Chapter 2 Section 1 Reunion in a Foreign Land

In the early autumn of that year, my mother came to the southern city where I worked. This is the first time my mother has come to a big city.Before that, she had never even been to the county seat, and the farthest place she had been to was a town at the foot of the mountain more than ten miles away from her hometown.There is a temple fair every ten days in that township.Every few months, my mother would carry bamboo baskets with her aunts from the same village and go to the temple fair to buy daily necessities: soap, matches, oil, salt, sauce and vinegar.Every time I go to the villages and towns down the mountain to catch the temple fair, my mother and aunts are as excited as children celebrating the New Year. They will prepare a few days in advance, and on the day of the "meeting", they will wear what they usually don't want to wear. The foreign cloth clothes pressed at the bottom of the box.

My mother was the first person from our village to come to a big city, and it was an unusually prosperous big city in the south.She was sent by her younger brother who rode a tricycle in the county town and had seen the world. Earlier, I mailed 1,000 yuan to my family, which was enough for my mother and younger brother to buy two sleeper tickets.However, they were reluctant to spend money. They bought two hard-seat tickets in the green leather carriages, and staggered in the sweltering carriages for more than 30 hours before arriving in the city where I lived. This is the first time for mother and younger brother to take a train.

When I picked up my mother at the train station, my mother and younger brother were both wearing thick cotton padded clothes. They looked extremely eye-catching and bloated among the crowd in the street with short sleeves.They stood by the wall of the exit, looked at the people coming and going around them in horror, and looked for me in the crowd with timid eyes.As soon as they saw me, the cowardice on their faces disappeared. They held my hand and talked and laughed in their clumsy native dialect, which attracted many curious eyes. At their feet were two snakeskin bags and two canvas bags.Those two bags were used to carry steamed buns when I was in middle school. They have been washed out of their original yellow color and turned into a color that is neither gray nor white.I asked: "Why do you bring so many things? It's too difficult to carry such a long way."

My mother said: "People in the village knew that I was coming to you, and they all gave you things. This is your uncle and aunt's wish, so I brought them all." I picked up the snakeskin bag and bag, feeling that each one was heavy.I asked what was inside, and my brother said, "There are red dates, walnuts, mung beans, buns, peanuts, chili noodles, pepper noodles, and crispy melons." The younger brother said that the crispy melons were not yet on the market in our remote mountainous area at that time. An uncle who planted crispy melons in the village specially selected a few ripe crispy melons and asked them to bring them to me.Crispy melons are called cantaloupe in some places. The most delicious one is a kind of crispy melon called "little white rabbit".I know this uncle who grows melons. He has been growing melons all his life. We stole melons from him countless times when we were young. Rolling in front, we crawled behind, and stopped as soon as there was a turmoil, our whole body was pressed to the ground, and our heart beat like a drum.At that time, almost none of the melons we stole was ripe. When we got to a safe place, we smashed open these half-baked watermelons with our fists and ate them with our hands. After eating, our hands were covered with sticky sugar juice... At that time, we still stole crispy melons, and the unripe crispy melons were very bitter, so we could only eat the rind... The next day, when the uncle planted melons saw the rind and flesh, he would always yell and curse in the village.

Unexpectedly, many years later, Uncle Zhonggua sent me his first ripe melon. We took the subway first, and then the bus. We talked loudly in our native dialect on the bus, completely ignoring the surprised eyes around us.The native dialect is heavily pronounced and has a long ending. Even if you speak softly, it is like arguing with someone.The southern dialect has a soft pronunciation, Yingyingyanyan, which sounds very nice.The thick Northwest dialect is extremely different from the mild southern language, just like a rough cry suddenly came from the forest of birdsong. My mother was very curious about everything in the city. She asked me what the subway was, and I said, the subway is the train that runs underground.After thinking about it, my mother said with emotion: "Ah, people in this city can do it, and trains can run underground. When I go back and tell the people in the village, they must not believe it."

