Chapter 11: Floating

With the compensation payment for the relocation received, each family in the village began sorting their belongings in preparation for moving.

The convenience store still had some stock left that wouldn’t clear out anytime soon, so Uncle said she should move everything to the temporary housing. After all, she was the only one living there, and it would be fine to leave a space in the living room to store things. Chen Jin thought about it and agreed; once everyone in the village moved to their new homes, they might need to buy a lot of daily necessities, and she could set up a little convenience store at home. Just in time, Aunt had a clothing store that didn’t need many staff, and since Tian Miao had nothing to do, she called her to come help out.

There was quite a bit to tidy up at home. The sofa, coffee table, and kitchenware had all been replaced over the last two or three years and were still in good condition, so it felt wasteful to just throw them away. However, the temporary housing was small, and the resettlement houses were still under construction. She wanted to move everything out, but there was nowhere to put it.

She still needed to buy a house quickly.

Both the temporary and resettlement houses were in the splendid community, with the temporary housing being part of the first phase that had already been built and decorated. The community was a bit far from them, located at the junction of the Xicheng (West) District and the Nancheng (South) District, and belonged to the South District.

Uncle had little to sort out since his house was newly built, renovated, and had not been lived in much, so he simply moved everything directly to the temporary housing. But the family still lived in the house they had bought earlier. The third uncle’s family had more belongings, but they were also packing quickly. Their cousins were all working and had resumed their jobs. Only her younger cousin Chen Yongan was still at home; after packing his family’s things, he was sent over to help her.

“Sis, you have too many books. You should sell some,” Chen Yongan said, looking at the entire wall of bookshelves in the study, feeling a bit overwhelmed. It was terrifying; did his sister grow up reading all these?

Chen Jin gave his forehead a playful knock. “Selling them sounds more reasonable. Don’t be lazy; hurry up and pack them into boxes. Remember to organize them and write the order number on the boxes.”

Seeing Chen Yongan sulking, Chen Jin said, “Once we’re done, I’ll treat you to something delicious. You can choose whatever you want.”

“That’s more like it,” Chen Yongan huffed and started dragging boxes over to get to work.

He had given up on getting the latest game console. As long as his parents didn’t agree, his sister would never buy it for him. It was too difficult! He just wanted to get through the college entrance exam as soon as possible and graduate quickly!

After a whole day of work, they finally packed everything that Chen Jin needed to take to the temporary housing. There weren’t many belongings that belonged to her mother left; the photo albums and some trinkets they had picked out together were packed up with her six boxes of books. She didn’t plan on taking these items to the temporary housing.

The temporary housing was just a transitional place; she didn’t plan on living there for long. She still wanted to buy a house near NTU (South University). However, it depended on the situation in the next semester. If she could successfully stay at the school, she would live near NTU regularly. If not, she would buy another one near her workplace.

With all this in mind, there were still quite a few things to do over the summer: moving and learning to drive. But the most pressing issue was that she needed to buy a house quickly to store these items.

Today, her third uncle and third aunt were going to the bank, and she needed to go as well to plan how to use her savings.

A couple of days ago, Aunt Zhou had caused a big scene at home, and the village chief and the former party secretary had gone to mediate. They hadn’t come to a final decision yet, but it was confirmed that Aunt Zhou wanted to split from the family and live independently; now the argument was about how much she could split.

When Chen Jin went out, she saw that Aunt Zhou’s fruit and vegetable store had also been demolished. Aunt Zhou was carrying a bag of old clothes out to throw away, and when she ran into Chen Jin, she seemed to be in a good mood, smiling broadly as she greeted her, “Going out to have some fun?”

“Yes,” Chen Jin thought about asking Aunt Zhou if the family division had been settled but worried that Aunt Zhou might think she was just being nosy, so she hesitated.

However, Aunt Zhou didn’t think too much about it and asked her how she planned to handle the items in her convenience store. Upon learning that she was taking them to the temporary housing, Aunt Zhou smiled and said, “That’s great! Once we move over, we won’t have to find a place to buy things. By the way, didn’t everyone in our village get assigned to one building?”

“That should be the case. They only let people choose one building,” Chen Jin replied. “My family is small, so we got a one-bedroom apartment on the second floor.” In contrast, Uncle and Third Uncle’s families received three-bedroom apartments based on the number of people registered in their household, located on the first and third floors, respectively. Uncle’s oldest cousin, Chen Yongcheng, and his wife and child had urban household registrations and were not listed in Uncle’s household registration book.

“Oh, my family’s on the second floor too, 202. What about you?”

“I’m in 201!” Chen Jin replied happily, “We’re neighbors!”

“Haha, it’ll be convenient for us to buy things in the future.”

Since they were neighbors, they would have plenty of opportunities to see each other. Aunt Zhou said she still had things to pack and needed to get going.

When her third uncle and third aunt came to find her, they asked if Aunt Zhou’s family situation had been resolved. Chen Jin replied, “It should be settled; I didn’t ask too much.” The first floor of the temporary housing had three types of apartments: 1-2 were one-bedroom apartments, 3-5 were two-bedroom apartments, and 6-8 were three-bedroom apartments. Aunt Zhou’s family got a one-bedroom, indicating that she and her husband were not living together with anyone else.

