Chapter 2 Chapter One

Dry Jinggou Village - a village that is familiar to me in my memory.This is a poor mountain village where a drop of water is as expensive as oil.There is not a single river or stream in a radius of more than ten miles. What the people drink is mud pond water accumulated by the rain.When there was a drought, the villagers had to climb mountains and ridges to fetch water dozens of miles away.In the first year of the Republic of China, a man in the village who went out and became a foreign student returned to the village. He looked at Fengshui on the left and the terrain on the right. He dug several wells one after another, but the Dragon King did not appear.Later, a few gangs of young men sold their sons and daughters for some money, and dug countless wells on the side of the village and on the mountains, all of which were exhausted.Dry well ditch village got its name from this.A village without water is like a baby without milk, and Kujinggou has always been a poor village. Since liberation, it has received state relief every year.As soon as I entered this village that year, I found that the men and women here were all wearing uniform work clothes.After inquiring, the clothes they wore were all national relief supplies.Kujinggou is surrounded by mountains on all sides, and it takes three days to walk to the county seat.The young man can't find a partner, and the girl would rather marry a blind or deaf man than fly out of this mountain nest.Several men shared a woman, the father died, and the son slept with the mother. It was all publicly admitted.Here, people's incest theory does not exist at all.In the house where I live, the son is a strong young man in his twenties. I don’t know what he ate. His back, which is as strong as a mountain, is full of males.His father is said to have died not long after he was born.His home is far away from other village households, and it stands alone in the recess where two big mountains meet.

He never gets along with the people in the village, but his house is spacious, so try it out.When the production team leader heard that we were going to live in his house, he said. Curious and anxious, we ran to his house and knocked on the door a few times.The young man came out, he was only wearing a pair of black trousers, and his upper body was bare.The slate-like chest is black and shiny, and only people who have been naked all year round can have this color.Seeing that all of us were wearing military uniforms, the young man's hostile and dim eyes suddenly shone with enthusiasm. Hey, come out and pour some water for the PLA comrades.This is how he greeted the mistress of the house.I can't imagine that his she is an old woman with a big neck.This disease is very prevalent in this area, and it is caused by eating the dirty water in the mud pond.The lad never introduced her to us, and I never asked him what else he called her, hello meant the whole thing.The appearance, age, and appearance between him and her are enough to show that they are mother and son.It's just that in the very few words and the kind of eyes where men are superior to women, I have noticed another relationship that only exists between husband and wife.And one day I accidentally discovered that there was only one bed in the master bedroom, which seemed to confirm what the production team leader said.

In order to help the villagers of Kujinggou solve the millennium worries, our troops are determined to find underground water sources for the masses in this area.This is an arid karst area. After several surveys by hydrogeological engineers, we concluded that there is groundwater in the dry well ditch area, and according to the geological data we have, there is a dragon king hidden underground here.It's just that people haven't discovered it in the past, because the Dragon King usually hides in the deep underground, and ordinary people will definitely not be able to get results by simply digging a well manually.The army used a lot of manpower and material resources to check one thousand year old cave after another, but they still couldn't find it.Finally, based on the analysis of the terrain and the data provided by the villagers, it is concluded that there should be a cave.After much trouble, we found that the opening was behind the house of this young man named Maxis.The next day, when we were about to march to the last cave exploration, we didn't expect that Maxis would not let us in. I saw him standing angrily at the entrance of the cave, holding a giant ax for chopping wood in his hand, as if to Fight hard with us.

What's wrong with you, Mexico?asked our company commander. Mexi's hands were trembling, and his chest was heaving and heaving.Said: I will never let you in!This is the hole discovered by my ancestors, and you will never be allowed to collide with the gods of my ancestors. This is really weird!Helpless, it was useless to ask the cadres of the brigade to persuade us, so we had to stop the action.In the evening, I found that Mexico had thrown all our luggage out of his house. He wanted to drive us away! The fellow villagers in Kujinggou sent us away with tears in their eyes, while we left the village with regret and melancholy.There is a discipline in the army: respect the local ethnic customs when working.Yes, in order not to offend the gods of Mexico, the people in Kujinggou have to live a life where dripping water is as expensive as oil, and they have to be poor forever.What a backward mountain village, what ignorant mountain people!Xiangxi at that time left such a deep impression on me.