My mother was most moved by the high-rise buildings in the city and the endless traffic on the streets.My mother stood in front of a building and looked up. She said, "This building is so tall, you have to stand on your heels to look at it. Quack will definitely not be able to fly over it." People in my hometown call the magpie "Quack". I said, "There is no quack in the city." My mother asked suspiciously, "How can there be no quacks in the city? Quacks are beneficial birds that only eat bugs." I don't know how to answer.Mother thought about it, and seemed to have figured it out, so she said: "There are no crops in the city, so maybe we don't need quack."

When we crossed the road, we waited for a long time on the side of the road before the red light turned to green.My mother grabbed my arm, walked cautiously, and looked at the cars beside me in panic.My mother said: "Why are there so many cars? One by one, you can't see the end at a glance, just like ants." I said: "Living in the city, owning a house and a car, is considered a success." When I returned to the village where I lived in the fringe part of the city, my mother said excitedly: "Today I followed my son to a big city, took the subway, and also took the bus, saw the western-style buildings and so many My little sleeping car, I’ve spent all my life working in vain.” People in my hometown call the car a sleeping car, and some people call it a dung beetle, and it’s really short and small like a dung beetle.

The mother also said proudly: "I am afraid that in our entire township, Mom is the first farmer to take the subway." I said: "Probably yes, this subway is not available in every city, and now it is only available in a few big cities." The mother said with a serious expression: "My child is working for the country in a big city, so he must do it well, take the country's affairs seriously, and don't let others poke the spine." I nod.Every time I went home, my father and mother would tell me to "do the country's affairs well". The younger brother said: "Brother, you will also buy a house and a car in the city in the future, and be a city dweller."

I vaguely agreed, but in fact, I know that it is not easy to gain a firm foothold in a big city.I live in the fringe, and everyone here wants to have a place in this southern metropolis, just like me.We are all still on the first rung of the ladder and don't know how many more steps to climb. My living environment is very simple, only a small room of seven or eight square meters, a bed and a table occupy all the space.When Chi Dao heard that his mother and younger brother were coming, he moved to live in a private school and gave me his room. The newspaper office heard that my mother and younger brother came to the south from the far northwest, so they gave me three tickets to the show.The day after my mother came here, an American symphony orchestra came to the city to perform around the world.

I remember that night, my mother, who was sitting next to me watching the symphony performance, kept staring at the foreigners with tall noses and deep eyes on the stage, with a look of surprise on her face, she whispered to me: "Why do these people grow up to be so big?" This look? It’s not the same as ours at all.” I said, "That's an American." Mother asked: "Where is America? Farther than our house?" I said, "America is on the other side of the earth, much farther than our home." My mother said with emotion: "These people are also panicked. They came so far to perform for us and let us watch."

