Traveling back to 1977

Chapter 72 Going Fishing

The two talked for a while and soon arrived at the educated youth settlement.

Zhang Wenliang and Huang, the storekeeper, were old acquaintances, so there was no need for Chen Fan to introduce them. Seeing that the two were chatting enthusiastically, he smiled and said, "Brother Sanhu, Storekeeper Huang, you two keep chatting. I'll go see what dishes to make for dinner."

Hearing his words, Zhang Wenliang turned around and said with a smile, "From now on we're all family. You just said yourself that you don't want to be polite with me, so let's not make things too complicated."

Chen Fan laughed and said, "I'm short of things here, so there's no way I can cause any trouble even if I wanted to."

"So much the better."

Zhang Wenliang laughed and said, "Anyway, it'll be kept simple."

Chen Fan nodded vigorously, smiling as he raised his right hand high. "Okay."

He then left the room.

Only then did the storekeeper, Huang, ask in a low voice with a look of surprise, "A family? Company Commander Zhang, what's going on?"

Could it be that the Zhang family has betrothed one of their daughters to him?

That's a pretty big bet!

Seeing his expression, Zhang Wenliang guessed what he was thinking and immediately said, with a wry smile, "It's like this..."

……

Chen Fan came out of the house and walked straight ahead. He stopped at Jiang Lili's door. Before he could speak, Jiang Lili got up and walked over.

Jiang Lili pointed to the kitchen and said, "Yang Mei and Yang Lan just brought over a jar of wine, along with grapes and wine bowls, which are all in the kitchen."

He then glanced at Chen Fan's room and asked in a low voice, "Are you going to entertain Company Commander Zhang? Shall I help you wash the vegetables?"

Chen Fan laughed and said, "I really can't live without you."

He then pointed to the back of the house and asked, "I didn't look closely, what kind of vegetables are in the vegetable garden behind the house?"

Jiang Lili walked out directly and said, "I'll take you there."

The two walked to the back, and Jiang Lili pointed to the vegetable garden and said, "This is mainly cabbage and white radish, and there are also a few clumps of red cabbage and small green vegetables, as well as scallions, ginger and garlic, and that's all."

Chen Fan glanced at the dishes, silently calculating for a moment, then asked, "Do you know where else I can catch fish now?"

"Catching fish?"

Jiang Lili blinked, then pointed blankly to the riverbank, "In summer, the ditches are full of fish, but in winter you can only catch them in the river."

"In the river?"

Chen Fan frowned, then asked, "Do you know which family in the team has a fishing rod or net?"

Jiang Lili said, "Almost every household has a fishing rod, and many households also have fishing nets, like Captain Yang's family. When the water level rises, many people go fishing. As long as it's not one of the ponds in the team, any fish caught in the wild rivers and ditches are theirs."

She paused for a moment, then suddenly remembered something. "Oh, there's a fishing rod in the room next door. It was left behind by a former educated youth. The fishing line and hook are still there."

Chen Fan immediately tilted his head and said, "Take me to see."

A moment later, he found a fishing rod lying upright in the corner of the room. It was a dry bamboo pole, yellowed in color, with several spots that looked like it had been baked with fire, marks left from "straightening" the bamboo pole.

Chen Fan straightened the bamboo pole; the more than four-meter-long pole stood upright with little sign of drooping.

I shook it gently, and it felt quite elastic.

Chen Fan then found the fishing line and hook and began to wind the line.

Before he transmigrated, he wasn't a fisherman and didn't know much about fishing. However, he had a big client who loved fishing, so in order to maintain the client relationship, he learned a little bit of "modern fishing techniques," but not much, just enough to be considered a beginner.

Another thing is that when I was a child in the countryside, I would go fishing with the older kids in the village and catch quite a few big fish with a bamboo pole. If that skill wasn't enough, I would try to communicate with the fish using my own language, but I don't know if those fish were easy to talk to, so I just asked them to bite the hook themselves.

If it's difficult to talk to people, then you'll have to borrow a fishing net to cast it.

Otherwise, when hosting a dinner party, you can't just serve cured meat and fish all the time.

He remembered his grandfather saying that the custom in Yunhu was to serve guests fresh meat and vegetables if possible; if not, a plate of scrambled eggs would do. Now Chen Fan had no eggs, so he had to find another way; if that didn't work, he'd have to kill a turtle.

Kill the turtle directly?

Forget it.

He ate with gusto for the first two days, but after that he ate it every day, at every meal. Now he can't even bring himself to eat turtle meat.

Moreover, he noticed during lunch today that Zhang Wenliang didn't eat turtle very often, while only Technician Huang ate with great gusto.

So he would only consider using turtles to make up the numbers if he couldn't catch any fish.

Soon the fishing line was wound up and the hook was tied tight. The float was made of goose feathers. The feathers on both sides of a goose feather were cut off, and the remaining white rod was cut into small pieces and threaded onto the fishing line. Usually, seven floats were used, hence the name "Seven Star Float".

The fishing sinker also has a vintage feel; you can simply cut a small strip of toothpaste tube, wrap it around the fishing line, and that's your fishing sinker.

Looking at the antique fishing gear, Chen Fan felt a little uneasy. Could this thing even catch fish?

Regardless, give it a try first.

Anyway, it's still early, probably around 1 p.m., so I'll have Jiang Lili help with the preparations while I go fishing for a bit.

After preparing his fishing gear, he returned to his room, waved and smiled at the two people who were chatting happily, then took out a piece of cured meat and a fish, and came back with a bag of rice, a jar of pickled vegetables, and a bottle of oil.

When they saw that Chen Fan had even brought a kimchi jar, Zhang Wenliang and the storekeeper Huang looked at each other in surprise.

The custom here is that even if you're poor, you shouldn't serve pickles or kimchi. Otherwise, the guests will think that the host is making them eat more rice and less vegetables, which is very impolite. But Chen Fan actually brought a jar of kimchi.

After a couple of seconds of stunned silence, Zhang Wenliang couldn't help but chuckle, "Our Master Chen is an extraordinary person doing extraordinary things!"

Seeing that Chen Fan was about to settle in Team 6, Huang, the storekeeper, ultimately defended his own team members and laughed, "Isn't it because he's forgetful? He might just have forgotten about this."

He then changed the subject, saying, "Let me tell you, even though he's only been here a few days, he's already made quite a few jokes."

Zhang Wenliang's eyes lit up. "Details."

……

Chen Fan moved the things to the kitchen and carefully explained to Jiang Lili, "Slice half a radish, shred the other half, dice the other half, and cube the other half; remove the leaves from half a cabbage and keep the stalks, then shred the other half; cut the red cabbage into large pieces, and..."

Jiang Lili felt dizzy and confused listening to him. When he was halfway through, she quickly raised her hand and said, "I... I'm afraid I won't remember it. I'll go get my notes."

He ran back to his room to get paper and pen and wrote down Chen Fan's instructions one by one.

After she finished writing, Chen Fan grabbed a handful of rice and put it in a bowl, then poured in a bottle of liquor to soak it.

Jiang Lili's eyes widened. "Are you going to use rice to make a nest?"

The people in the team use rice bran to fish!

Chen Fan replied naturally, "Yes."

He glanced at the cupboard again, went over and opened it. Sure enough, there was still some leftover rice inside. He happily grabbed a clump and threw it into the bowl, then mixed it with his hands.

With this bowl of stuff, see if the big fish will come!

Then he cut a small piece of cured pork, the kind that's all lean meat, finely sliced ​​it into strips, and threw it into the bowl. Only then, with a fishing rod in one hand and a bait bowl in the other, he swaggered off.

(End of this chapter)