Chapter 96: College Entrance Examination Resumed

Fortunately, everything went as she expected, and nothing unexpected happened.

The people from Yunnan Medical Glass had to stay in the factory for three days. On the first day, they visited the factory workshop, and Wen Jiajia accompanied them.

The people at Yunnan Medical University  actually felt aggrieved because their Linhe Medical University’s equipment was obviously much better.

Several of the machines were the latest models, but half of their machines were beyond their scrapping deadline.

They hadn’t thought it was a big deal before coming here. They could still use it after some repairs. Anyway, they didn’t think about retiring it until the last minute!

But they were afraid of comparison in everything. When they saw other people’s new machines, they couldn’t help but feel sorry for their own hard lives.

Some even lamented: “Compared to your conditions, we are just like adopted children.”

Wen Jiajia immediately decided to ask the canteen to add one more bowl of meat dishes in the next few days. The colleagues at Yunnan Medical University have indeed worked hard.

Fortunately, the factory was willing to help them connect with some chemical machinery factories in the east, so they could also bring a few new machines back.

Wen Jiajia is still in charge of this matter, and this task will be included in the business trip next month.

April is the time when spring flowers are in full bloom.

Wen Jiajia finally freed up a few days to go to Fang Hongjun’s house for dinner with Wei Dai.

In fact, Chen Qianyue already worked in the factory. What was particularly coincidental was that she was in the finance department, so Wen Jiajia would always meet her when she went to collect wages or check various invoices.

In Wen Jiajia’s opinion, she has changed a lot. She was a slightly immature girl back then, but now she looks much more mature.

But the reverse is also true.

In Chen Qianyue’s opinion, Wen Jiajia was also very different from a few years ago.

Later, the two reflected on each other’s changes and finally figured out the reason: it had a class flavor.

There is no way around it. The difference between going to work and not going to work, or even working for a long time, is huge.

It wasn’t long since Chen Qianyue went to the countryside, and Wen Jiajia had just traveled to this era. Now, after working for several years, it would be abnormal if there were no changes.

Early in the morning on a day off, Wen Jiajia and Wei Dai brought two cans of food, a bag of brown sugar, and a pound of meat to Yaobo’s dormitory.

This was the second time the two of them had come back to Yaobo Dormitory^[1]also known as a housing complex for workers.. As more and more people moved in, the place changed very rapidly.

Yaobo Dormitory is located next to the Workers’ Cultural Palace, and the shortest straight-line distance does not exceed 50 meters.

There is also a bus stop here, and after getting off the bus, there is a cement road leading directly to Yaobo Dormitory.

However, the two of them came here today on bicycles, and they were overloaded because the two sisters, Wen Chun and Wen Xuan, insisted on coming along.

Wen Chun counted on her fingers and said, “We haven’t been out to play for five whole months.”

Wen Jiajia recalled it for a moment, and it seemed to be true.

The last time she took them out was last year, when the weather was about to get cold. The two girls did well in their midterm exams and wanted to go to the city for dinner, so she took them to the city.

Thinking of this, Wen Jiajia couldn’t refuse the two of them.

It is true that you will get bored if you stay in one place for too long. As the weather gets warmer, the aunt is going out to the army more and more frequently. She even made friends with people from the nearby villages.

So a bicycle with four people on it stopped in front of the iron gate of Yaobo Dormitory.

Wen Jiajia looked up at the brand new iron gate, got out of the bike, and walked towards Chen Qianyue’s house.

Wen Chun and Wen Xuan were very curious about this place. Wen Xuan even said with emotion: “The house is taller than the building in our family compound.”

Indeed, it was two stories higher than the building in the staff quarters, so that one-third of the factory employees were allocated houses this time, and the enthusiasm of the employees increased a lot.

After entering, Wen Jiajia felt like a fish in water, and she found people she knew every few steps.

“Jia Jia, I haven’t seen you for a long time! What have you been doing recently? I always see you in the factory every once in a while. Hey, I heard that you got a promotion, congratulations.” The person who spoke was from the pharmaceutical factory, and I was particularly surprised to see her.

Wen Jiajia smiled and said, “I’ve been busy with work lately. I’ve been so busy that I don’t have time to look for Sha Yue and the others.”

