Chapter Ninety-Four: Before the Wedding

This was an agricultural county, and animal husbandry was still rather underdeveloped. The meat-processing plant got its supply from the county slaughterhouse, and mainly made sausage and some canned meats.

In the past two years, the state’s support for agricultural cash crops had been quite good. More and more people in the lower-lying areas were planting profitable crops, and more and more were also starting livestock farms.

Aside from Zhangjia Village, the Bai Ping Dam area planned to develop animal husbandry as well. Because the land was flat and water was plentiful, the whole village intended to raise pigs and chickens collectively.

Bai Ping and Zhangjia Village were separated by only one valley. From the tea gardens in Zhangjia Village, one could look down and see the Bai Ping settlement.

Their village had adopted terraced livestock zones. Chickens were raised near the middle slopes, half penned and half free-range. They were fed a set ration at dawn and dusk, and the rest of the time were left to forage in the fenced mountain woods. In several places they had also built partially covered coops, so hens could lay eggs more conveniently.

Below the chicken pens were the pigsties, three tiers in all, with piglets and full-grown pigs kept separately. Pig manure could be sealed into biogas pits, or fermented and used as fertilizer.

Zhangjia Village sat at a higher elevation. Its main crop was tea, along with other high-altitude cash crops. There was not much suitable land for livestock, so they also raised chickens. But unlike a single communal operation, each household kept its own birds, and the village merely took the lead in purchasing them all together.

In addition, the village had used funds allocated by the township to build fishponds. Four large ponds had been dug by the river, where the four major freshwater fish were raised. These were cold-water fish from the mountains, and could not be fed with commercial feed. Instead, they were given carefully balanced natural fish food. This had been told to them by experts from the agricultural research institute, who said the fish would be tender in texture, free of any pollution, and more nutritious than ordinary freshwater fish. The fish were specially trucked to major cities and sold to supermarkets, fetching nearly double the price of regular fish.

At first the village head had worried that the price would be too high and there would be no market. Later, after receiving a call from the buyer asking them to raise more because supply was always short, he finally relaxed and increased investment. Now they planned to open two more fishponds, and in addition to the four major species, raise some more high-value cold-water fish.

In just one year, Zhangjia Village had gained more sources of income, and everyone’s spirits had improved greatly. There were fewer quarrels over trivial matters. Most people, besides taking turns working at the fishponds, were also taking advantage of the support policies to run small family operations on their own.

Take the Zhang family, for instance. They were now one of the wealthiest households in the village. Their former bamboo-rat breeding yard had expanded again, and together with the neighbors on both sides, they had taken over nearly half a mountain for breeding.

In the past, many young people in the village had gone out to work after graduating, but now at least half of them had come back. Every household was busy to the point of exhaustion, lamenting that there were too few hands rather than too many.

This time, with the Zhang family elder brother’s wedding, the whole village treated it as a major affair. Everyone felt that Zhangjia Village had favorable feng shui, and that a golden phoenix had come to bring prosperity and lead the village forward together. So they were all willing to lend a hand and make the wedding of Zhang Da lively and grand.

Some of the women were thinking even further ahead. They wanted people from other villages who came to attend the ceremony to see how strong their village was, so that the children in their own homes who were of marriageable age would have no trouble finding suitable matches.

And indeed, the sister-in-law and the sister-in-law’s friend who had originally come to help Zhang Er Sister ended up taking a liking to two young men from the village.

They had always thought Zhangjia Village was poor, and that Zhang Er Sister finding her husband’s brother was like smoke rising from an ancestral grave. But after coming up here and seeing it for themselves, they realized that although Zhangjia did not look impressive, the things they ate and used were no worse, and in some cases even better than what they had at their husband’s home. The sister-in-law felt a little sour inside.

But Zhang Er Sister was broad-minded by nature. Since her husband treated her and her family well, she returned the favor and was no stingy person toward her in-laws either. This time, when her sister-in-law came up to help, she directly pressed a red envelope into her hand, and the food was good too. Instantly, the woman felt much more at ease.

Then when Chen Xin and Bai Mengqing came back by car carrying large bundles of things, and there was also the money gift sent by Lei Bang, the sister-in-law and her friend exchanged a glance, and their smiles sweetened by another three parts.

“Sister Er, I brought back a set of gold jewelry for Sister-in-law, and this bracelet is for you. This longevity lock is for my nephew. Keep them safely for now, and take them out later after everyone has left.”

The golden shimmer nearly dazzled Zhang Er Sister’s eyes. Rural people were different from city people. City people liked diamond rings, but they liked gold. Big gold bracelets, big gold earrings—the brighter, the better.

Zhang Er Sister put away the set Chen Xin had given her, and boxed up the set for the elder sister-in-law before taking it over to show off.

Because of the wedding customs, Yan Chunhua had been staying at the village head’s house these past few days, in the room where the village head’s daughter had lived before getting married. The women who came to help crowded the courtyard, while the older grandmothers sat in the side room cracking sunflower seeds and chatting.

When Zhang Er Sister went over, she smiled and told Yan Chunhua to try the jewelry on and see what kind of hairstyle would suit it best.

The gold jewelry Chen Xin had given was from Lao Fengxiang. The gold there was of excellent purity, though the designs were a bit old-fashioned. But in the late nineteen-nineties, the overall styling of gold jewelry was not very good anyway. What mattered was the bright color and good purity; the design could be ignored.

Everyone cheered her on, and Yan Chunhua put on the full set of gold jewelry: gold bracelet, gold earrings, gold necklace, all solid and heavy.

“Hey, why isn’t there a gold ring?” one daughter-in-law suddenly called out, even showing off the ring on her own hand.

“The ring I wouldn’t dare give carelessly,” Chen Xin said with a laugh just then, arriving while holding Zhang Zhang and greeting Yan Chunhua. “A ring is something a husband gives his wife. Where is there a sister-in-law giving one to her brother’s wife? My big brother must have prepared one already. We’ll just wait until he brings it out himself for us to see.”

At that, Yan Chunhua smiled with her lips pressed together and beckoned Chen Xin and Bai Mengqing to sit beside her.

She did not refuse Chen Xin’s gift, because her maiden family had not come. Although the villagers, for the sake of the Zhang family, did not say anything openly, there was bound to be a few sharp-tongued women in any village, and she had heard some of the things they muttered behind her back.

Chen Xin was willing to give her so many things because she wanted her to hold the line. If Yan Chunhua kept refusing, it would only make her seem small in other people’s eyes. In any case, Yan Chunhua was thinking that when Chen Xin got married, she would definitely return a generous gift in kind.

Bai Mengqing did not give a separate red envelope either. Her gift was mainly for the bridal trousseau: a pair of gold bracelets and a silver belt set with rubies.

The silver belt was a custom from Yan Chunhua’s hometown. In principle, it was supposed to be part of the bride’s dowry from her maiden family. A silver belt would be saved up from the moment a daughter was born, and then accompany her when she married. When she eventually died, the belt was meant to go into the grave with her.

But because Yan Chunhua had fallen out with her family, she had not even invited her parents to the wedding and had married herself off on her own.

This custom had been told to Chen Xin by a classmate, so before coming, Chen Xin had discussed it with Ba Jia and asked his mother and grandmother to make such a belt for Yan Chunhua.