flstandardbreds Chapter 108: When a woman reaches a certain age, must she get married and have children?
Chapter 108: When a woman reaches a certain age, must she get married and have children?
Since moving to Jiangcheng, Zhou Rong has sent a letter home every two weeks to report on the lives of himself, Zhou Cai, and Zhou Jiaguang. He usually reports good news but not bad news so that his father and mother can rest assured.
Zhou's father had to work in the fields or go hunting in the mountains, so he rarely had time.
Zhou's mother had done too much embroidery and her eyes had been injured, so her eyesight was poor. So the task of reading and replying to letters was given to Zhou Gui.
In the letter, Zhou Gui not only told Zhou Rong about his family's living conditions, but also talked about his blind date experiences in recent months.
Zhou's parents didn't dare to look for a family with better financial conditions, fearing that Zhou Gui would be bullied after marrying into that family. They had no way to go to their house to seek justice.
Those with poor conditions are not considered either, for fear that there will be another blood-sucking in-law like Yang Jinlin and Yang Kaiyun.
There are three families whose situations are comparable to Zhou's, but Zhou Gui looks down on any of them.
She had met the blind date candidates from those three families, but they didn't get along. The other parties either demanded that she must give birth to several sons after marriage, or that she must listen to her parents-in-law and not disobey the elders.
Or ask her how much dowry she can have, saying that if it is too little, she will lose face in the village.
But when Zhou Gui asked the other party how much dowry he could offer, the man said that he had many brothers and sisters and limited financial resources, so he could not give a dowry. He also said that the organization advocated freedom of marriage and freedom of love, and prohibited selling daughters under the pretext of marriage.
If it weren't for his upbringing, Zhou Gui would have wanted to slap that man a few times.
Zhou Gui told Zhou Rong all this in the letter.
She asked Zhou Rong, does a woman have to get married and have children when she reaches a certain age?
She felt that this society was so unfair to women. They kept saying that men and women are equal and that women hold up half the sky, but she only found this reflected when she was working, as men and women were required to do the same physical work.
At other times, men are superior to women.
The village is currently vigorously promoting agricultural production cooperatives. Men go to the fields to plant rice, and are awarded 10 work points, while women are only awarded 8 or 6 work points.
After a day's work, a woman has to cook and do housework when she gets home, while the man just sits at the door to rest and wait for the meal to be cooked.
Although this situation did not happen in the Zhou family, Zhou Gui was worried that she would be treated like this in her husband's family after she got married. It turned out that everyone lived like this, and she had no place to reason.
Zhou Gui said she was very confused and wanted to change the way she lived her life, so she asked Zhou Rong if he had any good suggestions.
Zhou Rong received this letter in mid-May. After reading it, she did not rush to reply to Zhou Gui.
A few days ago, a major news was published in the newspaper that Jiangcheng was going to build a large steel plant and was recruiting a large number of workers from all over the city, offering a monthly salary of 30 yuan, including food and accommodation. Those who performed outstandingly during the construction period could become formal workers after the steel plant was completed.
The Zhou family treated him with all their sincerity, and Zhou Rong hoped that all his relatives would have a good ending.
Conditions in rural areas are always worse than those in cities, and Zhou Rong also wanted to avoid some of the tragic plots in the original book, so he moved Zhou's father and his family to live in the city.
After going to work the next day, Zhou Rong asked Xu Man for half a day off and went to the steel plant's recruitment office to learn about recruitment matters.
There were so many people that it was impossible to squeeze in. Zhou Rong suspected that all the people in Jiangcheng who didn't have formal jobs came to apply.
The newspaper said that as long as you are willing to work hard, you can fill out the application form.
But there are so many people who have signed up, how can everyone be selected?
I guess I still have to rely on the side door.
Zhou Rong asked someone about the office of the person in charge and learned that the other party was a man. After finding the person, he got close to him, stuffed two bottles of Jiangcheng's unique Fenjiu and a pack of cigarettes into his pocket, and got three places.