The man nodded and said, “That’s right. I heard about your medical team’s activities next door. You went to the capital and communicated with factories in the southwest. The leaders of our factory also wanted to communicate with them.”

Wen Jiajia laughed twice, then looked at her watch, said a few words quickly, and left.

It is taboo to complain about the boss in a public place like a factory dormitory, so Wen Jiajia didn’t dare to respond.

Afterwards, she met a few more acquaintances and kept greeting them all the way to Chen Qianyue’s house.

It was also the first time that Wei Dai realized how extensive his wife’s social circle was, and he joked, “This is your territory.”

Wen Jiajia was proud: “What a joke! I managed to secure 12 houses for our department!”

Their department is not a front-line workshop department, so the number of houses allocated to them is not large. Among all the administrative departments, only their department has more than 10 houses.

Therefore, Wen Jiajia is a secure deputy director, and the department staff have a high degree of trust in her.

If she is willing to continue working in the factory, once Director Gao is promoted, the employees in her department will definitely find a way to push her to the top immediately to prevent others from being promoted.

As they were talking, they arrived at Chen Qianyue’s house.

Chen Qianyue had been waiting in the corridor for a long time. When she saw the two sisters, she immediately ran over and pinched their cheeks.

To be honest, Wen Chun and Wen Xuan are seven or eight years old now, and few people would pinch their faces anymore. They were not used to being pinched so suddenly, and their cheeks turned slightly red.

Wen Jiajia asked with a smile, “Don’t you recognize them? These are acquaintances from our hometown.”

Chen Qianyue led the two sisters into the house and said, “Chun’er and Xuanxuan were still very young when you left Fuyang, so how could you recognize them?”

Wen Jiajia said, “Xuanxuan definitely doesn’t remember. Her memory has never been very good, but Chun’er probably still has some impression.”

The first feeling after entering the house is that it is spacious, and even Wei Dai’s eyes light up.

Chen Qianyue asked them to sit down, poured some water, and said, “Not bad, I renovated it according to what you said, Jiajia. After the renovation, many people came to my house to see it, even people from the pharmaceutical factory came.”

Then she put the cup on the coffee table and said, “Sit down for a while. Hongjun will be back soon.”

Wen Jiajia took a closer look and found it to be very good.

The last time she came back, she was shocked by the layout of the house because the layout of the Yaobo dormitory this time was a bit like the houses of a few decades later, but the decoration concept at that time did not keep up.

Wen Jiajia couldn’t bear to see Chen Qianyue and her husband ruining the house, so she looked through the house and gave them a design drawing, which she squeezed out of her busy schedule to draw.

In fact, it is a picture of the minimalist style decades later—mainly due to the lack of materials, but it also allowed the couple to immediately abandon the original rough decoration style and turn it into the minimalist style mentioned by Wen Jiajia.

The main reason is that the two of them had basically not decorated the house before. In fact, most houses nowadays are like this. You can just put in furniture, and move in.

After the renovation, Chen Qianyue’s home is particularly bright. There is a shoe cabinet at the entrance, followed by a bright living room with large windows.

Outside the window, you can still see towering green mountains and surging rivers. Wen Jiajia feels that the houses here will be very valuable in a few decades.

There are also two rooms, an indoor bathroom, and a kitchen. The area is quite spacious, and since there is no shared space, Wei Dai likes it more and more. His eyes light up when he looks at Wen Jiajia.

What does it look like? It looks like Xiaomei is asking for minced meat and eggs.

“…”

Wen Jiajia decided to look away and not meet his gaze.

After chatting for a while, Fang Hongjun returned with two large bags of vegetables.

The two men went to the kitchen to start cooking, while Chen Qianyue talked with Wen Jiajia.

Her due date was approaching, and she was discussing with Wen Jiajia what to do after the baby was born.

When it came to this, Wen Jiajia had a lot to say: “My little sister is fine. The most difficult thing for me was probably feeding her at night. My sleep schedule was completely disrupted during that time. My endocrine system was also messed up, and I started losing my hair. It took me a long time to recover.”

