prostitutes accompanying the army. There is no difference between commercial prostitutes and military prostitutes in form, but their nature is completely different.

Military prostitutes are slaves, completely like machines, with no autonomy and no income, except for the occasional small tip from soldiers.

Being a military prostitute is purely for making money. It is a business. They can leave when they want to, stay when they want to, and stop receiving customers if they are not feeling well. They do nothing else except receiving customers, unlike military prostitutes who have to do laundry and cooking.

Under the abolition order, the military prostitute system was abolished, and the Privy Council promulgated the Regulations on Commercial Prostitutes accompanying the Army. One of the clauses stated that brothels were not allowed to accompany the troops, only individual prostitutes were allowed to accompany the troops.

The biggest advantage of this regulation is that the price is low, but military prostitutes also earn a lot of money.

The commanders were quite welcoming to the prostitutes who accompanied the army. They could not only meet the soldiers' physical needs, but also their psychological problems. For example, if a soldier was out of control, they would call in a prostitute to comfort him and the soldier would feel better. For another example, when the soldiers held a competition, the prostitutes could come on stage to dance and liven up the atmosphere.

According to the regulations promulgated by the Privy Council, the commanders must set aside a separate area for them, not allow them to camp together, and prepare large tents and food for them.

Most of these military and commercial prostitutes were older prostitutes, around 30 years old, and they were self-employed. They charged low prices, 20 or 30 cents per time, but fortunately there were many soldiers and no madams to exploit them, so their income was generally good. They could save up some money for retirement after working for ten years, and could retire at the age of 40.

This time when the army went to Suiye, more than 200 commercial prostitutes followed them.

The army was stationed in Xizhou, and the prostitutes who followed the army all took a day off to go shopping and buy cosmetics. The business was left to the garrison prostitutes, so there were long queues in front of the red tents outside the brothels.

On the second day of stationing in Xizhou, Beiting Governor Li Feishouyu rushed over from Tingzhou and brought the latest news from Suiye.

(End of this chapter)