Siheyuan, my new life

Hao Aiguo, relying on his senior brother being the director of the fitter workshop, always acted arrogantly in front of the workers. While other workers would gather in groups of three or five during their free time to smoke and chat in the abandoned warehouse outside the workshop, Hao Aiguo disdained to interact with these ordinary workers. He would swagger over to the workshop director's office to smoke, drink tea, and read newspapers.

Therefore, few workers in the workshop were willing to pay attention to him. After all, everyone's technical skill level was about the same, and no one wanted to listen to someone who always spoke in a lecturing tone. Even though he had a senior brother who was the workshop director, few people gave him any face. You should know that the high status of the working class these days is not just empty talk. Once a worker becomes a formal employee, the factory not only allocates housing according to his skill level, but also provides free medical services and other welfare benefits. Even his immediate family members can enjoy a certain percentage of medical expenses reimbursement when they are sick and hospitalized.

To put it bluntly, in that era, factories were responsible for the workers' lives from birth to death. Large and medium-sized enterprises like Hongxing Steel Rolling Mill had their own primary and secondary schools, their own bathrooms and barbershops. The factory also had a service center specifically for workers. As long as a worker did not break the law and was sentenced to prison, it was very difficult to fire a formal worker. Even if the factory leaders wanted to fire a worker, they had to go through the Party Committee and then report to the higher authorities for approval.

Therefore, when Xiong Qingshan led his men to escort Hao Aiguo out of the workshop, the workers in the workshop immediately began to discuss it, and a noisy commotion ensued.

Chen, the deputy head of the security department who stayed behind to investigate the workers living in the courtyard house at No. 95 Nanluoguxiang, frowned upon seeing the scene before him and said loudly, "Everyone, please be quiet. We need the workers living in the courtyard house at No. 95 Nanluoguxiang to come over and ask them questions immediately."

Upon hearing Deputy Section Chief Chen's words, the two workers, who looked somewhat nervous, quickly took off their work gloves and walked over.

Deputy Section Chief Chen immediately arranged for four security guards to question the two individuals and record their statements.

Statistician Xiao Liu approached Deputy Section Chief Chen, hesitated, and whispered, "Deputy Section Chief Chen, do you think I could go to the production department and inform Director Feng?"

Deputy Section Chief Chen didn't make things difficult for the young man, and nodded slightly: "Go ahead."

After thanking him, Xiao Liu quickly walked out of the fitter's workshop and jogged towards the factory office building. However, he did not see the back of Deputy Section Chief Chen, who was watching him intently.

Less than fifteen minutes later, Director Feng of the Fitter Workshop No. 2, panting, followed statistician Xiao Liu back to the workshop. Xiao Liu had just come to the production department with some shocking news: his troublesome junior colleague Hao Aiguo had been arrested by the security department. What shocked him even more was that the person leading the arrest was none other than Deputy Director Xiong Qingshan.

To be honest, Director Feng was somewhat troubled by Hao Aiguo. He didn't put his mind to learning fitter skills and always acted arrogantly. He was truly hopeless. If it weren't for Director Feng's help, who knows what kind of mess he would have made. Even his current level 5 fitter qualification was only achieved because Director Feng had let him pass the exam two years ago. Now, almost two years later, this guy has barely reached the intermediate level of level 5. Several workers who passed the level 5 exam at the same time as him have already passed level 6 this year, and one of them has even passed level 7.

Director Feng dared not continue to give Hao Aiguo leeway during the assessment. Firstly, the Ministry attached great importance to this year's assessment of intermediate and senior technicians and sent several engineers to supervise the examination. Secondly, even if the assessment team was still composed of senior technicians from Hongxing Steel Rolling Mill, Director Feng did not want Hao Aiguo to pass.

After all, once a fitter reaches level six, they will be considered a senior technician, just like those at levels seven and eight. They will be processing workpieces of the same level. If Hao Aiguo's actual skill level does not reach level six, even if he asks someone to help him pass the exam, he will immediately reveal his weakness when processing level six workpieces. In that case, not only will the person in charge of the exam be implicated and held accountable, but he himself will also be held responsible.

A few days ago, Hao Aiguo's wife hurriedly came to him, saying that Hao Aiguo had been caught by the steel mill's security department at the black market. Director Feng didn't take it too seriously at the time. Even he himself would occasionally go to the black market to buy things. Everyone knew it was an open secret. However, if you were caught when law enforcement was cracking down on the black market, you could only accept your bad luck. Under normal circumstances, the only thing that would happen in this case was to confiscate your property and notify your unit for criticism and education.

However, when Director Feng contacted an acquaintance in the security department, he learned that Hao Aiguo and his group had been arrested for resisting arrest and attacking security guards. Therefore, the acquaintance did not dare to release them privately.

Director Feng was furious. Had this guy lost his mind? How dare he resist arrest and attack a security guard? The consequences of him falling into the hands of the security department were unimaginable. But he couldn't just stand by and do nothing. After all, if Hao Aiguo hadn't been quick to pull him out, he'd probably be long gone. So Director Feng immediately asked Deputy Director Huang of the Production Department to intervene and ask Deputy Factory Director Li Huaide to help get him and the other arrested workers out of the factory.

Hao Aiguo did indeed save Director Feng's life. Back then, before the liberation, both of them were apprentice fitters at Lou's Steel Rolling Mill. At that time, apprentices were mainly responsible for assisting master fitters, and their usual tasks included miscellaneous work such as moving steel, collecting workpieces, and cleaning workstations. Once, when these apprentices went to the warehouse to fetch steel, a stack of steel suddenly collapsed. Hao Aiguo reacted quickly and pulled him aside at the last second. Of the five apprentices who went to the warehouse to fetch steel, only the two of them survived. The other three were killed on the spot by the collapsing steel, and the third could not be saved even after being sent to the hospital.

Director Feng was certainly not an ungrateful person. From then on, he took good care of Hao Aiguo, providing him with considerable help both in his work and life. To be honest, Hao Aiguo's talent in fitter work was quite average. Both of them learned fitter skills from the same master craftsman, but while Director Feng officially graduated and began processing basic workpieces, Hao Aiguo was still an apprentice. There was nothing he could do but teach him hand-in-hand whenever he had free time, passing on all his experience without reservation. Finally, two months later, Hao Aiguo became a junior fitter.