Qi Yun's next action adheres to the policy of being cautious in words and deeds, and planning before acting, just like Sister Lin who has just entered the Grand View Garden, she doesn't dare to say a word, and she doesn't dare to take one more step on the road, lest she make people laugh at shame. The village chief took her from house to house in the village, introducing adults and children to her, and she has always followed resignedly. There are thirty or forty families living in the small village, and the kinship between each other is complicated, Qi Yun remembered how much for a while, and he just agreed casually. In this afternoon, although Qi Yun was restrained enough, he didn't make another mistake by half a step.

Dinner was eaten at the village chief's house, and the village chief's daughter-in-law slaughtered a hen that laid eggs to welcome the rare guests, and made an old bowl of stewed chicken in Yatsujin, and two bowls of vegetables were peppers and eggplants soaked in salted and salted water. The village chief's daughter-in-law brought the vegetables and small rice to the table, smiled shyly at Qi Yun, and turned around and went out. Qi Yun was already hungry and scratching his liver, and when he smelled the fragrance of the local chicken stewed in the wood pot, he couldn't wait to open his mouth and swallow the plate together, but he saw that the village chief's wife didn't come back as soon as she went out, and she heard that the village chief's family still had a son and a daughter, and she hadn't shown up until now, and she was embarrassed to say that she wanted to eat. Since she was a child, her mother taught Qi Yun that there must be rules in a girl's house, and if you can't be a guest at someone's house, the host's house will not move the chopsticks, and the guest must not move first, otherwise it will be regarded as uneducated. So now I can only wait bitterly, I forgot to wear it, and the slender figure of the village chief's wife still did not appear at the door of the earthen house where the dry base was built, Qi Yun couldn't help but cast a sad glance at the village chief, and the village chief smiled:

"Teacher Qi, you eat, eat chicken."

Qi Yun was slightly startled, and hurriedly politely said: "That...... Wait for the eldest sister, and the children will come and eat ......"

The village chief smiled, and in the dim light, the ravines and ravines on the village chief's face looked more obvious and shocking, just like the vast and calamitous plains outside the door.

"They, they're all eating in the kitchen, maybe they'll all be finished by this time."

"Huh?" Qi Yun once again showed his helplessness, "This ...... Aren't you all the whole family eating together? ”

The village chief was stunned and opened his mouth, "Of course not!" ”

Qi Yun's heart sank, and he remembered that his father had told him before leaving: Even in contemporary times, the custom of male superiority and inferiority of women in some rural areas is still commonplace. But tonight, because there was only the village chief, Qi Yun was not afraid of his laughter, and said straightforwardly: "Let them serve together, okay?" ”

She pointed to the bowl of oily chicken stew, "Children love this." ”

The village chief hesitated at first, but when he saw Qi Yun's earnest eyes, he thought that Qi Yun was a female guest after all, and it was not convenient for him to accompany him alone. So after thinking about it, I agreed, and called my wife and children into the house. The village chief's wife was a thin woman, and as soon as she entered the hall, she kept rubbing her hands back and forth with her body, as if she were not the owner of the room. The two thirteen- and fourteen-year-old children were not so formal, although they were also dark and thin, they were in good spirits, and their eyes were bony and bright, and they looked smart and naughty. As soon as the two children entered the house, they stared at the chicken in the old bowl and could no longer take their eyes off it.

Qi Yun stood up first and thanked the village chief's wife for her hospitality, and then beckoned the two children: "Let's eat together." ”

The village chief's wife and children sat down next to each other. The village chief slowly and methodically picked up the bowl with both hands and asked:

"Teacher Qi, please first."

When the two children entered the house, they were holding unfinished rice bowls in their hands, Qi Yun glanced at their bowls, which were leftover millet offal and sweet potato rice from the previous meal, which were already hard and solid, and there were two saltwater pickled peppers in each bowl, which were far less colorful than the plate of salted peppers on the table. The village chief repeatedly urged Qi Yun to move the chopsticks first, but Qi Yun was inconvenient to excuse himself, so he took a green pepper into the bowl, and the green and shiny pepper sent the newly steamed golden rice, which tasted quite fragrant.

The eyes of the two children were firmly nailed to the chicken bowl. The girl was timid in the end, she looked at it for a while and lowered her head to pick up the rice, the boy was bolder, after Qi Yun made a move, she first stretched out her chopsticks and grabbed the saltwater eggplant on the table, and after eating it, the chopsticks that were stretched out again lingered in the "air" for a while, and finally quietly deviated from the original course and went straight to the chicken bowl.

When the village chief's wife saw it, she struck the child's chopsticks with her chopsticks and scolded: "Eat well!" ”

The village chief blushed and beckoned: "Please eat chicken, Teacher Qi, please eat chicken." ”

Qi Yun smiled and said to the two children:

"I don't like meat, you two eat it quickly!"

