Journey 1995:Non-Stop

Chapter 88 Fire Fighting
After working here for about half a month, the four of us have earned a total of 6000 yuan. We only had two days when we didn't make any business at all, and we made money every day on the other days.

Yan Hui received 2400 yuan for himself! In just half a month!
Everyone's income has exceeded a thousand, but they have become increasingly low-key. When they encounter a boss who disagrees with the price, they would rather not sell than negotiate.

Anyway, I've already reserved it, so how do you know I don't have any stock to ship?
The freight station is large enough and has enough routes; it can accommodate the four of them for now, since everyone has always listened to Yan Hui and isn't greedy.

If they come every day and fill half the freight cars with wood, it won't be long before they cause a stir here, and then they'll never be able to come back.

"Since we're making money by exploiting the rules, we must not break the established rules here." This was Yan Hui's advice to everyone.

This job cannot be done by one person, nor by a group of people.

Everyone had things to do during the day the next day, so there was no celebration that night; everyone went home.

Yan Hui got home early today, and when he got back to his room, he found that Brother Zhao wasn't there, which made him quite curious. However, since he was back early, he could finally get a good night's sleep, so Yan Hui washed up and went straight to bed.

Yan Hui got up very early the next day. After getting up, he saw that Brother Zhao was still sleeping. He carefully put on his clothes and went out to have breakfast.

Summers in Fengtian are relatively short, and it's still a bit chilly in the early morning, which secretly pleased Yan Hui. Having more clothes would make it easier for him to sew money.

At this moment, Yan Hui had more than 21,000 yuan on him, even though his fourth uncle hadn't paid him his wages yet.

Walking down the street, no one would ever guess that this ordinary-looking young man carries 20,000 yuan in cash with him every day!
In Fengtian, Yan Hui didn't actually receive much care from his fourth uncle. He always felt that this wasn't where he belonged, so keeping his money on him was the safest option. Since he quit drinking, he felt even more at ease; as long as he didn't drink, he wouldn't be in a state of impaired consciousness.

In those days, bank passbooks couldn't be used to withdraw money across provinces. You had to deposit your money in one bank and then come all the way here to collect it, which was incredibly inconvenient. Not only banks, but even pagers couldn't communicate across provinces; even crossing city lines was difficult. To contact someone far away, you still had to rely on the telephone. However, even landlines cost at least 3000 yuan to install, making telephones a rare commodity, and telephone charges were exorbitantly high.

After finishing his meal, with nearly an hour to go before the factory started operations, Yan Hui wandered around the streets for a while.

"Fire! Fire!" Yan Hui suddenly heard someone shouting.

In Northeast China, everyone is very enthusiastic. As soon as they heard about the fire, many people started running towards it, and Yan Hui followed suit.

Near Factory 239, many factories and houses are located close together, and there are many lumber mills, making a fire a very dangerous situation. Once the fire spreads, no one can guarantee that they will not suffer losses.

Running with the crowd, Yan Hui realized the fire wasn't heading towards his fourth uncle's factory, which put his mind at ease. After running for about half a minute, Yan Hui spotted the fire.

Upon looking at it, he felt that this place looked very familiar.
This is where Yan Hui gets his hair cut.

There's no wood here, so how could it catch fire?
There was no time to think, and people kept coming over with basins of water to put out the fire. Yan Hui saw this and joined in.

Unable to find a basin or bucket, he continued running. After running several dozen meters, he came across a hardware store, shouted "Fire!" a few times, and asked the owner for a basin.

"How much? How much?" Yan Hui asked quickly.

"What money do you need for putting out the fire? Hurry up! I'll lock the door right now, I'm coming too!" The shopkeeper said, placing a stack of basins at the doorway before locking it. "Thank you, sir," Yan Hui called out, grabbing an iron basin and rushing towards where everyone was getting water.

This place is relatively developed, and the surrounding factories and shops all have running water, which came in very handy at this moment. Dozens of people took turns carrying wooden basins to put out the fire, and after hundreds of basins of water were poured down, the fire was quickly brought under control.

The fire started quickly and was extinguished relatively quickly, mainly because there were too many people around to help. In less than 15 minutes, the flames inside the house were gone, and the father and daughter who were trapped inside by the fire were rescued.

The house was mostly burned down, but fortunately no one was hurt; they were just trapped inside by the sudden fire.

"How did the fire start?" Some of the braver ones had already peeked inside to take a look.

At this moment, Yan Hui turned his attention to the female hairdresser.

Because everyone splashed so much water, the man wasn't burned, but he was soaked to the bone. After being rescued, the father kept kowtowing to everyone, while his six- or seven-year-old daughter clung to his legs, refusing to let go, looking at everyone timidly.

Several men rushed over to help the barber up. Many people had gotten their hair cut there and knew that the barber was a good person, so they all said a lot of comforting words.

"It must have been the electric kettle; the wire caught fire and set the curtains on fire." At this point, someone came out and told everyone after "investigating."

"Oh? That thing caused the trouble. That thing is definitely not a good thing, in our house..."

Everyone was discussing it animatedly, and some kind-hearted people helped by cutting off the power and dragging out the burnt sofa.

This sofa was the worst burning spot; it took more than a dozen buckets of water to put it out!
Yan Hui's pants were also wet, but seeing that the father and daughter were unharmed, he felt an indescribable sense of relief.

He had to go to work, so before leaving, he first found the hardware store owner, returned the iron basin, and then took out a blue 100-yuan bill and forcefully stuffed it into the barber shop owner's hand.

"This is unacceptable, absolutely unacceptable!"

"Brother, work hard! If I come here for a haircut later, you won't charge me, right?" Yan Hui also picked up some of the straightforwardness of Northeasterners. "Don't give me any nonsense!"

After saying that, Yan Hui swung his arms and strode back.

After returning home, Yan Hui didn't tell anyone about it, but with work approaching, he encountered another problem: his pants were wet—should he change them or not?
If I don't change them, the wet pants will get covered in sawdust, and I'll feel awful later. But if I do change them, the money sewn on won't be easy to transfer.
Having no other choice, Yan Hui took off his pants and hung them out to dry wherever he could find a spot. Then he took out all his money and stuffed it all into his pocket.

All day long, Yan Hui worked with the money in his pocket, without any tension. Perhaps it was innate, but Yan Hui had always had a rather calm attitude towards money. If a good opportunity presented itself, he would be willing to act instantly and invest all 20,000 yuan.

However, on ordinary days, he would also like to earn more than one yuan, so there is no conflict between them.

(End of this chapter)