Wind Rises in North America 1625

Chapter 197 Expectation
In September, autumn begins to arrive and the cool breeze from the sea blows gently, making the earth, which has been noisy all day, suddenly become warm and soothing.

As night gradually fell, the stars in the sky jumped out one after another, twinkling, as if they were lighthouses from ancient times, guiding the tired people back to their homes.

Xu Xinghuai's family of four sat at the door, around a small wooden table, enjoying a fairly sumptuous dinner.

Golden corn buns, steaming hot noodles, a large pot of stir-fried vegetables, and half a bowl of delicious fish soup will whet your appetite.

"Stinky boy, leave some for your mother." Xu Xinghuai saw his eleven-year-old eldest son licking his lips after drinking a small bowl of fish soup. He picked up the soup spoon and wanted to add some for himself. Then he scolded him with a fierce face, "Your mother has a little brother in her belly. It's time to replenish her nutrition."

"It's okay, it's okay." His wife, Sun, smiled, supported her waist, stood up, took the child's bowl, scooped him another half bowl of fish soup, and picked out a few pieces of salmon meat from it. "The child is growing and can't let him starve. Besides, Mingzi is still studying in school, which requires a lot of brainpower!"

Turning around, he saw his three-year-old sister looking at him eagerly, so he put an egg from his bowl in front of her, then carefully removed the few bones from a small piece of salmon and fed it to her.

"Oh..." Xu Xinghuai sighed slightly in his heart, wondering whether he should go to the production team's quarters office after a few days to get a few more fish tickets and buy a few more fish to supplement the nutrition for his wife who was five months pregnant.

But then I thought that if I received the fish ticket, the performance points I had accumulated over the years would inevitably be deducted, which made me feel a little sad.

This is all real money!

As the four-year service period is about to end, they will receive a piece of land of their own from the government and become formal self-employed farmers.

At that time, the government will not only provide a certain amount of production material loans, but will also no longer take care of their family's food, clothing, housing and transportation.

This requires them to have a savings fund that can maintain a normal life and be used for future living expenses.

Over the past four years, these immigrants have lived a collective farm-like life under the unified arrangement of the government, farming together, living together, and undergoing military training together. During this period, they were not paid any labor remuneration, but were provided with necessary food, clothing, housing, medical supplies and services in a timely and quantitative manner according to needs.

Each of them will obtain certain performance points based on their work performance and labor success over the past four years. After the agreed service period expires, they will receive corresponding land and a certain amount of "initial funds".

Of course, these performances can also be exchanged for necessary cloth, extra food or other consumer goods in daily life, so as to experience the joy of early consumption.

However, the spirit of diligence and thriftiness engraved in the bones of the Chinese nation means that most immigrants will not redeem and spend the performance points they have accumulated with great difficulty in recent years in advance. Instead, they hope to obtain a considerable amount of funds from the government after the end of their service period so that they can have a perfect start in life.

Xu Xinghuai had learned from the production team's statistics office that his accumulated performance over the past four years was enough to earn him a one-time payment of about 12-13 yuan from the government, which was equivalent to about 10 taels of silver.

Adding the performance bonus my wife has accumulated over the years, that’s 16-17 yuan.

Although this amount of money may not seem large, it is definitely a huge sum of money for Xu Xinghuai's family, who were once penniless. It can allow their family of four to maintain basic living for five or six months without any subsidies.

However, after becoming self-employed farmers, they still need to purchase farm tools and seeds, hire cattle and horses to plow the land, and purchase corresponding daily necessities. It is estimated that this money will be spent completely in a short time.

If you want to build a bigger house, buy some chickens and ducks, or raise a few pigs and sheep, you may have to apply for a low-interest agricultural loan from the government, and then repay the money bit by bit after the harvest from the fields every year.

However, Xu Xinghuai is still full of infinite expectations for his future life.

A full forty acres of land!

Even if only one-third of the arable land is managed, it will be enough for the family to have three full meals.

Not to mention, during the winter slack season, you can get together with a few villagers, carry knives and pitchforks, and go to the woods to hunt a few silver foxes, a few reindeer, or catch a few beavers, which you can exchange for some spare money.

These days, just thinking about them makes me feel hopeful!
"Brother Xu, is your family still eating?"

Xu Xinghuai was slurping a bowl of noodle soup when he suddenly heard someone calling him outside the courtyard. He put down the bowl and turned to look.

But he saw that it was Chen Wangquan and Tian Dechang, his fellow villagers from Xinhui who had come to Xinzhou Continent with him. They were each holding a jar of potato wine and a plate of dried salted fish in their hands, and standing outside the wooden fence with smiles on their faces.

"Hey, you're here." Xu Xinghuai stood up and welcomed the two of them in. "Have you eaten yet? ...Would you like to have a few bites here?"

"We just had a quick bite inside, no need for more." Chen Wangquan smiled, shaking the wine can in his hand and saying, "Tomorrow is the tenth day of the month, so my brother Dechang and I bought a can of wine at the supply and marketing store and grabbed a few handfuls of dried salted fish. We're coming over to have a couple of drinks with Brother Xu and chat." "Hey, you two are really spending money!" Xu Xinghuai looked at the wine can, his throat moving a few times. Then he turned to his wife and said, "Relight the stove and stir-fry some vegetables and bring them over. Tonight, I'm going to have a few drinks with you two brothers."