The honest village chief was taken aback: it took a long time before he said slowly:

"What's wrong? Our stewed chicken doesn't suit your taste? ”

Qi Yun hurriedly smiled and said, "No, it smells very fragrant." ”

The village chief asked, "Then why do you say you don't like to eat?" ”

"I don't dare to eat more at night, I'm afraid of gaining weight, really, I never eat meat at night when I'm at home, I don't eat rice, I just eat two vegetable leaves." Qi Yun explained a little embarrassedly, and laughed vigorously after explaining.

The village chief and his daughter-in-law looked at each other. After a while, the village chief squeezed out a sentence:

"Don't see the outside, our place is bitter, but it's like home."

Qi Yun was a little embarrassed. She quickly said, "Yes, it's like home." ”

She pushed a bowl of chicken in front of the two children and said, "You two are growing up, eat more!" ”

The hot aroma of the chicken drilled into the nostrils of the two children, and the boy was tempted to be unbearable, so he stretched out his chopsticks straight and went straight to the chicken bowl.

He took a pair of chopsticks, looked at his father and then at his mother's face, and their expressions showed some kind of acquiescence, so he reached over to the chicken bowl again, and glanced at the girl.

The girl's chopsticks also reached into the chicken bowl, and as she stretched out, she looked up at Qi Yun, who squeezed her eyes and grimaced at her.

Qi Yun went to bed early that night and slept in a room specially reserved for her at the village chief's house, but it was not stable. She was lying on the bed board, and when she opened her eyes and saw the swarthy and tall beams, she asked herself, where am I?

The night in the mountains was cold, but it was the beginning of November in the Gregorian calendar, and the night wind poured in through the cracks in the windows, and there was a sharp whistle. Qi Yun lay on the bed, tossing and turning, as if he was asleep, as if he had a strange dream that he couldn't remember, but he clearly felt that he had been awake, and he had seen the sky outside the window change from dark to gray and then to light pink, which was the color dyed by the morning glow.

It was about morning. Qi Yun put on her clothes, walked to the door and pushed the door open, and a strong mountain wind that took her breath away came in, and the force almost lifted her head. She quickly closed the door, stepped back, dragged a thick coat from the box and wrapped it around her body, and then pushed the door open again.

Mornings in the countryside were silent, and the occasional string of roosters crowed deepened the silence. There is a mountain in front, and there is also a mountain on the left and right, and this small, dozens of families are nested in the mountain col, and the eyes are full of vast loess. The wind slashed at Qi Yun's face like a knife. Qi Yun touched the skin on her face, and until now, she still hadn't found her true feeling.

On a new day, the village chief brought Qi Yun to the school and arranged for her to meet the two heads of the school, two middle-aged men, but they didn't speak, Qi Yun looked a little funny when they squatted there, thinking that such a person was actually a teacher, looking at the sturdy big hands, it was obvious that he had just touched the hoe handle from the ground.

The village chief pointed to one of the men and said, "This is the principal." ”

Qi Yun stretched out his hand, the man's right hand was originally holding a long pole cigarette pouch, and at this time, he quickly handed the cigarette pouch to his left hand, and shook hands with Qi Yun, the principal's palm was very dry and smelly.

On the same day, the principal took Qi Yun to visit the classrooms and student dormitories. The classroom is a few brick houses that are said to have been built in the sixties of the last century, which is wet and cold, and the light is not good, but the children sitting in the classroom are accustomed to it, rubbing their frozen red hands indifferently, and their heads are very low, almost sticking to the books spread out in front of the desks, turning over the books, writing and calculating, the desks and chairs in the classroom are also high and short, and they are not complete, according to the principal, some of these desks and chairs are donated to the village in batches from different places and through different channels. There are also old chairs or useless wood used by the villagers, and the headmaster, a clever man in the village, helps to repair the nails and make do with them. This is the only school in the three natural villages within fifteen kilometers of the vicinity, Qi Yun sighed softly.

After visiting such a classroom, Qi Yun naturally didn't have much hope for the student dormitory he was about to meet. But Rao couldn't help but gasp when she saw it, because the house was so dilapidated that she had imagined, especially the roof of the haystack and platen was crumbling, the dust was falling overhead, the windows were broken, and the walls were deeply cracked one after another. There are no beds in the dormitory, only a long row of bunks.

Qi Yun asked the principal:

"Sleep in this bunk, right, how many children do you have to sleep?"

The principal said, "More than thirty." In previous years, there were only a dozen, but last winter, the school in Dongwa Village collapsed, and the children also crowded here to go to school, so there was not enough sleep. ”

The principal still smiled slightly, and there was a kind of relief in his voice that he didn't take this matter seriously, but Qi Yun preferred to believe that this was a kind of resilience in the face of difficult environments all year round. The principal said with a smile, "It's too crowded, a few babies told me: I have to turn sideways to sleep at night, or there is not enough space, and I don't dare to get up at night, for fear that the place where I come back to sleep together at night will be occupied." ”

Then the principal took Qi Yun to see the dormitory arranged for her, although it was also low, it was already comfortable compared to the students' dormitory. A cast-iron stove was lit in the center of the dormitory, and it was hot as soon as you entered.

