July is the beginning of the second half of the year, and it is also the sprint to go home before the Chinese New Year. Many people will go to factories in the south to work, and only in July will they resign and go to Xinjiang. At this time, only safflower is waiting in Xinjiang, and cotton is coming one after another. Then Korla pear welcomes you. Finally, Aksu Apple said goodbye to Chuxue.
The Yellow River Team, the place it goes every year, is just like its name. The Yellow River is inexhaustible. Familiar faces and familiar names have appeared, but some people will never come back or meet again.
The position of the Yellow River team is particularly easy to find. Take the shuttle bus from Urumqi and tell the driver to stop where he sees the house. The boss will wait at the entrance of the village on time in his shabby Wuling Hong Guang, and then stop at the door with the same eyes.
When I came home for dinner first, the proprietress had already cooked the meal. No matter where it comes from, there are rice, steamed bread and noodles, and there is always one that makes you homesick.
The boss's family has 300 acres of land, and each piece of land is endless. It takes 20 minutes to walk from the field to the ground. In order to prevent someone from grabbing the line, the boss thought of a trick and drew lots to decide. No matter who broke the thread, there is nothing to say, just quietly put away your temper and pick up the flowers.
Summer in Yumin county is hot and long, and the temperature is particularly cold in the morning and evening. You need to wear a coat to resist the wind from Siberia. In other parts of Xinjiang, you are not so lucky, and there are many fans, which is one of the reasons why many people like to come to Yumin County every year.
This year, the red flowers are in full bloom again. Luo Yun, a girl from Hanzhong, Shaanxi, arrived as promised. This is her fifth year in the Yellow River team. She didn't come except for the outbreak of the epidemic in Xinjiang in 2020. At other times, as long as it is early July, no matter where she is, she will rush to Xinjiang to pick red flowers.
Luo Yun is short and a little thin, weighing less than 50 kilograms, but she works very fast. As long as she is here, she is the first. In the safflower field, you can always see her surpass everyone at a speed visible to the naked eye, and finally become a little ant.
On average, Luo Yun can earn more than 400 yuan a day, and in less than a month, she has eight or nine thousand yuan, which is much more than four or five thousand yuan of Qian Qiang in a factory in Zhejiang, which is why she insists on coming to Xinjiang and the Yellow River team every year. Life in Xinjiang is free, carefree, undisturbed and happy.
Every day before work at noon, no matter how the boss shouts, everyone packs up and is ready to leave. Luo Yun and Lao Li are still working hard in the fields, yelling at the boss doesn't affect the speed of picking red flowers at all. It was not until everyone was far away from the safflower field that they gave up the bag tied to their waist and poured it into the bag containing safflower. That's how they earn more than 400 a day. They should have the spirit of hard work.
At 5: 30 in the morning, the proprietress told everyone to eat on time and knocked on the window next to me. At first, I didn't think of it. In the back, I always feel something is missing if I don't knock on the window.
When eating, Gansu people and Sichuanese sit separately, and Sichuanese eat indoors. People in Gansu are always fixed on the big table outside, and they are also separated when picking red flowers. Generally, six people from Gansu choose from above, and I pick up people from Sichuan from below, and the boss is on our side. When we get off work, our group will go back first.
There is a mother and daughter in Sichuan. My girl is a sophomore. During the summer vacation, she followed her mother to Xinjiang to pick red flowers to earn living expenses. She is the slowest in the team. Every time, she called her mother to help her pick it. Sometimes it was too hot for the girl to quit. She moved a stool to one side and drank mineral water frozen into ice bumps from the refrigerator. Originally, her mother planned to pick the red flowers of the Yellow River team and continue to pick them in Qitai County, Changji. Because she was not at ease, she went back to Sichuan by train alone.
Because there are workers everywhere this year, in order to satisfy everyone's appetite, every noon, the proprietress will prepare a large pot of rice and steamed bread. If you want rice, you want steamed bread. There is an old Jia Shu in Henan who is very strange. He never eats rice and noodles, but only eats steamed bread for ten years, which makes the boss wife complain every time. When eating noodles at night, Uncle Jia will scoop a bowl of noodle soup and eat steamed stuffed buns. Everyone admires him.
Zhuo Ma, a Tibetan girl in Gannan, Sichuan, works faster than boys. She and her partner pick out a bag slowly every time. Obviously, more than half of the red flowers come from her hands. If the proprietress doesn't say anything, she really can't see that she is Tibetan. According to Sister Gansu, when picking peppers in Shawan County, Zhuo Ma can pick three or four hundred pieces a day. Really a good girl, went to the kitchen under the hall.
The yellow river team's red flowers are not too high, so they need to bend down to pick them, and sometimes they need to kneel down to pick them. At the end of the day, everyone shouted back pain, but the next day it was like beating chicken blood, one faster than the other, just like yesterday's back pain did not exist.
If it's rainy and windy on cloudy days, and everyone stays on the ground, the proprietress will arrange for everyone to wrap jiaozi together, help themselves, have plenty of food and clothing, and eat the leek buns of fans. It's already dark, and everyone will spend a long day laughing.
Twenty days have passed in an instant, and the red flowers have come to an end. Everyone made thousands of dollars. They are all talking about going to the next stop. Some go home, some go to the next stop to continue their efforts. Wherever we go, everyone meets in the Yellow River team. This is fate. Before leaving, the boss will prepare a table of delicious food as usual, and thank you for your hard work for so many days. I had the last sip of Wusu beer and the last sip of saute spicy chicken. The next morning, everyone.