Chapter Thirty: Strolling Through the Market

  In the following weeks, Qiu Ye's family life was very regular. Starting at 3 am, Qiu's father and mother would go to the tofu workshop to make tofu. At around 6 am, Qiu's father would return home to cook for the children and also bring back tofu residue that Qiu Ye needed, as well as two thermoses of fresh soy milk, which was a beauty product for the three women in the family (Qiu Ye, Qiu's mother, and Zhao Shuyan).

  Qiu's father would eat his meal and then deliver food to Qiu's mother. After working at the tofu workshop until after 7 o'clock, he would go straight to work. In the morning, Qiu Ye would make meatballs at home by herself. At around 10 o'clock in the morning, Qiu's mother would come to pick her up and take her and the meatballs to the entrance of the cafeteria. Then, Qiu's mother would go to Qiu's father's unit to pull frozen tofu that had been frozen overnight and sell it at the market.

  At noon, after Qiu Ba gets off work, he goes home to cook lunch first. After eating simply by himself, he takes the meal to deliver it to Qiu Ma. After Qiu Feng finishes school and comes back, he goes to pick up Qiu Ye first, and the two of them eat together, and can also take a short nap.

  In the afternoon, after waking up from sleep, Qiu Ye would do an hour of yoga. When Qiu Feng came back around 4 pm, they would go sell meatballs together. After dinner, Qiu Feng started doing his homework and reviewing lessons, with Qiu Ye accompanying him all the way and also asking her brother to teach her knowledge from the textbook. Around 7 pm in the evening, the siblings would go downstairs to Fang's house to learn a foreign language, paint or practice calligraphy. Meanwhile, their parents would use the evening time to either make tofu at the tofu workshop or take a walk around the fields.

  These few weeks, Qiu Ye himself has earned quite a bit, with an average daily income of about 8 yuan, which is quite considerable in this era. Calculating it out, that's over 200 yuan a month, more than what a worker earns.

  As for Qiu's father and mother's tofu business, although they didn't say it explicitly, from the increasingly frequent smiles on Qiu's mother's face and her earlier return home every day, it can be seen that their family's tofu business is also booming.

  In terms of learning, Qiu Feng was unconsciously motivated by Qiu Ye, and his grades improved slightly. In addition to school assignments, Fang Haibo also gave them tasks every day, requiring them to memorize 10 words a day, take a small test every Sunday night, and have a big test once a month. If they got everything right, there would be a monetary reward.

  Fang Haibo came to realize from their close interactions over the past few weeks that both his godson and goddaughter were money-minded. As soon as money was mentioned, his goddaughter's eyes would sparkle with excitement, full of energy. His godson wasn't like this at first, but later he too became like his sister, looking at everything in terms of money. Fang Haibo sighed, thinking that indeed, "those who live near vermilion are stained red, and those who live near ink are stained black".

  I don't know if it's because of rebirth or because I'm still young and my brain is good, but Qiu Ye feels that learning English now is very easy. Every day, she does the 10 words left by her dad, and after reciting them a few times, she can memorize all of them. As long as she reviews them every day for the next few days, she won't forget them. It's really amazing.

  But when she saw her brother remembering words more easily than her, she was calm, this wasn't a benefit brought by rebirth, she could only sigh, being young is really good.

  They both seriously completed the tasks left by their godfather, striving to get rewards every week. Although it was only a small amount of money, every little bit counts, and Qiu Ye would never let it go.

  Qiu Ye has been wandering around the hospital all along, this week she wants to go to Central Street to take a look, see if she can get some other things to sell and expand the types of business, and also go to the post office to see if there are any monkey tickets for sale.

  She had actually wanted to go to the post office for a long time, but she has been busy making money these few weeks and didn't want to waste even one day, after all it's 8 dollars.

  She found out that the sales of steamed buns on Sundays were the lowest, as many people went back home or went out, or slept in their dorms. In short, there were the fewest customers buying at noon on Sundays, so she planned to go to the market on Sundays.

  Zhou Tian Qiu Ye and her brother slept until they woke up naturally, after eating, the two of them walked to Central Avenue with a bounce in their steps, about twenty minutes later, they arrived.

