Chapter 47: Attending the Banquet

Sha Yue’s wedding was on Saturday, and because they were having lunch, Wen Jiajia didn’t go out until almost ten o’clock.

There were only three tables, and it was easy to tell that the guests at Sha Yue’s wedding banquet must be close relatives. There shouldn’t be many friends like her, and if we narrow the scope to friends at work, she is most likely the only one.

Wen Jiajia was afraid of being embarrassed if she went too early, so she stayed out so late.

Wei Dai was puzzled by her behavior, “There’s no such thing as going to a wedding on time. If you go early, just think of it as meeting a new friend.”

It’s rude to go late, especially since today is Saturday. People might think you don’t want to go.

Wen Jiajia thought, what’s the point of getting to know each other?

Even after knowing each other for decades, you can still add a friend and add some likes to your circle of friends.

These days, ordinary friends communicate face to face. Because of the differences in factories, everyone has their own circle. We met today, but we may never see each other again in the future. Wen Jiajia is sometimes a little introverted and doesn’t want to spend time on this.

“Oh, stop nagging me. I’ll be late if you keep talking, and then people will think I’m impolite.” Wen Jiajia snorted and rode away from home.

Wei Dai had nothing to say but to catch up, “Ride slower!”

“Numbular—”

The sound came from the wind.

Wen Jiajia obediently didn’t ride fast. She rode even slower than when she usually went to work.

She arrived at Sha Yue’s house at almost eleven o’clock, and the banquet was scheduled to start at half past eleven. Wen Jiajia felt that she had arrived quite early.

Sha Yue’s home is in the pharmaceutical factory’s staff quarters, and this is Wen Jiajia’s first time here.

The buildings in the family compound are obviously much more luxurious than those in the army. They are just as tall, but the area of ​​each building is much larger, almost twice that of the army.

There are more of them than in the army. Wen Jiajia curiously asked the gatekeeper, “Auntie, how many buildings are there in our family compound?”

The old lady was very alert. She looked Wen Jiajia up and down and asked three questions in a row, “Who are you, comrade? Which unit are you from? Why are you asking this?”

Wen Jiajia was embarrassed, “Auntie, I work at our pharmaceutical factory, but I don’t live in the staff quarters. I’m going to Sha Yue’s house for dinner today. I just thought our pharmaceutical factory staff quarters were big, so I asked out of curiosity.”

When she heard that it was from the pharmaceutical factory, the gatekeeper relaxed a little, put down the leeks she was cleaning, and said, “There are ten buildings in our family compound, and there are two more, but those two are together with the family compound of the textile factory.”

Wen Jiajia clicked her tongue twice and said with emotion, “That’s twelve buildings; that’s a lot.”

The aunt said proudly, “Of course! Our pharmaceutical factory is very wealthy, and the number of houses in the family compound is among the best among all the factories in the city. Except for the steel mills and the provincial factories, who can compare with our pharmaceutical factory?”

Wen Jiajia didn’t talk any more. She asked how to get to Building 6 and then followed the direction the old lady pointed to.

There was a small open space under Building 6. At this moment, three tables were placed in the open space. Wen Jiajia knew that Sha Yue’s banquet might be held here.

There was indeed no one she knew in the open space. It was not until she went upstairs to Sha Yue’s house that she saw someone she was vaguely familiar with, Sha Yue’s aunt. Because Wen Jiajia always went to canteen No. 2, she became familiar with Sha Yue’s aunt, who served food.

“Oh, Comrade Wen, Sha Yue has been thinking about you for a long time. Come in quickly.” She hurriedly called Wen Jiajia and took her to Sha Yue’s room.

Before Wen Jiajia could say a word, Aunt Sha ushered her into the room.

Sha Yue was sitting on a chair, trying to redo her hair. She saw Wen Jiajia in the mirror and turned around in surprise. “Jiajia, you are finally here. I thought you had something come up and couldn’t make it.”

Wen Jiajia replied, “What could happen on a Saturday?” Then she took out a red envelope from her pocket and handed it to Sha Yue. “Happy wedding.”

Sha Yue smiled. “I won’t be polite on my wedding day. Anyway, I missed your wedding. I’ll return it to you when you have a child.”