Chen Qianyue was a little scared and hurriedly asked, “How many times did you have to get up in one night?”

Wen Jiajia thought for a moment and replied, “If it’s just a baby, it’s probably two or three times a night. It depends on the child, mainly on how fast they digest. It gets easier in the following months. Oh, and changing diapers. My little sister was born in the winter, so washing and drying diapers every day was a big challenge. I had to use a drying rack to dry them every day.”

Wen Jiajia shook her head as she spoke, finding it painful to recall those days.

Chen Qianyue touched her belly and sighed, “There’s nothing I can do about this baby in my belly, but after I give birth, I won’t want a second one.”

Wen Jiajia replied, “If you don’t want it, then don’t. We’re talking about family planning now. I’ve even seen slogans written on gates.”

When Wen Jiajia saw the phrase “fewer and better births, a happy life” (phrase used to describe the slogan of China’s One-Child Policy.)), her memory became momentarily confused.

All jokes aside, decades later, her father’s hometown village still had the same slogan.

To avoid increasing the pregnant woman’s anxiety, Wen Jiajia quickly changed the topic.

Sisters Wenchun and Wenxuan were exploring outside the house. Because they were unfamiliar with the place and found it difficult to play with the other kids around them, they quickly returned.

Chen Qianyue was feeling a little down, and when the two girls ran to the kitchen, she whispered to Wen Jiajia, “You couldn’t really tell when you were little, but the older Xuanxuan gets, the more she resembles your second sister.”

Wen Jiajia was surprised, then took a closer look at Wen Xuan’s profile. “They do look alike,” she said. Maybe their faces hadn’t fully matured before, but now it was clear.

She couldn’t help but feel fortunate that she had brought Wen Chun and Wen Xuan out early. One could imagine how many people in the village would mention that Wen Xuan looked like her mother.

Children shouldn’t grow up in such conditions.

After discussing this, Chen Qianyue whispered about Wen Xuan’s father: “… None of us in the Youth Academy had any contact with him before. Later, a new person came, from the same place as him, and mentioned that his life was average. You have to be careful; he doesn’t have a strong moral foundation. He might come looking for Xuanxuan when she grows up.”

Wen Jiajia snorted coldly, “It’s fine as long as he doesn’t come to my house. If he does, I’ll make sure he regrets it.”

The two didn’t discuss this topic for too long, considering Wen Chun and Wen Xuan were still in the room.

The meal was ready quickly, and Fang Hongjun even brought back some beer.

Wen Jiajia asked him, “Is it from the state-owned restaurant near our factory?” If not, she wouldn’t drink it. Many restaurants use open wooden barrels for wine, so hygiene isn’t guaranteed.

Fang Hongjun poured her a glass of wine. “Of course! It’s the first batch of wine this year, and it must taste good.”

Wen Jiajia felt relieved.

The meal was very rich, with fish, meat, and the eel that Wen Chun had been talking about some time ago.

“I didn’t expect there to be eels at this time of year,” Wen Jiajia remarked with some curiosity. The weather wasn’t too hot now, and you even had to wear two layers of clothes in the morning and evening.

Fang Hongjun said, “I bought it secretly. You may not know, but there’s a market at the city gate.”

Wen Jiajia asked, “A market?”

“Yes, the kind of market we have in our hometown,” he replied, looking a little confused. “The social situation has changed so fast. I never would have thought there would be a market at the city gate at this time last year. I don’t know what it will be like in the future.”

Wei Dai served chicken soup to the two children. “Society is constantly changing and developing, but the recent changes have indeed been significant.”

Wen Jiajia didn’t think the changes were that drastic because she had knowledge of history. But she was also curious, so she asked about the specific location, intending to tell the aunt so she would have a new place to visit in the future.

The four of them arrived around nine in the morning and didn’t leave until around three or four in the afternoon.

Wen Chun and Wen Xuan successfully made friends in the Yaobo dormitory, while Wen Jiajia and Wei Dai also went to the Workers’ Cultural Palace next door for a stroll.

There are many classrooms in the Workers’ Cultural Palace, offering various training programs.

For example, when Wen Jiajia saw someone teaching people how to use a sewing machine to make clothes, she felt that she could become a teacher.