Traveling back to 1977

Chapter 138 Please, Secretary, Uphold Justice

In a short while, Chen Fan finished treating the falcon's wound, placed it in a corner, patted its head, and said, "Stay here obediently, don't spread your wings, and wait until it's healed before moving."

The falcon shook its head and stared blankly at him. "Hungry."

Chen Fan couldn't help but scratch his head, wondering where he could find food for it.

Eurasian hobbies are carnivores. They usually catch small birds and insects on their own. If they can't find these, they will also prey on small animals such as mice and rabbits when they are hungry, but they will not eat vegetables.

Therefore, to raise this little creature, you absolutely must feed it meat.

If he were at home, he could kill a fish and try to feed it fish meat, but there's nothing here. In the dead of winter, not even insects come out. He can't exactly go and catch birds.

The key is to be able to grasp it.

At this moment, Zhang Wenliang said, "Hey, my fourth brother's family is making glutinous rice cakes today, and my ninth brother's family is slaughtering a pig. Don't go back later, we'll eat the pig-slaughtering feast."

Chen Fan turned to look at him, his expression hesitant. "Isn't this a bad idea?"

At the same time, a thought popped into my head: could I buy some fresh meat later?
Zhang Wenliang chuckled and said, "What's wrong with that? If you feel embarrassed, you can just cook a few dishes to liven things up, that'll do."

Chen Fan's face fell. "I suspect you've come here to find me to be your craftsman!"

Zhang Wenliang laughed heartily, “We can’t afford to hire one. A skilled craftsman costs 2 yuan. We’ll just do it ourselves. We didn’t even hire Liu the craftsman from your team 6. We’ll make our own pig-killing feast. When you come over, there will only be wine and food, nothing else.”

Chen Fan nodded, "Okay, I'll go over after the broadcast."

At the same time, he was secretly delighted, thinking that the Eurasian Hobby's food supply was now secured.

Later, when Zhang Laojiu's family slaughters the New Year's pig, we'll ask him to buy some scraps of meat or offal like heart, liver, and lungs to feed it for a few days until its injuries heal and it can be released.

As for whether the Eurasian Hobby would return, Chen Fan didn't care. He'd leave it to fate and wouldn't force it. The main problem was, where would he find so much meat to feed the little creature every day?!

Let it fend for itself!
Just as Chen Fan was secretly making plans, Zhang Wenliang patted him on the shoulder, "What are you waiting for? After the broadcast is over, turn on the radio and go straight there. You have to get there early to make glutinous rice cakes so you can eat them hot later. After that, go to my ninth brother's house to watch the pig slaughter. When you come back around 9 o'clock, just turn off the machine and you're done."

Unable to refuse such hospitality, Chen Fan waited until 7 o'clock, turned on the radio to make sure everything was alright, and then closed the lid of the cardboard box. To prevent it from moving around and damaging the machine, he cut a hole in the side of the box, then closed the door and left, leaving the falcon all alone there.

As soon as Chen Fan stepped out of the compound, he saw Captain Yang huffing and puffing as he walked over, white breath coming out of his mouth. "Are you going out?"

Chen Fan: "Ah, Company Commander Zhang's family is making glutinous rice cakes and slaughtering a pig. They asked me to come over and help prepare some dishes."

Captain Yang couldn't help but chuckle, "You've really become a half-master craftsman."

Chen Fan laughed and said, "It's just helping out, making a few dishes. They'll have to make the pork stew themselves."

The implication was that I didn't steal Liu Jujiang's business.

He paused for a moment, then asked, "Did you come to the brigade for some business?"

Captain Yang nodded and pointed to the yard. "Okay, let's have a meeting."

He waved his hand and said, "You go ahead with your work, I'm going inside."

They then walked inside.

Not long after Chen Fan left, one squad leader after another arrived and went into the meeting room of the brigade headquarters.

There weren't many people at the meeting today: Yang Yizhong, the brigade secretary; Zhang Changjiang, the brigade leader; Ye Shubao and Xiao Liewen, the deputy leaders; and then the leaders of the 12 squads.

Among them, Zhang Guangwen, captain of team 5, Yang Chuanfu, captain of team 6, and Su Yujun, captain of team 10, were the first to arrive and had already smoked two pipes in the meeting room.

After the last team leader of Team 12 arrived, they greeted each other noisily, poured themselves a cup of tea, and sat down. Secretary Yang then tapped the table and said, "Sit down, everyone, the meeting is starting."