The principal said honestly: "This small house has been empty for more than two years, and the stove can be used to remove the cold." ”

After saying that, he pointed out to Qi Yun some daily necessities placed in a corner of the room, although the number was a little less, but the rice, flour, oil and vinegar were readily available, and after introducing them to Qi Yun one by one, the principal rubbed his hands and said goodbye, and added before going out: "There is nothing else, that is, there is no water in our place, and we have to use clean water to pick it up in the river five miles away." ”

Qi Yun was stunned when he heard this. The principal immediately said, "I will arrange for the students to help you pick one load a day, which can fill the big bucket at your door." ”

Qi Yun thanked the principal. After sending the principal out, I took a special look at the bucket at the door, the water in the bucket was not much, about half of the amount of bottled mineral water in the city, this is the water I can use every day in the future, Qi Yun thought. Leaned down and sniffed, and a smell of mud and sand rushed from the barrel.

She straightened up, looking at the distant gray sky and listening to the whirring of the wind in her ears. She thought: "It's a little bit worse than I expected." I can't be defeated, though.

That afternoon, Qi Yun stayed in his dormitory, cleaning and tidying up the small house. In front of her eyes, the scenes always flashed the appearance of the student dormitory: cracked walls, cold wind passing through the room. She suddenly remembered that the night before her departure, she had stuffed two beautifully printed idol magazines into her large suitcase, all coated paper, in case of loneliness and boredom on a night in the countryside. Thinking of this, she slapped her thigh and jumped up: "Hey! I was so prescient! ”

Opening the suitcase, after a devil entering the village, Qi Yun took out two magazines that were very precious when he was in the city, and tore them page by page. Then he used a little flour and water prepared for him by the principal in the dormitory, squatted in front of the iron stove and made some paste, and "sneaked" into the student dormitory before the students got out of class, and used magazine pages to paste a few holes in the dormitory windows and walls.

After doing this, Qi Yun sweated slightly, she patted the paste on her hands, examined the fruits of her afternoon's labor, and was very satisfied, not forgetting to bow deeply to the big beauty Sister Lin Chiling, who was trying to resist the cold wind at the window, so that Na's body trembled like a painting:

"I'm sorry, but you've worked hard!"

It was already dark after doing this, Qi Yun walked back to the dormitory at night, and found that a pair of hiking shoes under her feet were so dirty that they couldn't be dirty anymore, she took off the shoes, put them aside and prepared to brush them, rummaging through the big box she brought to find other shoes to replace.

After looking for a long time, there were only three pairs of leather shoes: a pair of leather sandals with a strap wrapped around the ankle, a pair of flat shoes with pointed toes, and a pair of fish-toe boots with a delicate platform, all of which were popular styles, but tonight, under the flame of the oil lamp, Qi Yun looked at them and felt that they were so slippery and ridiculous.

She shook her head self-deprecatingly and put her shoes back away. Then she took out the textbook she brought to teach, and a local stall was placed under the oil lamp to look at it carefully. The village school looked so different from what she had imagined, and she had to change her lesson plan to do so. So the top priority now is to work out a suitable teaching plan before taking over the teaching.

That night she worked until 2 o'clock in the middle of the night, so she slept very deeply that night. When I opened my eyes the next day, I saw a white expanse outside the window. Qi Yun thought in surprise: It's snowing? How long has it been snowing?

She put on her hat and gloves before she walked out of the house, but found that it was not snow, because there was nothing on the ground, only on the trees in the sky, as if it was fog, but she had never seen such a cold fog, and reaching out was like touching the ice edge, which had an extremely strong texture.

The village chief passed by her, carrying a bundle of firewood from the stove in his hand.

The village chief said, "It's frosting." ”

Qi Yun Daqi: "This is frost?" ”

The village chief said "um" and turned to leave. Qi Yun looked carefully at the corner of the wall, and what hung in the corner of the wall was indeed like frost. But it is not the same as the frost in the city, which is cold, dry, hard, and not a thin layer, but it is stored in the ground heavily.

The figure of the village chief disappeared into a cold frost flower, and there was silence all around. Qi Yun only felt as if she was in the middle of a world of Hongmeng's first judgment, and the fear of loneliness filled her body.

Qi Yun lowered his head and thought of Lu Yun, and a wry smile appeared on the corner of his lips. Lu Wei, if it weren't for you, I wouldn't have lived a day like this in my life. Am I supposed to blame you? Or should I thank you for writing such a colorful page in my life?