Unexpectedly, today, ten years later, my first interviewee with the Ministry of Geology and Mineral Resources of the State Council to investigate the out-of-control mass mining trend turned out to be Kujinggou again! Dry Jinggou is still the same, after getting off the train from Guzhang, it takes three days to walk.On the swaying walking tractor, while looking at the mountains towering into the clouds on both sides, I wondered whether after entering the village, there was still a warm scene of welcoming the comrades of the People’s Liberation Army with drums and drums, and the enthusiastic congratulatory speech of the brigade secretary .Of course, what I miss the most is Mexico. Is he still so strong and sticking to that cave?Still married to the woman who gave birth to him?

Beep——!The tractor's sudden brake suddenly interrupted my train of thought, here we are, get out of the car!The handlebar style speaks to me.Sure enough, in front of me is a small mountain village that I am familiar with but unfamiliar! Pay it! How many? 150 pieces. What, it costs 150 yuan for a distance of only twenty miles?I was amazed at such a black price from the car owner! The owner of the car had a dark face, obviously very dissatisfied, and glanced at me with obvious contempt in his eyes, and said: You didn't bring anything with you, and I drove it at a cheap price!Take the money quickly, or just leave the suitcase in your hand.He looked at me, showing a sly smile unique to mountain people.

I almost exploded my lungs!But think about what to do.If I don't give it, I know that the opponent has a vigorous look and a body that is so strong that it can be compared with the Siberian tiger. I know that I am not his opponent.Helpless, for this unlucky interview, for this friend of Rongjinggou. Here, I will give you all my half-month interview fee!I angrily opened my purse, threw three new 50-yuan bills to him, and walked towards the village. Ouch, comrade, walk slowly!He called me from behind. What, it's not enough!I was so angry that I put the suitcase on the ground, which meant: You might as well just take this thing away together.Anyway, except for an old camera, a few changes of clothes and a few manuscript papers, there is nothing valuable in it!Comrade, don't get me wrong, I, I don't mean that.Boss Che changed his face of a businessman just now, smiled and said to me: Are you a reporter?I nodded and thought to myself: Why, can reporters knock more?

I'm really sorry, I'm sorry, take this money back!Count me on your way.He returned the three new tickets to me.He said embarrassedly: I thought you were the big boss who came to receive the goods, so... big boss?Receipt?I couldn't understand what he said. Didn't you hear?Ha, our Hujinggou is on fire now!Inside and outside the mountains, even people from the provincial capital are running to us!The owner of the car became more and more enthusiastic: this spring season is still free!From June to July, I will bring in about thirty or forty foreigners like you every day. Who are they?What are you doing here?I asked curiously.

Boss Che's eyes widened, and then he laughed loudly: Why, reporters like you don't know; they are all big bosses who come here to receive goods! What are you receiving?Is there really gold here?Although when I was in Changsha, the comrades from the Provincial Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources introduced Kujinggou to me, but I came to this village ten years ago, so I have never believed how this poor mountain village, where even a drop of water is hard to find, could become a treasure gourd? That's fake!The owner of the car said richly. So, you and your village have become ten thousand households!I couldn't help but be happy.

Boss Che squinted his eyes, and Tong shook his head: "10,000 yuan households are nothing!" I'm so happy, I want to say that to him, you are a household of 100,000 yuan!He smiled, paused for a while, and said: Let’s put it this way, those wealthy gentlemen who come to receive goods from other places come to our place, and the number is usually above this number.The mountain people have their own cleverness and cunning, and he put aside the answer I want to get completely and skillfully. five thousand! He shook his head and said: Multiply by ten times! I stuck out my tongue.