The meeting room immediately fell silent. Secretary Yang didn't mince words, directly explaining his intention to recommend Chen Fan to study veterinary medicine, and to arrange for two other people to study with him—essentially, to be his apprentices. He concluded by saying...
“We’ve discussed this, and if Xiao Chen can become a veterinarian, it will be much more convenient for our nearly 100 large livestock in the whole brigade to see a doctor. Also, if any chickens, ducks, geese, or pigs raised by each household have any problems, we can solve them immediately.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Captain Hou of Team 12, who arrived last, said loudly, "This is a good thing. The brigade has recommended people to go for training before, but they all failed the exams and none of them graduated."

When livestock got sick, we could only ask a few experienced livestock farmers who had raised livestock for decades to prescribe some herbal medicine. By the time the livestock were sent to the commune's veterinary station, they were usually seriously ill. Station Chief Zhou and his team were just a few people who were busy all day long and sometimes couldn't take care of everything.

If we had our own qualified veterinarians, the livestock would be much more comfortable. Not to mention, Master Chen is even willing to bring two apprentices along—that's a fantastic thing!

He paused for a moment, then looked at Secretary Yang with excitement, "We're having a meeting over this? If you ask me, I'd raise my hand and agree to give them three work points, let alone two! What's the point of having a meeting?!"

Secretary Yang coughed lightly, looking at him with a half-smile, "If we don't hold a meeting, I'll give those two apprentice slots to another team?"

Captain Hou nearly choked upon hearing this and quickly said, "No, no, that won't do."

He paused for a moment before realizing what was going on. "Oh, so the meeting is about the apprentice slots? Then I have a suggestion. I don't care about the other teams, but our Team 12 is the furthest away, so we should be given some consideration, right?"

The team leader next to him immediately objected, "What nonsense! So what? Is our team closer to the brigade or the commune than yours?"

Captain Hou quickly tried to win over allies, "Hey, look at you, don't you think about it? If our Team 12 had a veterinarian, and your Team 1 is so close to us, how could we possibly ignore you?"

The team leader simply spat, "If you were on our team, would we ignore you?"

Just as an argument was about to break out, Secretary Yang tapped the table and said, "What's all the arguing about? You're all over 100 years old combined, and you still have such a temper. This is a meeting, not an argument to see who can shout the loudest."

Team Leader Yang from Team 6 chuckled and said, "The secretary is right. We're in a meeting, so let's discuss this properly."

He then turned to Secretary Yang and said, "Secretary, look, Xiao Chen is from our Team 6. What if he leaves one day and we, Team 6, end up with nothing? Wouldn't that be a huge injustice? How about giving our Team 6 a spot? It would be a small way of repaying us for taking care of him all this time."

Upon hearing this, Su Yujun, the captain of Team 10, was about to speak, but Secretary Yang raised his hand and stopped him.

Secretary Yang looked at everyone and said seriously, "Here's the situation: Xiao Chen was pulled out of the river by Yang Chuanfu, and he never made any demands regarding this..."

Yang Chuanfu lowered his head and chuckled, "Hey, why bring this up?"

Secretary Yang looked at him and said, "Let's not talk about this and give the spot to another team?"

Yang Chuanfu immediately raised his head and said with a serious face, "Please, Secretary, uphold justice!"

Upon hearing this, the others gritted their teeth, but all agreed that six teams should occupy one spot.

Yang Chuanfu rescued all these people, so what can they say?
At this moment, Zhang Changjiang took a puff of his cigarette and said, "Don't be envious, Team 6 also paid a price."

Yang Chuanfu quickly nodded, "Yes, yes, Xiao Chen doesn't have a homestead yet. I approved land for him at the highest rate of 2.5 fen, and also approved a 2 mu yard. This morning, all the commune representatives put their fingerprints to agree, so it's a done deal and there's no going back."

Su Yujun's lips twitched slightly, and he muttered to himself, "If it were me, I could get approval for 4 mu."

But in the end, he didn't say it.

At this moment, Team Leader Hou of Team 12 said with a bitter face, "Secretary, Team Leader, Team 6 has taken one, and there's one left for us 11 teams to share. How are we supposed to compete for it? Can't we just get two more?"

Secretary Yang said earnestly, "I went to see Secretary Qian and Station Chief Zhou last night. They can only give us a maximum of 3 slots. Didn't the commune give us slots before? It's because we couldn't seize them. You don't have the ability. What use would it be if I gave you 10 slots?"

At this point, everyone fell silent.

Zhang Guangwen, the captain of Team 5, had already been informed. He looked at the silent crowd and took the initiative to say, "Xiao Chen works at the brigade headquarters, and Team 6 also has one spot. We, Team 5, will not take it."

After he started, all four teams voluntarily gave up.

Lujiawan is divided into two parts, north and south. Teams 4 to 9 are in the south, while teams 1, 2, 3, 10, 11, and 12 are in the north. There is a 10-meter-wide main irrigation canal in the middle as the dividing line. So at this time, everyone knows that the last spot will definitely go to the north. It just depends on which team can grab it.

(End of this chapter)