According to regulations, the temporary housing was assigned based on the number of people listed in each household’s registration book. Some larger families received more than one apartment. In Aunt Zhou’s case, her daughter had married and moved out, so her household registration only included her, her husband, and their son. Given that there were only three of them, they should have been allocated a three-bedroom apartment.

With what happened a few days ago, it was clear that living together was no longer an option. It seemed that the village chief had intervened, leading to Aunt Zhou’s family being given their own separate apartment.

Chen Jin and her third aunt took the bus to the Agricultural Bank in the nearest Nancheng (South) District.

Both were high-value clients with deposits of several million, and as soon as they sat down, the branch manager invited them to the VIP room.

Chen Jin wanted to apply for an additional bank card to split her money into two portions—one portion of four million would be left untouched for the time being to earn interest. The other portion, which was over four million, was meant for buying a house.

“Opening a bank card isn’t difficult, but leaving money to sit idle and only earn interest isn’t the best option. You might want to consider buying government bonds. Currently, the three-year annual interest rate for government bonds is 10%…”

The compensation that thrid Uncle’s family received was only slightly less than Chen Jin’s, leaving them with a substantial amount of savings. They had initially planned to let the money sit and earn interest, but after listening to the branch manager discuss the benefits of buying government bonds, they became intrigued.

In the past, they had no knowledge of investments, and as a Chinese major, Chen Jin only knew a little about it. While the manager was explaining, she couldn’t help but think about making some investments herself. However, she quickly reminded herself: it’s best not to touch things you don’t understand; who knows if it’s a pie in the sky or a deep pit?

Seeing that thrid Uncle was about to give in, Chen Jin tapped his arm, saying, “thrid Uncle, we don’t really understand government bond investments or anything like that. How about we go back and ask eldest Uncle first?”

At this moment, third Aunt also came back to her senses and quickly agreed, “Yes, yes, we don’t understand it either. Let’s go back and ask your uncle. If it sounds good, we can come back to buy it.”

“Oh right, we should ask,” thrid Uncle said, coming back to reality. He had almost been swept away by the manager’s words; without Chen Jin’s reminder, he might have ended up spending a hundred thousand.

The opportunity slipped away, and the manager maintained his cheerful demeanor, reassuring them that it was fine to take their time to think it over before coming back. Later, they went to open the new card, with the manager personally leading them. As they exited the bank, each of them was carrying a bag of rice and a bucket of oil.

“Thank goodness you were here, Third Sister,” thrid Uncle said gratefully. “Listening to that manager talk so glowingly about it, I was almost tempted to buy at least a hundred thousand worth!”

Chen Jin replied, “I thought about it a bit too. If it’s really that good, how come we get to buy it? The manager mentioned that this year’s bonds were issued earlier this year and now they’re implementing value preservation and subsidy rates, which should make them more valuable, right? I just can’t believe the other wealthy people are that foolish. Oh, I don’t understand this stuff well; we should still ask eldest Uncle.”

Her eldest Uncle was knowledgeable and had many connections; he might know how it works.

third Aunt sighed, “We used to say we were afraid that Yongfei and Yongan would get carried away with their newfound money, but look at us adults—we can’t help but get carried away either.”

With their bags in hand, they didn’t linger in the city and headed straight to the bus station to wait for their ride.

Maybe it was due to having made plans, but Chen Jin was eager to learn to drive, get her license, and buy a car. The sun was too hot, making her eyelids droop.

Suddenly startled by a loud honking, Chen Jin glared in the direction of the sound, only to realize it was someone she knew. She rolled her eyes at the driver: that crazy guy!

thrid Uncle noticed her reaction and saw that the young driver was looking back at Chen Jin. Once the car had passed, he asked, “Was that your classmate driving?”

Chen Jin felt embarrassed to admit that the “crazy guy” was her ex-boyfriend, and that having dated him for three years was a rather humiliating experience. “He was a high school classmate, also from NTU. He’s quite eccentric.”

thrid Uncle fell silent. Generally speaking, if Chen Jin categorized someone as “eccentric,” it meant they were truly not worth much. However, thrid Uncle had more thoughts on the matter.

When Chen Jin got into the top 100 of the city’s entrance exam for high school, her whole family was delighted. But later, they found out that most students at the city’s Third Middle School were urban dwellers, and students like Chen Jin, coming from rural backgrounds, often faced exclusion. Although Chen Jin always claimed she got along well with her classmates and no one bullied her, they didn’t believe it. thrid Uncle assumed the guy from earlier was someone Chen Jin didn’t get along with.

“Driving a beat-up car and acting all high and mighty; Third Sister, when you get your license, buy a Tiger Head!”

Chen Jin was shocked. Her uncle was really getting ahead of himself—wasn’t a Tiger Head nearly a million? Her savings wouldn’t even cover that.

“My budget for a car is only two hundred thousand,” Chen Jin insisted. She felt that two hundred thousand was already a lot. The price of good houses in prime areas of the city center was already in the thousands per square meter; she could buy a nice apartment with that.

“Uncle, Third Brother is learning to drive too. Why don’t you buy him a car as well? You see, he’s out doing business now, and having a car would make things more convenient.”

thrid Uncle had a complicated attitude toward his savings, caught between frugality and extravagance.

It was tough when suddenly having several million dollars really tested one’s character.

The next morning, when Third Cousin Chen Yongfei came home and saw her, he smiled, “Third Sister, I remember your kind intentions.”

What intention? She hadn’t done anything!