You think, they come to pick so many in one trip, and it’s a fart to take my car for three or four hundred yuan into the mountains! Good boy, no wonder he charged me so much for the trip and said it was less!He thinks I'm a gold smuggler.It's a pity that he didn't know that the travel expenses of 150 yuan were almost the total of my monthly salary and bonus!The money is still in my hand, I thought about it and said: Although I am not a big boss, I still take your car, so you have to charge for it! Well, let's keep you to buy rice and oil for your wife and children, or invite some mistresses and other ladies to have a meal!This kid is also a thief. Hey, friend, tell me about the situation in the village, and is Messi still there?I can't wait to learn about Kujinggou today and the people I knew before. Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I don't have that much free time.You guys who play with ink can never finish talking, and what we have done in the past few years cannot be finished in one or two hours!The young man pushed very crisply.He felt sorry for me, so he said: Well, let's rest at my house first, my old man is at home, you can talk to him, anyway, he is fine at home all day long! This was a good idea, and I followed him confidently to a privately built wooden loft at the head of the village.This is another typical Xiangxi mountain dweller’s building. The umbrella-shaped wooden house does not use a brick and there is no brick. Except for the house foundation, which is made of stone, it is all made of wood.A box-shaped two-room room above it is a room with four sides open on the first floor. Generally, there are no people living in it, and some stored food such as corn and pepper is placed.The young man's wooden house is not much different than the wooden houses I have seen in the past, except for the structure, its area, materials, and decoration are completely different.The new boards were painted with tung oil so that they gleamed in the sun.The mountain wrapped in highland barley behind the house looks elegant and unique from a distance.If there is an oil painter who takes down this scene, I think it will be comparable to Repin's famous Italian mountain village. The young man led me into his drawing room, where I was really surprised by the furnishings.The wooden walls and ceiling are all covered with high-grade wall coverings, and the floor is covered with a big red carpet.I touched it, yes!Inner Mongolia brand products; a set of modular furniture, although the appearance is a bit rustic, but the modular cabinets in the city of that material are absolutely incomparable.TVs, refrigerators, tape recorders, button sewing machines... everything. How is it, not worse than you people in the city? I nodded in shame.When he was holding the cup for me, I saw two large rings that weighed at least 20 grams in his hands.pure?I asked. He nodded and said of course.We're not like the impostors you're wearing in town.Do you want to?I can make one that is 30% cheaper than what you buy in the city!He is very serious; then I will have to starve for half a year! He shook his head again, and smiled smugly, his demeanor was obviously mocking us urbanites who feel good about themselves. Dad, come down for a while, this reporter from Beijing is here to chat with you.He went out of the room and called to the attic.After a long while, the male voice came from above, it doesn't matter so much, you can figure it out! The young man shook his head at me: I can't help it. After the gold rush happened in the village that year, the old man was so angry that he resigned the party secretary and stayed at home all the time.He can't understand everyone, and he can't understand his son. You see, I built such a nice house for him to live in, but he doesn't like it, saying that he will never sleep in this hotbed of capitalism.No, it is exposed to the cold and heat all year round.Alas, I can't get out by the horns! Your father is the old party secretary?I hurriedly asked the young man to take me upstairs, wanting to hear how he, who has been the head of the village for thirty years, thinks of Kujinggou today. Walking up to the attic, I seemed to see that strange but familiar cadre of the production brigade.The old branch secretary is much older, but he still wears the same attire I saw ten years ago. He was wearing a blue shirt, a dry pipe, and a grass-green military cap on his head—but the color had turned whitish, and the brim of the hat was torn several times.I remember that he specially asked for this hat from our company commander. He was lying on his back on the bed, wrapped in a black quilt. On the head of the bed was a full-face portrait of Chairman Mao. The eight characters of struggle, diligence and thrift governing the country... Before my eyes was a terrible apparition.It has been more than ten years since the reform and opening up, and there is still a character of Chen Yonggui here. The old branch secretary still remembers that year when a team of the People’s Liberation Army entered our village to help dig wells.He remembered what happened ten years ago and recognized me too. Old branch secretary, Kujinggou is much richer than before, but I feel that it is not right to be rich!Can you tell me about the past few years?And that Mo Xi at the west end of