Traveling through 1942 with space

The man in the suit must have just got on the train, and was eating two meat buns in big bites.

Hou Xiaoge originally wanted to walk directly up to the middle-aged man to absorb the energy, but he was worried that the ring would make noise when absorbing the energy, so he did not dare to act rashly for a while.

It just so happened that the carriage behind the man in the suit was a toilet. Hou Xiaoge planned to wait until the train started before going into the toilet. The toilet was right next to the seat, so a one-meter distance was enough.

There was still nearly an hour before departure, and Hou Xiaoge could only suppress his excitement and return to his seat.

"Auntie, these are the sweet potatoes I just bought, they are still hot!

You, your uncle, and your elder sister can eat first, and share it with the little ones after they wake up." Hou Xiaoge poured the sweet potatoes held in her clothes onto the table in front of the chair and said.

"Heiwa, seeing how capable you are makes me feel old." Hou Cuiping sighed as she touched a handful of steamed sweet potatoes.

"Aunt, you and uncle should eat it while it's hot! I tasted this sweet potato and it's very sweet."

Hou Xiaoge didn't blush or feel nervous, and she didn't feel embarrassed at all about eating buns and eggs, drinking soy milk, and giving sweet potatoes to her family.

“Okay, I’ll eat it.” Hou Cuiping smelled the sweet potatoes and felt her stomach rumbling. Her sallow face turned a little red.

Hou Cuiping only ate two bran pancakes a day. She still had to cook and take care of the children, so she was already very hungry. She didn't feel embarrassed at this time and picked up the sweet potato and started eating it.

"Heiwa, these sweet potatoes are so sweet, much sweeter than the ones we grow at home. If we had these sweet potatoes at a stall, they would definitely sell well.

Alas! It’s a pity that our family originally had six mu of mountain land, but now it’s all sold.” Hou Cuiping ate the sweet potato and her first reaction was to plant it, and she sighed as she finished speaking.

In any era, land is the lifeblood of farmers and their last resort. Once farmers lose their land, their lives are truly inferior to those of human beings.

Hou Xiaoge heard from his eldest cousin that the six acres of mountain land in his family was accumulated by four generations of his family.

Although these acres of mountain land rely on the weather for food and cannot be irrigated, in normal years, after deducting various taxes, they can bring the family more than 300 kilograms of wheat and more than 900 kilograms of sweet potatoes or potatoes each year.

Of course, the family rarely eats such precious fine grain as wheat. Apart from keeping about 100 kilograms for breeding and entertaining guests during festivals, the remaining 200 kilograms of wheat would be taken to the landlord's workshop and exchanged for sweet potatoes or potatoes after the harvest every year.

During the slack season, the strong laborers in the family would occasionally go to the landlord's house or the town to do odd jobs to supplement the family income. It was no problem for the family to have enough food and clothing every year. This was the life of an ordinary rural family.

Such small farmers with little savings may be able to live well in normal years, but once a natural disaster strikes, they will immediately go bankrupt.

This is the case with Hou Xiaoge's family. Last year they could still borrow some money to barely hold on, but after this year's summer harvest they were completely devastated.

There was no hope of a summer harvest and heavy taxes had to be paid, so the rich landlord was not likely to lend money or grain to Hou Xiaoge's family. Instead, he took the opportunity to instigate debt collection.

Faced with the pressure from the tax police and the debt collection from the landlord, the family finally lost the five acres of mountain land, which was swallowed up by the landlord at the price of 60 yuan per acre. (This is the legal currency)

According to my uncle, although the mountain land at home is not as good as irrigated land, it is fertile after years of careful care.

Moreover, the terrain of their own land was not high and could be irrigated by carrying water. Each acre of land could be sold for more than 80 yuan at a normal price, but in years of disaster, people died, and in the end they had to sell it to the landlord at a low price.

The six acres of land were sold for more than three hundred yuan. After paying back the landlord and paying taxes, only more than two hundred yuan was left.

If the legal currency maintained its value, these more than 200 yuan would be a considerable sum of money, but the thing that least maintained its value in the Republic of China was money.

Although there was a disaster in Central China, it was not very serious at the beginning of the year. One hundred French francs could still buy half a pig, but in June, the French franc began to depreciate rapidly.

By the end of June, one hundred French francs could only buy 30 kilograms of pork. By July, there were only 20 kilograms of pork left. By August when Hou Xiaoge was reborn, one hundred French francs could only buy 10 kilograms of pork. Even so, because of the famine, there was still no demand for pork.

By the end of July, my uncle and his brothers saw that they had money, so they rushed to buy grain. However, because they started too late and the landlords were hoarding the grain and refusing to sell it, they only bought more than 20 kilograms of cornmeal and 50 kilograms of bran with 200 French francs.

So in the end, Hou Xiaoge's family only exchanged six acres of land for more than 20 kilograms of corn flour and 50 kilograms of bran.