Wen Jiajia raised her eyebrows. “Okay, then you have to be ready. I can’t tell when that will be.”

Sha Yue didn’t take her words seriously, as Wen Jiajia had once mentioned planning to have another child after she turned 23.

There were other people in the room, and Sha Yue couldn’t just talk to Wen Jiajia and leave the others aside. After introducing everyone, they started discussing Sha Yue, the protagonist of the day.

“Cousin, is my brother-in-law really willing to hold the wedding at our house? That would be the same as marrying into the wife’s family,” remarked Sha Yue’s cousin.

Wen Jiajia couldn’t help but turn around and look at her. The girl was quite young and could still improve her emotional intelligence. On such a happy occasion, to suggest that the groom was marrying into the bride’s family was quite tactless.

Sure enough, Sha Yue’s face suddenly turned ugly. The person next to her said, “Third Sister, how can you say that? It’s because my brother-in-law doesn’t have many relatives, and he just joined the company, so he did it here.”

What for? To make it more lively and collect more gift money.

The little cousin was embarrassed, lowered her head, and said nothing more.

Wen Jiajia changed the subject. “Sha Yue, where are you going to live in the future? Last time you said Feng Yu still lives in the research institute? That’s in the western suburbs, even farther from the factory than my home.”

Sha Yue wanted to sigh but held it back. “There’s nothing I can do. He can’t live in the city because of his job. I’ve made up my mind. I’ll ride a bike to work every day like you do.”

“It will take an hour to ride, right?” Wen Jiajia asked.

In fact, she could now get to the pharmaceutical factory by bike in about 30 minutes every day because she was familiar with the road and knew where there were potholes and shortcuts.

Sha Yue nodded. “Isn’t it? Fortunately, the western suburbs are far from the pharmaceutical factory but not far from the city, and there are people living along the way, so there’s no need to be afraid when getting off work at night.”

As they were talking, Feng Yu arrived.

Although the wedding was simple, the oath was an indispensable part of weddings in this era, and Wen Jiajia did not omit it when she got married.

After taking the oath, they could eat.

Wen Jiajia sat at a table with more young people. As the dishes were served one by one, her stomach growled.

The dishes at this banquet were really good, with four meat dishes, two vegetable dishes, and a cold dish; it was considered a high-standard banquet.

Wen Jiajia was not a polite person. Being polite at a banquet at this time meant going hungry. 

She quickly picked up five pieces of elbow meat with chopsticks, then picked up another piece of fish and another piece of river shrimp, then paused and started eating with rice.

Almost no one was talking at the table at this moment; they were all eating.

The pork elbow, which was braised with rich sauce and extremely tender, was eaten up in less than half a minute, and even the sauce on the plate was poured out completely.

Soon, the soup was served.

The soup turned out to be black chicken soup. Wen Jiajia also had a bowl and was lucky enough to get a chicken wing.

The people at the table were still “silent,” with only the clinking of spoons and chopsticks.

The two vegetarian dishes were not simple either.

One dish was stir-fried mushrooms. Three kinds of mushrooms were stir-fried in heavy oil. They tasted salty and fragrant. Wen Jiajia couldn’t even recognize what kind of mushrooms they were.

The other dish was fried yam with black fungus. The yam was crispy and tender. Wen Jiajia ate several mouthfuls in a row and immediately decided to go to the market to buy some yams before going home.

The banquet ended quickly, and after saying hello to Sha Yue, Wen Jiajia rode her bike home.

She had not forgotten the yam, so after buying the yam, she saw the newly-launched sweet potatoes and used her food coupons to go to the grain and oil window and buy half a bag of sweet potatoes.

Now they have to buy sweet potatoes. The vegetable plot they were allocated is not large, not even enough to grow vegetables, let alone sweet potatoes.

However, sweet potatoes are cheap and don’t cost much in food coupons, so Wen Jiajia thinks it’s more cost-effective than growing sweet potatoes herself.

In the afternoon, she returned home.

There was no one at home, so Wen Jiajia put the sweet potatoes in the corner of the utility room to dry so that they could be preserved longer.