Like my father, my mother felt sympathy for anyone who felt panicked.My mother felt that these foreigners who had traveled across the ocean were very anxious, and they must have a bad life, so they performed for them, just like those opera singers in the village who only sing on weddings and weddings.When my mother watched these foreigners perform, there was a look of pity in her eyes. That night, what impressed my mother most was a tall and fat black man.The black man weighed three hundred catties, and his figure was like a ball, as if he would roll up when he fell.My mother said, "Why is this black man so dark and fat?" My mother also said that if this black man was born in our village, no one would be able to support him. At the end of the performance, many people rushed to take photos with foreigners.I also took my mother to the stage to let my mother see these foreigners she had never seen before.The 300-pound black man greeted his mother friendly and held out his hand.Mother also subconsciously stretched out her hand.As soon as the Negro took hold of his mother's palm, he let out a cry of alarm and let go.Mother's palms are full of calluses, which are as rough as sandpaper from being worn out by farm tools all her life; the calluses on the finger joints are cracked and sharp as blades. The foreigners all looked at their mother in amazement, wondering how a person's palm could become like this.I stood aside, full of sourness and bitterness in my heart. I remember that I took my mother and younger brother to watch the performance of "The Same Song". "The Same Song" was the hottest program on CCTV at that time.There were a huge crowd of people at the performance that day, most of them were young people, and my mother was probably the oldest among all the audience.Mother looked at the countless excited faces and listened to the sound of mountains and tsunamis. She was very surprised. Mother had never heard of the names shouted out of these people at the same time. singers, but my mother had never heard of any of them.Rural old people at the age of my mother have been completely abandoned outside of modern civilization. What they care about year after year is only three meals a day and spring planting and autumn harvest. To them, it is completely extravagant and alien. Just like after watching the performance of the American Symphony Orchestra, my mother only remembered the big black man; many years later, when my mother mentioned to me the performance of "The Same Song" that night, she said: "There are so many people, compared with the temple fair here." There are a lot of people on the scene. The dolls are shouting all the time, I don’t know what they are shouting.” In addition to caring about the dolls, my mother also cared about the ticket price of the performance. A ticket was as high as 680 yuan, which made my mother very surprised every time I mentioned it, "The ticket price is so high, I'm afraid to die, there are so many people watching. How do people in the city get so much money?" My mother has kept the performance tickets of the American Symphony Orchestra and "The Same Song" for many years. It seems that in my mother's eyes, those two tickets represent the life in the southern metropolis, which is a life that they are completely unfamiliar with but fascinated by. .A colleague of mine said that when he was young, a person in his village went to Beijing and brought back a pack of dim sum. After eating the dim sum, the papyrus wrapped in the dim sum had been treasured by that person for many years. The huge difference between urban and rural areas is completely beyond the imagination of my mother's generation.As long as she walks on the street, the mother from a remote village will be extremely surprised, as if she has stepped into an unimaginable magical world.There are so many small sleeping cars on the road, one after another, they are all bought by private individuals, and each car costs tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of yuan; and a farmer can't earn so much money in a lifetime.There are so many commodities in the supermarket, piled up like a mountain, you can buy whatever you want, and you can buy as much as you want, there is no shortage of anything, and you can buy everything; and there is only a temple fair every ten days in the countryside, and there are only temple fairs. Some limited merchandise.In the brand-name clothing store in the city center, a piece of clothing costs several thousand yuan, and a pair of shoes can cost as much as one thousand yuan, and they are still queuing up to buy; while my mother has been wearing her own cloth shoes before, and a 20 yuan foreign cloth dress cost ten yuan. A few years ago, this time when I was going to come to the city where I worked, I bought a pair of cloth shoes and a suit of clothes at a temple fair, and spent nearly a hundred yuan, which made her feel distressed all the time... The ticket for "The Same Song" was given by a female colleague of the newspaper office.Whenever there is a performance, the performance unit will send some tickets to the newspaper office, and the news of the performance will be published in the newspaper.Whenever a ticket is delivered, the newspaper office will post a notice on the bulletin board, and employees will claim it on a first-come, first-served basis.Some female colleagues like to watch performances, so they pay special attention to the bulletin board.That day, a chubby female colleague of the newspaper office heard that my mother had come from a distant country, so she gave me the three tickets she had received. Before that, she was going to take her parents to see it. That female colleague is very optimistic, tall and fat, weighing up to 200 catties. She has a motto that has been circulating in the circle for a