After Hou Xiaoge heard what her eldest cousin said, she felt like blood was dripping from her heart. This was such a loss to her grandma's family.

In the end, Hou Xiaoge could only sigh helplessly. He knew that the upper class of the Republic of China was corrupt and was harvesting the common people like leeks! This is just the beginning, and it will only get more ruthless in the future.

In fact, not only ordinary people, but also middle-level capitalists and landlords were exploited.

However, the wealthy landlords relied on their deep financial resources and thick blood to shift their losses onto the common people.

The war and tax increases, the years of disaster, and the upper echelons of the Republic of China's financial system harvesting leeks, not only did ordinary people lose everything, but even their "hearts and lungs" were taken away. (Here, the hearts and lungs refer to selling children.)

Nowadays, children are not as valuable as land to farmers. If you lose a child, you can have another one, but if you lose the land, you really have nothing.

Without land, in most cases future generations can only work as tenants, farmhands, or maids for the landlords, unless there are "mutated" descendants in the family, then it will be possible to own land again.

The landlords and wealthy people took advantage of the fact that the lower-class people had given their hearts and souls and had nothing to sell to give us the people the final blow and directly dig out the people's roots.

They colluded with the government and directly forced the common people to sell their land at low prices to repay their debts and pay taxes. Most of the wealthy landlords actually became much richer during the disaster years.

According to Hou Xiaoge, although most of the irrigated land in Nanjiagou used to belong to landlords, 30% was still owned by self-cultivating farmers.

But after the natural disaster, most of these lands were bought up by landlords who were enjoying their lives in the city. Even the mountains that the landlords had previously looked down upon were taken by more than 90% of them.

Many time travelers come to this era to go fishing and hunting in the mountains.

Sorry, the mountains belong to the landlord, the prey belongs to the landlord, the grass belongs to the landlord, the water belongs to the landlord, and even the land you stand on belongs to the landlord.

Hearing what his aunt said, Hou Xiaoge felt a little emotional for a moment.

"Aunt, I heard that there are few people but a lot of land in Qin Province. Due to the war a few years ago, a lot of land has been left barren.

When we get to Qin Province, we will inquire about the land reclamation policy. Maybe we will have more land in the future than before. "Hou Xiaoge recalled the historical memories in his mind and comforted his aunt.

"Well! I heard that people in Qin Province eat white steamed buns for every meal. We people from the Central Plains are down-to-earth and hardworking, so we will definitely be able to survive in Qin Province." Hou Cuiping's eyes lit up when she heard about reclaiming wasteland and farming.

What Hou Xiaoge said was actually correct. Although Qin Province had been part of the northwestern border area for thousands of years and had suffered heavy population losses, it was relatively stable during the Qing Dynasty, with its population peaking at 13 or 14 million.

But Qin Province was in a terrible situation in the late Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China. During the Taiping Rebellion, the largest ethnic conflict since the Tang Dynasty, the "Hui-Han Rebellion", broke out in Qin and Long provinces. In just a dozen years, the foundation accumulated by Qin and Long provinces for nearly thousands of years was directly destroyed.

In his previous life, Hou Xiaoge was from Qin Province and had a deep memory of this period of history. In total, nearly 30 million people died. The impact of this turmoil on Qin and Long provinces did not dissipate until the Republic of China.

But people are like crops. As long as the weather is favorable and life is stable, people will reproduce quickly.

By the early years of the Republic of China, after half a century of recuperation, the population of Qin Province had recovered to over 10 million.

But at this time, the disaster of the people of Qin Province came again! Because the Hui-Han War had dug up the foundation of Qin merchants, the commercial development of Qin Province was very fragile in the early Republic of China, but the warlords needed money to fight.

Warlords were rampant in Qin Province, and flags were flying over the city walls. The warlords could not get any money, so they forced the common people to grow opium, which later brought great suffering to the common people of Qin Province.

At that time, Qin Province was still the main cotton producing area in the country. As both opium and cotton were grown, the grain output was low.

In the 18th year of the Republic of China, Qin Province suffered a three-year natural disaster, killing millions of people in the province. It was known in history as the 18th Year of Nianjin.

In Hou Xiaoge's opinion, most of the past eighteen years were man-made disasters.

Otherwise, except for the arid plains in northern Qin, the land in southern Qin and central Qin is fertile, and the rivers are rich in rain and abundant in water, so it would be impossible for a disaster to affect the entire province.

It is now the 31st year of the Republic of China. It has been less than ten years since the 18th anniversary of Qin Province, and the population of Qin Province has not yet recovered. Now, those who flee famine to Qin Province not only will not be affected by war, but there is also wasteland that can be cultivated.

In fact, there is another reason, that is, it is still the Anti-Japanese War, and Qin Province also wants to send troops to fight the Japanese devils. This has led to a shortage of strong labor in Qin Province, and only the better irrigated land has been cultivated, and most of the ordinary dry land has been left uncultivated.

Therefore, Qin Province is a perfect place to recuperate.