The yam had mud on it, and she didn’t clean it off to help with preservation.

After living in this era for almost a year, she had learned some common sense about life.

After finishing her tasks, Wen Jiajia sat on the sofa. Yes, it had been almost a year since she came here.

—

As October approached, the weather gradually turned cooler.

You may not feel it during the day, but in the evening, the wind blowing from the mountains carried a slight chill.

Sweet osmanthus flowers were in full bloom, and the fragrance of sweet osmanthus lingered within a ten-meter radius. The fragrance gradually decreased, but the sweet osmanthus fragrance in the Wen family’s yard was obviously the strongest, so strong that it seemed like honey was circling in the air above the yard.

Wen Jiajia hid in the room and couldn’t even open the door to the small terrace. She was so frustrated that she complained to Wei Dai, “Is there any way to track these bees, find where their nest is, and wipe them out?”

The key is that after spring and summer, there must be a lot of honey in the beehive, and she wanted to eat honey.

Wei Dai reached out and touched her head, wondering, “You don’t have a fever.”

With a “pop,” Wen Jiajia slapped his hand away and stared at him suspiciously. “Do you mean I’m sick?”

Wei Dai denied it. “I didn’t mean that.”

Wen Jiajia looked at him sideways. “I’m not stupid; how can I not hear whether you meant it or not?”

Wei Dai thought, You know you’re not stupid, right? Then why do you ask me to follow the bees? Only a fool would suggest that.

He ignored his wife, who sometimes acted like a show-off, and went to the kitchen to peel sweet potatoes and cook porridge.

Sweet potatoes are not very delicious when they are just dug out. They need to be left for a while until the moisture evaporates and the sweetness increases. That’s when they taste best.

At this stage, the sweet potato is sweet enough that taking a bite raw fills your mouth with juice, like drinking sweet water.

Sweet potato porridge, pumpkin pie, and rose jam made tonight’s dinner especially sweet.

Wen Jiajia made the rose jam last month when she was bored. After transplanting, the roses became communal flowers. Today, one aunt would pick some, and tomorrow, a child would take two.

Occasionally, a typhoon would come, and several flowers would be blown down by the strong wind and heavy rain.

Wen Jiajia felt so distressed seeing this that she picked all the blooming petals, washed, dried them, and made flower jam.

Surprisingly, despite not being good at growing flowers, she excelled at making flower jam.

Sweet but not greasy, with no bitterness.

Not only could it be eaten with pumpkin cakes, but it could also be dissolved in water to make a refreshing drink. Making a cup of flower jam tea every day was quite a mood lifter.

Wen Xuan obviously loved it. She used a small spoon to gently scoop half a spoonful of the flower jam and spread it on the golden pumpkin pie. She sighed contentedly and said, “Auntie, can you make this flower jam again in the future?”

Wen Jiajia mashed the sweet potatoes in the porridge into small pieces, then looked up at Wen Xuan and said, “Okay, if you pick the flowers, I’ll make it for you.”

Wen Xuan: “Really?”

Why did she not believe it? The flower jam was sweet, but her aunt didn’t allow her to eat too many sweets.

Wen Jiajia nodded perfunctorily: “Really.”

Then fall and winter came. Apart from osmanthus and chrysanthemums, there were no other edible flowers for Wen Xuan to pick. By the next spring, she had forgotten about it.

Wei Dai clearly remembered this and smiled.

Wen Xuan looked at her aunt, then at her uncle, sensing something was off, but she couldn’t pinpoint what it was.

She lowered her head and decided to eat quickly.

Night.

Since they couldn’t stop the bees, they decided to eliminate the source.

Of course, they weren’t going to cut down the trees.

This osmanthus tree had been growing here for at least 20 years, and Wen Jiajia wasn’t cruel enough to cut it down.

She wanted to shake the osmanthus flowers off the tree. Wen Jiajia originally wanted to enjoy the fragrance of osmanthus for a few more days, but the flowers attracted too many bees, so she had to sacrifice them.

“Wei Dai!” Wen Jiajia shouted into the house.

Wei Dai was making a crib. Wen Jiajia had no idea why he was so obsessed with making a crib.