Chapter 14 wire and bamboo
In this village, I invited three families to make brooms, one made a large batch of brooms, and the man from that family collapsed in half after suffering from a chest disease.He had a bad complexion, and his lips were very red.Even so, until he was bedridden, he asked a nearby farmer to tie up a broom and let him receive the goods.
The other two are old people, they don't do much business, they only make brooms by their own family members.Not only these three, but the broommakers are very proud of their own finished products and belittle other people's goods.Acquired from three companies at the same time, if you check the good words here, it is likely to become a bad word about other people's family.
After the order of the broom production area increases, the price of shoal rises, and the purchase price also rises.Sometimes he cut corners and was reprimanded by his employer.By then, there were already quite a few brooms on the market, buyers hardened, payments started to fall behind, and pickiness grew.
Still, the broom sold.The problem is how to get the ordered goods delivered in time.
The broom manufacturer in Saga asked me to bring the iron wire, but the new iron wire is a controlled product, and the hands of a third party are beyond their reach.It is most suitable to tie the broom with the thin wire of No. 22 and No. 3.There was a Kokura Steel Works in Kokura, which belonged to Sumitomo Systems, and it produced shiny new products that were galvanized, but buying them at black market prices was out of the question.
At this moment, I met a man named Oda.He was a small worker in and out of the Kokura Steel Works, and achieved success in handling the substandard iron wire that was eliminated from the factory.
The so-called unqualified products are also new. When the iron wire is rolled by a machine, if there is a slight mess, the iron wire is twisted together like a thread.The steelmaking company can't take this kind of thing out of the factory, but treat it as a waste product and let Oda deal with it at a price below half the price.However, although it is half price, if you know the labor and hard work of untying those twisted wires, you will feel that it is not as cheap as the actual price.But this is a new product after all, what if there are no twisted wires?Of course, only these things can be in the hands of people like Xiao Tian.
Oda's family lives between Kokura and Moji, near the mountains and near the sea at Enmeiji Temple.After the tram passes through the tunnel, there is a pine forest, and Hiko Island can be seen ahead.Oda's home is a hut on the coast, where Oda lives with his wife and children.The sea breeze blew in through the cracks in the wooden walls of the little house.I've been to this hut several times and begged him to give me more wire to deal with.It takes about 20 minutes by tram from Shajin, where the newspaper office is located, and I can go there during my lunch break.
Oda struggled to wind up the tangled wires, calling four or five small workers for this.I sent these wires to the farmers who make brooms in Saga, and no matter which one they are very happy.Although it is a discarded product, once it is untied, it will be as good as new, so the delivery of my broom is going smoothly.
Oda naturally worked hard to get him to handle the wires from the steel mill.He gave gifts and wine to the storekeeper, and then it seemed that things went from bad to worse, and he couldn't get the wire out of the factory anymore.I can't provide Saga with all those wires, it's very embarrassing.
Oda is forty-two or three-year-old, hunchbacked, with a wrinkled face, black and dark from morning to night, and deep-set eyes that always shine.He wore a dirty military uniform and a patched coat, and walked with a lean forward look that looked poor.His wife always keeps the little house neat and tidy.Oda loves his wife very much, and once said to me: "You are from the newspaper office, please take a look at what my wife wrote!"
His wife divided the spacious corner of the wooden board room used as a workshop into four and a half stacks, and placed a table under the glass windows embedded in the wooden wall. There was always a bouquet of flowers on the table.Oda said "my wife, my wife" like a mantra.Once I asked his wife to show the tanka.She smiled shyly and said, "Why did the child's father tell you such an insignificant thing?" She is from Tokyo, but even so, she still showed me the original poems she wrote in her university notebook.I have forgotten the sentences of those short songs. It seems to say that I spent every day happily in the days of poverty.
Oda is proud of "my wife was born in Tokyo". Indeed, her voice is not like the image of wearing culottes and cotton waistcoats, and she speaks very clearly.I think she is about ten years younger than Oda.She wore her hair in a bun, and her cleansed face was neat without any makeup.
After the steel mill stopped supplying iron wire, Oda probably started to do many other things, but none of them may have succeeded.One day, he came to the newspaper office to find me.
He bid me farewell and said: "I have caused you a lot of trouble, and now I am moving to Miyazaki. There is a reservoir to be built in Shiiha, and I decided to take my wife there. There is really nothing to do here. what!"
I also caused Oda a lot of trouble, and I gave him some money as farewell.As I write this now, I really miss where he and his wife are, and what are they doing?Shiiba Reservoir has already been completed, where will Oda move to live?His girl must be married too.Oda's wife, who sings short songs, may still be in her tidy home, and she has her eyes on her grandson, right?
Since I couldn't get Oda's wire, I had to find a way elsewhere.I don't know how we met, but now I can't remember how, and I got close to a man named Zhishan.Shibayama lives in a place called Kurosaki slightly to the west of Yawata, where he has a "factory" for renewing scrap wire.According to his propaganda, the munitions factory handles a batch of 22-gauge iron wire, and can spare some for me.
So, I followed him to Kurosaki.I got off the tram and walked into the high alley on the side of the mountain.The "factory" he mentioned turned out to be a dilapidated house in front of the iron factory.Five or six women, who seemed to have been brought in from the neighbourhood, sat untangling bundles of twisted wire.Zhishan looks like a factory manager, he is the only one wearing a neat suit.
Although these spot wires are No. 22 iron wires, they are all black second-hand goods, and they cannot be compared with the galvanized and shiny iron wires that Oda brought out.
