I'm back in 1990

Chapter 248: Expired Food

The entire county town consists of only this one street, but although it's small, it has everything you need, including a post office, a police station, a savings bank, and a supply and marketing cooperative.

After breakfast, Huang Xiaochuan chatted with the stall owner.

"Boss, where is your school located?"

"What kind of boss? Just running a small business, a school?"

The stall owner leaned out and pointed in a direction, saying, "Just walk a short distance ahead and you'll see it; there's a national flag inside the school."

Huang Xiaochuan didn't leave immediately, and then asked, "There seem to be very few people here?"

The stall owner shook his head vigorously: "It's not a market day today, so there aren't many people. If it were a market day, there would be tons of people."

At this point, the stall owner asked Huang Xiaochuan, "What do you do? What are you doing here?"

Huang Xiaochuan smiled and said, "We're here for tourism."

Seeing that the stall owner didn't understand what tourism meant, Huang Xiaochuan explained again: "It's just coming to the mountains to have some fun."

After saying that, he took out his money to pay the stall owner.

After taking the money, the stall owner muttered, "What's so fun about going to the mountains? I don't understand these city folks. Are they just too full?"

Huang Xiaochuan and his group walked towards the school. As strangers, they attracted curious glances from the locals, and some bolder children followed them, wondering what they wanted to do.

A pack of Hongtashan cigarettes got the gatekeeper to open the school gate for them, and he answered all their questions.

"Now that the children are all on holiday, and so are the teachers, there's no one around."

Huang Xiaochuan nodded and looked at the school. The school was not big and could be seen at a glance. There were five rows of houses in total, all of which were tiled houses with blue bricks, black tiles, wooden windows and doors. They looked quite old, and teachers' quotes were still left on the gable walls on both sides of the houses.

Huang Xiaochuan counted them and found there were about forty-two classrooms, which probably included the teachers' offices.

It looked like a middle school, so Huang Xiaochuan asked, "Grandpa, where is the primary school in your county?"

The gatekeeper pointed to the row of tiled houses at the very front: "This is the primary school."

"Huh? Isn't this a middle school? Doesn't it say 'County Middle School' on the gate?"

"The primary school building collapsed, and the county didn't have the money to repair it, so it was temporarily moved to the middle school. They will move away once the new primary school is built."

Huang Xiaochuan was speechless. Even if they were poor, couldn't they afford to hang up a sign?

"Has the new primary school been built yet?"

"We don't have the money now, so we can't build it."

This was the first time Ding Yi and Yu Wei had ever seen a school like this. It wasn't their fault; they had never been to this place before and didn't know how different the southeastern coastal areas and southwestern inland regions of China were. This difference has existed since ancient times, but it will improve a lot in the future.

Coming from the prosperous southeast to the impoverished southwest, the two were shocked by the shabby school. A school where primary, middle, and high school were all mixed together? It was truly the first time they had ever seen anything like it.

While Huang Xiaochuan was talking to the gatekeeper, Ding Yi and Yu Wei followed the designer to walk around the school. Some classroom doors were unlocked, so they went in to take a look. After seeing them, the two of them felt a little sad for some reason.

After getting the address of the original primary school from the gatekeeper, Huang Xiaochuan and his group went to the original school site.

On the way, Huang Xiaochuan asked two designers from the same university's design institute, "Engineer Mei, Engineer Liu, I'd like to ask what the seismic margin is for the buildings here?"

Liu, a structural designer, immediately answered Huang Xiaochuan's question: "I checked the geological data here before I set off. According to the design standards of our Tongda Design Institute, the building structure should be designed according to the 85-degree standard."

"Is this the highest standard?"

"From a structural design perspective, this seismic margin is sufficient to meet the needs of most earthquake-prone areas in China."

"So theoretically, this standard can still be increased, right?"

"Of course you can, but that involves the amount of steel reinforcement used per square meter. Each additional degree of reinforcement requires tens of kilograms more per square meter. However, there is always an upper limit. You can't just tie the steel reinforcement into a single column, can you? Where would you pour the concrete then?"

Huang Xiaochuan smiled and indicated that he understood.

As they walked and talked, they soon arrived at the site of the former primary school. The iron gate was tightly closed, and there was a sign hanging at the entrance with a vivid picture of a building collapsing and crushing people, along with the words "Danger building, do not approach, no compensation for death." It was simple and blunt, but it should still serve as a warning.

The group peered through the iron gate and saw several dilapidated houses in the overgrown campus, some with collapsed roofs.

There were hardly any intact panes of glass left in the window, and it was pitch black inside. A broken door was swaying back and forth in the wind.