the village, does he still hold on to that magical cave?I asked. When the old man heard my words, he seemed to have found a bosom friend, and trembled with excitement.You, you... are from above, let's have a good chat today, about our Kujing Village, I have been holding back the words in my heart for several years, but... but no one said it!Woooo...he actually burst into tears.The shoulders that were so thin that they were only bones trembled violently.That cry seemed to make me feel extremely sad... After a long time, he raised his head and said to me intermittently: You know a little about the past of our Kujing village. It was so poor that the eagle would not rest on the top of the tree.It's all because God cut off our source.From the land reform to 1980, I have been a brigade cadre for 30 years since I was 28 years old. I don’t know how to think about it, but there is no way to let everyone grow grain and weave cloth on their own land.I have to eat state relief every year.We are members of the Communist Party, and we eat and wear for nothing all year round. I can't bear it, but what can I do?That year, I don’t know what kind of wind was blowing. The young people in the village packed up their blankets and ran out. They went to Guangzhou and Shenzhen. They went out for a few months. Brain money money money.Xiao San, the son of Murakami Wang Gui, used to be so poor that he wore the old man's clothes. He worked for a Hong Kong boss in Shenzhen for a year, and when he came back, he had gold bumps on both hands.Boast to everyone, how much money is a gram.For some reason, Mexico, who had never been a partner, was very excited when he heard about this.He pestered Xiaosan to take him to Shenzhen.After Moxi arrived in Shenzhen, he didn't look for a job, and he didn't get along with his mistress. He often wandered around the place where foreigners lived by himself. After a few days, Moxi came back with a look of color on his face.The dog guy guessed that he must have made a fortune, but he didn't know how he made it.After a few days, Mexico left again, and after a few days, Mexico came back again.In half a year, he went back and forth twenty or thirty times.I don't know what he's doing.Anyway, a few young people in the village said that when they went up the mountain with Moxi to collect firewood, Moxi dropped a lot of money several times when he lifted his pants after pooping.After the woman in his family died of illness that year, Mo Xiguang hired 23 Taoist priests for her to chant scriptures for seven days and seven nights. That scene even included the famous live skinning in the past?Landlord Wang Manda can't afford it either!That year was a year of severe drought. Everyone couldn’t even eat a full bowl of food during the Chinese New Year, and the government’s relief did not arrive. The old and young in the village surrounded the brigade’s office and insisted on getting us to agree to slaughter the only three-headed Huangfeng in the team. Filled the stomach.How can this work? Cows are farm treasures!In the beginning of spring, it still needs to rely on it to plow the land and pull water. When the villagers saw that the brigade disagreed, they wanted Qianbu's head.At this time, Mexico came.He opened a cloth pocket and said to everyone: Take it and have a good new year!Everyone, look, my God, there are stacks of new ten-yuan bills!Everyone rushed to grab it, and almost everyone got three or four.The lovers are like a movie in a foreign country, yes, it’s called Ali Baba!We in Mexico were like Alibaba at that time.People in and out of the mountains know that Mexico is rich. As the saying goes, great wealth will bring disaster.On the 17th or 18th day of the twelfth lunar month of that year, a group of outsiders covered their faces and rushed into Moxi's house with their guys in the dark. They thought that Moxi was sleeping on the bed, so they raised their big knives and slashed at the bed.Later, it was found that Moxi was not at home at all, and the masked men began to rummage through the boxes, but found nothing. At this moment, the man who was letting the wind outside saw Moxi suddenly come out of the bushes on the cliff behind the house. The one who released the wind hurriedly hid aside, and Moxi didn't know how many pairs of eyes were staring at him in every corner of his house.But Mexico was very shrewd. When he lit the candle and saw that the things in the room were not in the same position as before, he immediately noticed someone.He was very ghostly, so he took out something from his pocket and put it on the table, went out alone, and went straight to the outside of the village.Several people in the room saw the things Moxi put on the table gleaming, and they were curious. They stepped forward to strike a match and saw that they were a few gold bumps!When the masked men saw the baby, they fought each other.The next day, the news spread in the village: Mexi's secret was also known to outsiders.Later, the cadres in the village found Moxi and asked him where the gold came from... What did Mexico say?I asked. Do you still remember the cave where your People's Liberation Army helped us find water and wanted to enter the back house in Mexico?the old man asked back. Remember. What is the god cave, it turned out to be an ancient cave palace.The old man's eyes