His wife, Mrs. Sun, nodded with a smile, asked the eldest son to go into the house to find a candle and light it for them, then turned and walked towards the stove.

"Then please trouble my sister-in-law to cook some delicious dishes for us." Tian Dechang placed the plate of dried salted fish in his hand on the small wooden table.

"What delicious food are we talking about?" Sun said. "It's just vegetables picked from our own garden. ... Please bear with me, the dried meat and salmon in the house have been eaten, so I'm afraid you won't have enough meat to drink with your wine."

"That's all right! To be honest, Sister-in-law Xu, we really do crave your cooking. You know, the woman in my house can't even stir-fry vegetables well. Even if I bring her some meat and fish, she can't cook like you! ...Alas, it's all our fault that we can't marry a Han Chinese wife!"

"That's right!" Chen Wangquan agreed with a wry smile, "When it comes to living together, our Han wives are the most down-to-earth. My family is the same. They can't even clean up after themselves every day, making the house a mess. I'm thinking, after the land is divided and we move, if there's no public canteen to cook at the settlement, I'll have to eat grass all day!"

"Haha..." Everyone burst into laughter when they heard this.

Sun, who was sitting by the stove in the corner of the room, also laughed when she heard this.

Less than two years after arriving in Xinzhou, they each married a local woman under the auspices of the local colonial government and started a family.

Not only do the native women look different from us Han people, but their living habits, language and personalities are also completely different, which makes the daily lives of these families full of contradictions and conflicts.

Not only do they lack the necessary talent in cooking, but their children are also very "rough", forcing men to take a lot of time out after a busy day to patiently and carefully teach them some "civilized habits" and "traditional women's virtues" and how to be a competent wife and qualified mother.

To be honest, marrying a native wife is still very tiring.

"Brother Xu, after the autumn harvest this year, we will get a share of the land. This won't change, right?" After drinking a few glasses of wine, Chen Wangquan opened up.

"How could this change?" Xu Xinghuai asked. "The committee officials had already decided on this matter, how could they suddenly change their minds? Did you hear some gossip?"

"I heard some whispers," Chen Wangquan whispered. "A few months ago, Western barbarian gunboats reached our Qiming Island, and we might be attacked by a large Western barbarian army. Some people said that if Xinhua couldn't stop the Western barbarian attack, we'd lose everything! Not only would we have no hope of getting land, but we might even be captured by the Western barbarians and enslaved, working like slaves for the rest of our lives!"

"Nonsense!" Xu Xinghuai slammed his wine bowl on the table and said with a fierce face, "From the committee to the managers of the various settlements and production teams, haven't we been told repeatedly that the Western Barbarians are nothing to be feared? Not to mention that they are so far away from Xinhua, the troops they can send are definitely very limited. Even if they could mobilize thousands of troops, we have no need to fear them."

"At least we in Xinhua have well-equipped artillery batteries, several large ships, and a well-trained army to protect us. Even if things get worse, we have several thousand strong men who have received years of military training. If the situation becomes truly dire, we can take up arms and fight the Western barbarians."

"Well, even if we take a step back and say we can't defeat the Western barbarians in the wild, the worst that can happen is that we all hide in the city and starve them to death. You've seen that over the past few months, we've been using the slack season to speed up the construction of the city walls. By the time the Western barbarians come, the city defenses will be ready!"

"That's true, but some people still feel unsure." Tian Dechang spat out the small fish bone in his mouth and said worriedly, "In the past, we were always hearing news of defeats in Liaodong in the Ming Dynasty. You see, our Ming Dynasty is vast and populous, yet we couldn't even defeat the small-time Jiannu."

"And our Xinhua population doesn't even add up to 10,000 people. When we face the Western Barbarians, it's inevitable that some people will be worried."

"What's there to complain about?" Xu Xinghuai poured himself another small bowl of wine and picked it up. "For the sake of my wife and children at home, for the land we were given, and for the sake of not being slaves, in the end, the worst that can happen is that we fight the Western Barbarians. Before we came to the New Continent, we might have starved to death on the streets. How could we drink and eat meat like this?"

"Yeah, that makes sense." Tian Dechang raised his wine bowl and said with a smile, "Anyway, we have a child, and the silly woman has another in her belly. Even if I risk my life and lose my head, as long as I can keep them alive in the end, it will be worth it!"

"For our wives and children, we'll naturally fight to the death. That's unquestionable." Chen Wangquan also raised his wine bowl. "But I still feel a little uneasy. We haven't had this peaceful life for long, and now we have to go to war with the Western Barbarians."

"Well, let's do it! Let's not dwell on these things that haven't happened yet. Now, let's do whatever the committee officials tell us to do."

"Hey, have you heard a rumor? ... They say the natives in nearby Xinning Fort are causing trouble."

"What did they do?"

"They said the wall construction was delayed, and after being punished by a few native overseers, they all started rioting. They beat the overseers, stole some tools and supplies, and ran away!"

"What?..." Xu Xinghuai was stunned when he heard it.

(End of this chapter)