"Mr. Liu, how much would it cost to design and construct a primary school that can accommodate one thousand students?"

"It's hard to say, since we don't know the construction company here or what the construction costs are. However, we can contact the Chengdu Urban Construction Institute and ask them to help us with the cost calculation."

Huang Xiaochuan nodded. What Engineer Liu said was right. The construction conditions in different places are different, and the costs of building materials and labor are also different. This requires the cooperation of the local construction department to conduct cost calculations.

At this point, Yu Wei also sensed something was amiss, so he asked Ding Yi, "What exactly did Huang Xiaochuan bring us here for?"

Ding Yi looked at Yu Wei in surprise: "Didn't Huang Xiaochuan tell you that we're here to inspect the site and plan to donate money to build several Hope Primary Schools?"

"Donate a school?" Yu Wei looked at the dilapidated primary school and then he understood everything!

"This liar, doing a good deed is fine, but he tricked me into thinking I was here for tourism?" Although Yu Wei was still complaining, he actually agreed with Huang Xiaochuan's behavior. Any normal person would have compassion.

At this moment, Huang Xiaochuan called to the group, "Let's go! Let's go to the supply and marketing cooperative to buy some supplies. We're getting ready to go to the countryside."

The group arrived at the only supply and marketing cooperative in the county. It was not large, about a hundred square meters, and still had the atmosphere of the 1950s and 60s. The quotations on the walls were still there, but some of the words had faded and fallen off due to the passage of time.

The counter was actually made of bricks and cement, and the shelves behind it were sparsely stocked, but the basic necessities were still available.

They have needles and thread, batteries and flashlights, soap and laundry detergent, candles and matches, towels and toothbrushes, soy sauce and pickles, biscuits and candies, instant noodles and canned fruit.

Seeing these things, Huang Xiaochuan regretted it. He should have bought some things from Chengdu and brought them up. He had been too naive. How could he have imagined that the supply and marketing cooperative in a small county in Southwest China in 92 would be like this?

Choose the best from the worst; buy whatever you can afford!

Huang Xiaochuan let Zhou Wei and the others choose what they wanted, while he took out his camera and photographed the supply and marketing cooperative inside and out. If it could be preserved for thirty years, this supply and marketing cooperative alone could become a historical site.

Just as Huang Xiaochuan was taking pictures with great interest, a lot of children surrounded him, looking at him and the camera in his hand with curiosity.

Although their clothes were mostly old, their eyes were full of innocence and curiosity.

Huang Xiaochuan smiled and waved to them, and the children actually blushed.

Huang Xiaochuan turned to a girl with a long braid behind the counter and asked, "How much is this candy?"

The candy was in a glass jar with a lid. Huang Xiaochuan didn't see any milk candy; it seemed that only this kind of candy, whose name he didn't know, was wrapped in red paper.

"Two cents a piece."

The price startled Huang Xiaochuan. It was so cheap!

He took out his money and looked around. The smallest denomination was a one-yuan bill. Huang Xiaochuan handed the one-yuan bill to the girl with the long braid.

"Let's buy one for a dollar!"

The girl with the long braid took out a handful of candies from the glass jar and started counting them. She counted out fifty candies and gave them to Huang Xiaochuan.

Huang Xiaochuan waved to the group of children crowded at the entrance of the supply and marketing cooperative and said, "How about I treat you to some candy?"

Although they were somewhat afraid of strangers like Huang Xiaochuan, the children couldn't resist the temptation of the candy. Led by a slightly older child, they took the candy from Huang Xiaochuan and then quickly ran away, keeping a certain distance from these strangers.

Gradually, the children's curiosity overcame their timidity, and they watched with curiosity as Huang Xiaochuan took photos everywhere.

Huang Xiaochuan had the children stand together and took a few pictures of them. He promised to send the photos to them, but considering the address issue, he discussed it with the girl with the long braid at the supply and marketing cooperative. They decided to send the photos there and have the children pick them up.

Just then, two hand tractors sputtered past the entrance of the supply and marketing cooperative. Huang Xiaochuan guessed that these were the tractors he had asked the guesthouse manager to find for him. He quickly told the group to pack up their purchases and prepare to take the tractors to the countryside.

At this moment, Ding Yi handed a packet of instant noodles to Huang Xiaochuan with a look of disgust.

"Please help me! This instant noodle is expired, is it still safe to eat?"

Huang Xiaochuan took it and looked at it, and exclaimed, "Damn! Sure enough, it's been expired for a month!"

"Forget it, look at the state of this place. They probably don't even know about expiration dates. Let's just take it with us! It won't kill anyone."

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