Chapter 34 The road of life is contained in the wine talk

The late Zhang Boju, a well-known banker in Peking, was not only famous in the financial world, but also had a very high appreciation for inscriptions, calligraphy and paintings.He conducts himself in the world with sensitivity and comprehensiveness, so his popularity is second to none in all walks of life in the old capital.He often said: "There are four main conditions for begging for a job in society. A good calligraphy, two mouthfuls and two yellows, three catties of rice wine, and four rounds of mahjong. It is suitable to have all four. You can't have all four, at least You also need to account for two items, so that you can have a good meal." Although the two sentences are in Mandarin, it is not unreasonable to chew them carefully.

The ancestors often told us younger generations: "The more you drink, the stronger your friendship, and the more you play with money, the weaker your friendship:" Therefore, for young people, except for playing cards and throwing dice for half a month in the old calendar year, gambling is prohibited on weekdays. is very strict.As for drinking, as long as you don't drink "regular wine" or "drinking too much", and have a few drinks for socializing and socializing, there is no prohibition.The author has weak wrist tendons, and was born without a pen posture. Gambling money is neither a habit nor a favorite. Fortunately, the voice is full of five notes, and the four principles are as high as you want, and you can get half of it. According to the standards set by Boju, you can handle it well. .

Although the elders in the family do not prohibit me from drinking social wine, they are not allowed to drink to the point of insanity.Therefore, every time I come home for a business, I must first go to my grandmother's room to report how the banquet was today, who was at the banquet, and how much wine I drank, and then go to the mother's bedroom to report again.Sometimes I drank a few more glasses and practiced the ability to go back to my bedroom before Yushan collapsed.Because I have never made a fool of myself in front of others, my friends say that I am not drunk, but in fact, only God knows whether I am drunk or not.

My former teacher Qian Mengqin was one of the Eight Great Wine Immortals of Tongwen Museum in the late Qing Dynasty. He often told us: "Alcohol has a different taste. If you don't drink well, it's just a gift. To toast, you must first fill your own glass with wine, and drain it. The depth of the wine should not wear a "hat" (not full of wine), and do not wear "high heels" (no bottom left). As for whether the other party wants to drink, don't If you are too fussy, maybe they are really shallow, or maybe they don’t want to toast with you. If you force someone to toast too much, you will be making yourself miserable.” This kind of demeanor and virtue of drinking has made me unforgettable all my life.

The character of a person can be best seen in punching, and wit and frankness can also be seen in punching.There is a kind of competitive person who fights with others and can only win but not lose. If he loses, he will fight endlessly. I have a good friend who is gentle, kind, musing and frugal on weekdays.But as soon as he started punching, he changed his normal routine, and a competitive heart emerged spontaneously.Friends know his faults, and he always wins and loses when punching him, and they pass the test immediately.Once, we invited a Japanese sake expert to taste our aged flower carvings at the Puli winery.The original altar-packed wine taken out of the cellar has not been shaken or exposed to sunlight, so it is naturally much more mellow and thick than the general bottled wine on the market.The two heroes met and refused to admit defeat. After the wine was ordered, the fist fight between the two lasted for more than three hours.It wasn't until the two of them couldn't control their stretched fingers that they were persuaded by their friends to leave.Although this meal is not considered to be the most drunk, the punching time can be called the longest one.

Last year when fake wine was the most rampant, there were people in the society who advocated the no-drinks movement.It is of course a meaningful activity to keep everyone from drinking too much, but it is simply impossible for a person who is addicted to alcohol to stop drinking.Therefore, I advocate that it is not necessary to control whether he drinks or not. The basic principle is that enough is enough and not chaos. In the early days, there was an unwritten rule in mainland China that four stir-fries should be served at the banquet first. As for the assorted platter, it was invented later.Up to now, people who pay attention to food hygiene still use hot stir-fry instead of cold dishes to treat guests.Whether it’s a mid-day or late-night treat, when all the guests arrive, everyone’s stomachs are almost empty. Once the four dishes are hot-fried, both the host and the guest can sit on the bottom of the table, and the host will raise his glass and start toasting after the first dish is served, unlike today’s dish of peanuts on the table. Mi, the guests are like March, who don't know the taste of wine, and can't wait, so they can't stop fighting.

In the early years, the trained servants at home, or the waiters in the restaurant, saw that the guests and hosts were enjoying themselves, and if the quarrel continued, someone would help them back home drunk, and a terrible scene would appear, so they quickly served beets or sweet soup.When the guest saw it, he knew that although the host did not issue an order to evict the guest, it was an invisible sign that he had finished the wine in the glass.How is it going now? When the guests came to the table, they saw a plate of oil swallowed fruit, or strips soaked in mashed garlic, and there were one or two friends who were addicted to Liu Ling, who cares about their fermented rice wine, as if there was no one else around. Laughing and making noise, the host can neither stop nor listen to persuasion, this kind of embarrassing scene, the author has encountered many times, fortunately, Chi Yu was not harmed, so it is lucky.However, once at a dinner party in Jianyuan, there was a friend in the seat who was the commander of the war. As soon as he was seated, the friends who did not know each other would start guessing and gambling with others.This man's fingering method is not very good, and his quantity is not too elegant. Cai Wei Sanxun has already uttered speechless, his tongue is short and his neck is thick.Some people planned to leave the banquet quietly so as not to get entangled with him, but who knew that he sat at the door and was only allowed to enter but not to exit.Everyone was at a loss, fortunately Zheng Manqing, a famous Chinese martial artist, was also at the banquet, performing push hands half-truths and half-fakes with the Commander, forcing him to step back frequently to let out the hall, and the guests came out one after another.Later, when I met friends for a treat, and the commander was present, everyone thanked me.This is the worst friend I've ever seen in my life.

Nowadays, on social occasions, they like to entertain guests with foreign wine to show their extravagance.Drinking whiskey should be mixed with some soda water, at least with a few cubes of ice cubes, but soda water cannot be bought in Taipei.Some big restaurants don’t have ice cubes and soda water to mix in. If you don’t have a few years of experience in drinking hard alcohol, you will be miserable!A British-born Rhodesian friend, Glenn, told me: "When I encounter such occasions, I always get very drunk and have a very headache. Then I came up with a wonderful way, which is to express to the host that I love Drink Taiwanese Huadiao wine, so that you can avoid the fear of toasting pure whiskey."

I was in a supermarket the day before yesterday and saw small bottles of soda already on sale on the shelves. What a blessing for drinkers.I hope that friends who like to treat guests with whiskey in the future will prepare some soda water, so as not to upset friends who are not good at toasting pure whiskey at banquets.