With the approval slip, I will report on Sunday and officially start work next Monday.
Zhou Rong is not short of money now. Not counting the 4 million yuan in divorce compensation, there are more than 3 million yuan in cash that Yang Jinlin secretly hid in the coffin. Adding her own salary and extra income, she is definitely a "billionaire".
Although this amount of money is based on inflation and will shrink significantly when the new currency comes out next year, compared with ordinary people, she does not have to worry about money.
Only a complete set of coins and horse-herding coupons are valuable, and if you hoard too many, they will depreciate.
Through exchanges with bank manager Zhao and Xu Man, as well as the change she got from her daily shopping, she has saved 22 sets of all currencies and 35 horse herding coupons.
If she is lucky enough to live until after the millennium, it will be enough for her to have no worries about food and clothing in her later years.
Zhou Rong kept part of the remaining money for daily expenses and to exchange for new currency to be issued next year, and used the rest to stockpile supplies.
Cigarettes, alcohol, grain, oil, etc. are much more affordable when bought in reality than those copied in space. Before the government had fixed the purchase quota with tickets, Zhou Rong stocked up on them in large quantities so that he could take them out at any time when he needed to give gifts.
The Fenjiu and Xinhua cigarettes I bought in advance came in handy today...
When leaving the recruitment office, Zhou Rong met Yang Jinsen and Jin Mei.
Zhou Rong didn't want to talk to them, but Jin Mei took the initiative to greet them: "Zhou Rong, are you looking for a job here too?"
Zhou Rong: "Yes, raising three children in the city is very expensive. I heard that the salary here is high, so I came to take a look."
Jin Mei: "Have you got the form? Do you want me to go in and grab a copy for you?"
Zhou Rong: "No, I've already submitted the form. If everything is ok, I'll go back first."
Jin Mei stopped Zhou Rong who wanted to leave and whispered, "Jin Lin is getting married. The wedding will be held on May 5th. Did you know?"
Zhou Rong: "I don't know, he didn't inform me."
Jin Mei: “…I don’t have any other intentions, I just want to talk to you about this.
Jin Lin's wife is actually three years older than him and has two teenage children.
Jin Lin is really a fool. He didn't even tell us in advance. We didn't know about Qiaolan's situation until we went to her house. You don't know that when my parents first found out about this, their faces turned pale!"
Seeing Jin Mei's gossipy face, Zhou Rong said with a smile: "Yang Jinlin finally got the city girl he had been dreaming of. Please congratulate him for me."
Jin Mei was surprised that Zhou Rong was not angry, but then she thought that they had a big fight at home before their divorce, and they probably had no feelings for each other, so she didn't care.
"Jin Lin, the deputy director, lost his job and is currently working in a tea shop. His salary is not as good as before, and he has to go to the countryside with his employer to collect tea leaves frequently. You will have to take care of Erniu and the others in the future."
Zhou Rong: "I will take good care of my child. Just don't cause me any trouble."
"No, we have changed. I tell you, we met a god and swore to him that we would never do anything immoral again."
Then, Jin Mei told Zhou Rong vividly how the gods had visited her home, and said that they dared not do bad things anymore, otherwise the gods would come after them.
After hearing this, Zhou Rong smiled secretly in his heart. Whether a person can change for the better cannot be determined by oaths alone. There is still a long time to go, so let's wait and see the results.
I’m afraid it’s hard to change some people’s nature.
The two chatted for a while before parting ways.
Yang Jinlin got Fang Pozi and her friends a job sewing buttons at a garment factory. When Jin Mei saw him, she told him about her encounter with Zhou Rong at the steel factory's recruitment office.
Knowing that Zhou Rong was not doing well either, Yang Jinlin felt a little secretly happy.
Those who looked down on him and harmed him did not deserve to live a good life. When he makes a comeback one day, he will definitely settle accounts with those people one by one...