  Qiu Ye looked at the still very shabby street, and the prosperity of later generations was simply worlds apart. On both sides of the road, there were several restaurants and a few small shops, as well as a large state-owned department store. At the corner of the street was the post office she was going to this time, and opposite the post office was a Bank of China.

  The roadside has already formed a market, with individuals laying down a piece of cloth on the ground and placing their goods on top, creating a small stall. At this time, Qiu Ma had not yet arrived to sell tofu, she usually comes around 11 o'clock every day, even on Sundays she arrives at 10 o'clock. She has to complete her tasks at the tofu workshop and also take care of the tofu supply for the residential area.

  Qiu Ye pulled Qiu Feng to a stall, then asked the price. Everyone was selling their own produce: chicken eggs, duck eggs, goose eggs, and even whole old hens. Most were selling their own grains, such as corn and millet. There were also two households selling meat, one selling pork and the other selling mutton.

  It took only 5 minutes to walk from the beginning to the end, of course this is also because Qiu Ye didn't buy anything. But after all, the current market is still lacking in goods, and there are too few people selling things. Among them, there are even fewer people selling vegetables. The whole market has only one family selling vegetables, and they are still selling last year's stored winter vegetables. On the ground, there are wilted cabbage, sprouted potatoes, and moldy radishes.

  It's really nothing to look at, Qiu Ye went to the Central Department Store next door and took a look around. In summary, the location of the Central Department Store is quite large, the location is also good, and there are many goods.

  Under the glass-inlaid wooden counter, a dazzling array of household daily necessities are placed, buttons, sewing threads, wooden plugs for thermoses, Youyi brand skin cream... looks somewhat fragmented and disorderly.

  Qiu Ye's eyes were dazzled, all these things were very fresh to her, she didn't have too many memories of them. The only thing that felt familiar was the big bucket containing soy sauce and vinegar, she remembered that when she was a child, she also carried a wine bottle to fetch soy sauce.

  She stuck her eyes to the glass counter, picked out what she was interested in and asked the salesperson who was knitting a sweater inside about the price. The other party didn't respond to her at all. Qiu Ye blinked her big eyes and kept calling "Auntie" until the salesperson couldn't take it anymore. She put down the needle and thread, stood up, and said to her: "What do you want to buy?"

  Qiu Ye inquired about the prices of small items such as sesame oil and snowflake cream, then apologetically said she had no money, infuriating the sales clerk, who gave them a cold stare.

  Qiu Ye knew that the salespeople of this era were very arrogant, many people would beg them to buy things, so they had a big attitude and didn't have the idea that customers are gods like in later generations. Now buying things depends on the salesperson's mood.

  Qiu Ye pulled her brother out of the Central Department Store, secretly sticking out her tongue and playing a small prank. However, she had asked about the price, so she quietly calculated the cost of the pills.

  The bean dregs are free, the radish has been using her own family's for several weeks, and the ones at home have been used up by her. Today, one of her purposes is to come and purchase radishes. Just asked outside, radishes cost 5 cents per catty, about 30 cents for one, she can use it for about three times, that is to say, she can use about 10 cents worth of radish per day, which is not expensive.

  There is no flour here, it must be bought at the grain store with grain coupons. She has been using her dry mother's flour these days, which is still very cheap, about 0.4 yuan per time.

  There's also the cost of fuel and seasonings. Qiuye really can't calculate how much fuel is used to cook a batch of meatballs, but she knows that a 30-kilogram bottle of gas now costs 3 yuan, which her family can use for about a month or so, roughly equivalent to one mao (one tenth of a yuan).

  Seasonings are quite expensive, oil is now 70 cents a catty, she has already hit several times, and peanuts, just asked, 95 cents a catty, this is really expensive. Dried fruit is 1.3 yuan a catty, eggs are 10 cents each. The big soy sauce is from our own home, can be ignored, and that one bowl can make a small basin of seasoning, this seasoning is quite salty, so it's more economical to use.

  Qiu Ye calculated that the cost of 600 pills was about one yuan, because now the sales volume of sauce-flavored pills far exceeded that of Sichuan pills, and the most expensive oil, peanuts, and candied fruit were used relatively less. Not bad, she made several times more profit from this calculation.

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