long time: "Because you are kind, you are plump." She once initiated a "Fat Girls Club" and held regular meetings Activities, so many women who have low self-esteem because of obesity get rid of low self-esteem.Now, the club has as many as a thousand members, all over the country. Once, I took my mother and younger brother to the KFC store. My younger brother looked at the price list on the window and said, "I won't eat, I don't like these things." The price terrifies the younger brother.No matter how much I persuaded, my brother just refused to eat. Later, I only bought my mother a hamburger, a glass of Coke, and a bag of French fries.When my mother was eating the hamburger, I asked, "Is it delicious?" My mother said, "It's delicious, I don't know how they make it." After my mother finished eating the hamburger, I asked, "Do you still want to eat it? "My mother looked at me in embarrassment, hesitated for a moment and said: "I'm full, don't eat." I said deliberately: "This thing is very cheap, I will buy it if I am not full." How much does that food cost?” I said, “It’s not expensive, it only costs one yuan.” Finally, my mother was relieved, and she smiled and said, “Then buy another one.” After my mother was full, we walked out of the KFC store together.The mother looked back at the bearded old man at the gate of KFC, and said happily: "Today, I follow my baby to eat the food from foreigners. Mom is really blessed." Then, I went to work. After I came back in the evening, I suddenly saw that my mother was very upset, so I asked what was going on, and my mother said, "How can you lie to me? You spent 40 yuan for noon today, ah, you spent 40 yuan for a meal. I paid 40 yuan, if I had known earlier, I wouldn’t have eaten.” I knew that my younger brother told my mother the truth, and that a meal worth 40 yuan was beyond my mother’s imagination.After many years, my mother was still talking about the 40 yuan meal, thinking it was too wasteful. During the few days when my mother was in the city, we slept very late every night. We often talked about some things in our childhood, and we would suddenly shed tears as we talked, feeling both sad and warm. Like my father, my mother never felt that her life was bitter, and she always compared with the "low standard" age.The so-called low standard refers to the three years in the early 1960s, which was officially called the "Three Years of Economic Difficulty", when many people starved to death.My mother said that even the bark of the elm tree was eaten up at that time, and the weeds that only livestock eat were also eaten up, and in some places there were even extinctions.An extinct household means that the whole family is dead.In some places, "changing children and eating" appeared, exchanging children to eat. My mother said that life is now many times better than before, "the past was all good times".Like my father, my mother always said the same thing.Like the vast majority of Chinese farmers, this old couple has never known what it means to complain in their life. No matter how hard or tired they are, they never complain. They are always full of gratitude for life. Sometimes, Zhong Feng and his wife would also come to chat together, and there was no room to sit, so we moved a few small benches and sat on the roof.In the distant city, the lights are like a river of stars, while the sound of the village below is like waves, and the aroma of frying oil wafts in the air. "The city is prosperous, which is good." My mother said, "Compared with the countryside, it is really a world of difference." Zhong Feng and his wife couldn't understand their mother's dialect, so they always needed me as an interpreter.When I translated the words "prosperity" and "big difference" in my mother's mouth to them, they were deeply surprised, how could the old lady in the countryside also speak idioms?They don't know that although my hometown is a remote village, there were people living there in the pre-Qin period. Since then, Qin, Han, Three Kingdoms, Sui, Tang, Song and Ming Dynasties, it has always been an area ruled by the central government. In the market, those classical Chinese words entered the ears of the common people and remained in their hearts. One night, we suddenly talked about tomb robbery.There are many ancient tombs in our area. After the death of countless officials in the past dynasties, they would bury their bodies there in order to shelter future generations.It is said that our Feng Shui is very good there.Those who have exhausted all the tricks did not expect that they provided opportunities for future generations of tomb robbers to make a fortune. Zhong Feng, who used to be a cultural relics businessman, said that tomb robbery is an ancient industry with a long history and profound knowledge.During the Three Kingdoms period, tomb robbery was once legalized. In Cao Cao's army, there was an official position called "Mojin Xiaowei", which actually took people to rob tombs.During the Three Kingdoms period, due to successive years of wars, the common people were generally very poor. Cao Cao said in his poem: "The bones of the dead are exposed in the wild, and there is no rooster crowing for a thousand miles." How can the military salary be raised in such an environment?Therefore, Cao Cao focused on the tomb robbery business.Among the Three Kingdoms, the Kingdom of Shu is located in the land of abundance, and the State of Wu is located in the land of rice. They are all relatively rich, and the poorest is the State of Wei.However, digging people's ancestral graves is a disgraceful thing after all. There are no records of these things in all the documents of Cao Cao's era, and these things are only spread among the people. At this time, the younger brother suddenly said: "Uncle Gou Sheng will rob the tomb now."