widened and he continued to say that that day, hundreds of people from the whole village followed the militiamen and walked timidly into the cave.The inside of the cave is amazing, your uncle and I lived to be 67 years old, this is the first time I have seen such a beautiful stone, and strings of water beads dripping from the trees after the spring rain.The further you go into the hole, the more mysterious it is. There is a hole in the hole, and there is a hole in the hole, and you pass through a gourd mouth, and suddenly you hear a bang-bang sound, what's the matter, is it the king of Hades?At this moment, the timid man backed away in fright.A few basic militiamen and I walked slowly towards the sound with lights on and guns in hand.At this moment, the sound turned into a frighteningly loud white light.A few boys pulled my clothes and said: Uncle, have you ever seen a ghost?Is it true?I said what the hell, but my heart is also straight.Holding the flashlight in both hands, I looked in the direction of the white light, and what the hell do you think it is?The old man's face radiated the light I had ever seen before. I shake my head. water!This is the water you are looking for!What?Is there really water in that hole?I couldn't help exclaiming, yes, and it's very big. This is all right, Kujinggou no longer has to worry about poverty!I say happily. After hearing this, the old man's brilliance just now faded away again.You don't have to worry about being poor and faint, but what happens next makes you worry even more! how to say? Just when a few old buddies and I were so happy to find the Dragon Lord that we were about to faint, a group of young people were fighting on the sidelines.Guess why, they found the treasure cave where Mexico made a fortune!Beside that underground river, there is a very, very long sandy ditch, from which a handful of sand can be squeezed out to make pimples the size of soybeans.Villagers who were so poor that they couldn't even sleep with their wives, had a turmoil, robbing, beating, tossing and tossing for a whole day. By the time the sun went down, 4 people's arms and feet had been crushed. The injured were interrupted, but the injured were still fighting desperately with those strong and powerful people.I don't know who spread the news that we found the Jinbao Cave in Kujinggou. On the second day, thousands of people gathered inside and outside the sacred cave of the Moxi family.Everyone went crazy, and even the eighty-year-old man who hadn't gotten out of bed for more than ten years was abducted to dig gold.I don’t know what’s wrong with Master Di Bao, but before lunch that day, there was a loud noise in the cave, and then stones rained down on the gold digger’s head, and people ran out of the cave desperately , but because of the crowd of villains at the entrance of the cave, those who ran slowly or wanted to dig more gold bumps were all buried under the stones... Hearing this, my heart seemed to be hooked by a needle.How many people died? Afterwards, 6 people died in Kujinggou, 5 people from other villages, and even more were injured... The old man took out a photo from under his pillow, which showed a young couple and a child.Pointing to the photo, the old man said: My eldest son is one of six.After his death, my daughter-in-law took my little grandson and remarried to Shimen in the next county.The eldest son is doomed to be greedy for money, but I miss my grandson... Only then did I understand why old man Fang was so sad. He was not like this before. When we entered the village, everyone in the team said that the old party secretary’s bones were as hard as mountains. But now, I can’t help but sympathize. Uncle, where is that Mexico now? The old man shook his head.After he met the masked man that night and ran away, he never returned to Kujinggou. Later, someone said that when he was smuggling gold lumps in Shenzhen, his leg was broken by a gangster and he became a madman.Whether he is dead or alive now, no one knows... Ten years ago, the person Mexico was lost in my memory. Now, this Chinese Alibaba is even more interesting to me.I really want to know about this money dreamer who went from a backward valley to a modern city.I made great efforts to find him in a psychiatric hospital managed by the Shenzhen Public Security Department. Unfortunately, there was only one piece of his medical record, a very simple death record: Mexico, gender: male.About 32 years old.Claiming to be from Xiangxi, Hunan. In 1984, because of smuggling gold, people used a hammer to disable his right leg and robbed him of a large amount of money, so he suffered from madness, dementia and mental illness due to mental stimulation.After more than three months of treatment, he improved slightly.On the morning of October 15 of the same year, the nursing staff found that the patient was lying on the ground and had been dead for about three hours.The patient's nasal cavity and oral cavity were all blocked with mud. After on-site inspection, it was caused by the patient's behavior.On the day of death, send to the crematorium for cremation... Oh, sad Chinese Alibaba! Every exit and every road in Xiangxi feels more and more mysterious, not just nostalgic and curious.Because of yesterday and today in Mexico, I fell into a deep anxiety.I decided to keep going...