"In short, even the old iron wire, I hope you will give it to me." As soon as I asked, Zhishan said that he would not give it without paying in advance.I don't remember the amount, but it was paid out of two poor rolls.I immediately sent these to Saga and told them that although they were not as good as the wires of the past, they were still usable.No other wire came in.They also had to use those to get by.
Zhishan came to me again and said, this time there is a good product again, why don't you come and see it?I went with him on the tram and he said proudly on the way:
"Army stuff, it's old, sticky, and full of oil, so it's very difficult to roll. I ask women to roll it, and it's not efficient. So, a guy I know who graduated from the Tokyo Higher Technical School The man who invented the coiling machine. Now, the iron wire bundle is being put on it for operation, and if it is put into the track, no matter how much iron wire there is, it can be renewed."
When I arrived at Kurosaki's "factory", I was taken aback. The wooden "machine" was erected almost to the roof like a watchtower.
Shibayama introduced to me the "Chief Engineer" from the Tokyo Higher Technical School who designed this "watchtower".He didn't like to talk very much, and looked around at the "watchtower" that had just been assembled.This "watchtower" is a machine for winding wire.
"This thing is really amazing! If we start it, we can get a lot of raw materials from Hiroshima, and we can mass-produce it! This guy graduated from the Tokyo Higher Technical School, and he has a good brain! It's no match for us."
When Zhishan said this, he looked at the man climbing up the wooden machine trustingly.I looked at the "watchtower" that seemed to be designed by him, and even the carpentry was done by him. The more I looked at it, the more I felt a little unreliable.This "machine" does not use iron at all, only some iron screws are screwed in some places.
"What about the power?"
I looked at the "machine" with no screws and motors in sight and asked. "It's manual, just let two men turn the handle."
Zhishan replied confidently.
But a week later, when I went to see it, the gun still hadn't moved.
"How is this going?"
"The situation is still not good? It seems that something is wrong in the design. Now the chief engineer is stepping up to improve that point!"
Zhishan said with some listlessness.
Even if an engineer from Tokyo Higher Technical School can improve it successfully, what I worry about is getting him to take out the wire as soon as possible.
If I followed the agreed time, the wire should have been in my hands three days ago.
"There's no other way, let the women untie it by hand first." Zhishan confessed.
He said, "At least I'll give you a roll first!"
Money has been paid up front.I immediately asked them to send the coil of wire to Saga as soon as possible, and went back.
Later, when I went straight from Keihan to Saga via Hiroshima, the people who tied the brooms vented a lot of dissatisfaction on me.
"It's useless to send such a broken wire, it can't be used at all!"
"What's wrong?"
"It's not that bad. It's just that the wire was about to be strangled on the broom, and it was broken in pieces immediately, without any tenacity. It's all burned in the fire. Look at this!"
They took out the wires, bent them with their fingers before their eyes, and while they were still bending, the wires broke like pencil leads.
Only then did I suddenly realize that Zhishan said that these wires came from the Hiroshima munitions factory, so they must have been destroyed by the atomic bomb.Moreover, black oil was applied to the wire bundles to cover up the burnt area!The people who made the brooms said they had been burned by fire, but in fact they had been irradiated by atomic bombs, so they festered and decayed.
On the way from Saga Tonglai, I immediately came to Zhishan’s workshop. The wooden machine was still showing off its majestic appearance in the dilapidated workshop, but it was still. There was only Zhishan alone, the “chief engineer”, The "workers" were nowhere to be seen.
"Ah, I'm very sorry." Zhishan scratched his head and said.
"Totally deceived. As you said, these things have been bombed. And the 'chief engineer' said that the wire can be unwrapped by a machine, and chemical treatment can restore it. I believe it. Just build this one The machines that don’t work have to be changed several times by carpenters, and this alone costs a lot of money! It’s really a liar’s hands!”
he said disappointedly.
— Let’s talk about bamboo.
There are not many bamboos in Kitakyushu.The origin of bamboo is Oita, Kumamoto, and Kagoshima prefectures.
In Oita Prefecture, there is Bungotakata City, the end of the branch line from Usa Station, which is the distribution center of bamboo.
To get there, it takes three hours by train from Kokura.Bungotakada City is located at the bottom of the north side of Kunisaki Guam, and it is also a fishing port.When I walked to the street, I was shocked. Everywhere I went on the street, there were wholesale stores with bamboo piled up.These bamboos are felled from the central part of Kunitaki Guam and gathered in Takata.It is mainly used for umbrella handles, and can also be used as the skeleton of lanterns.Since the Warring States period, this area has mainly supplied goods to the Gifu area.I'm glad that the bamboo handles are just the right thickness for broom handles.
The reason why I go to Takata frequently is to transport bamboo to Saga.In addition to this, there is also a pleasure that there are many places I want to go near Bungotakada City.About 20 kilometers southward from Gaotian, there is a hall called Tuo, which is the remaining building - Fugui Temple.There are cliff Buddha groups nearby.At the end of Takada Street, there are also remnants of the Heian period, such as stone carvings of Buddha statues inlaid.
I have read descriptions of these stone Buddhas and stone statues in Kosaku Hamada's collection of essays "Research on Cliff Buddhas in Bungo".Although I wanted to see it once, I never had the chance.The same is true in Nara and Kyoto. As a broom broker and sideline business, I still have travel expenses.This kind of pleasure keeps me running more than "business".
The stone portraits are only lined up on the slope of the cliff, and they are exposed to wind and rain.Because it is sedimentary rock, the thin lines carved can only be vaguely distinguished now, and they are very worn.It seems that no one made a special trip to see these, and the stone portraits were randomly placed in the farmhouse.
Notes:
Notes: