Zhu Yanqiu picked up his leather suitcase, tucked away the money that Mother Zhu gave him, and stepped onto the steamship heading to Shanghai.
Not long after Zhu Yanqiu left, Zhu Suniang discovered that she had gotten pregnant. However, the current family situation was very bad, so she paid an apprentice fee to learn how to make tofu. While pregnant, she woke up early and went to bed every day very late to make tofu.
Making tofu was very hard work. You had to soak the beans, then grind them into paste using large millstones. After that, you had to filter the paste, cook it, add coagulant, then press it into shape. These were all done by Zhu Suniang. She barely had any time to rest each day.
She had to wake up before the sun even rose to start making tofu, then at early morning, she’d have to carry the tofu in buckets on a carrying pole while walking in the streets shouting in order to peddle her goods. After she finished selling all of it, she’d return home only to continue grinding the paste. Nine months later, Zhu Suniang gave birth to a son and finally allowed the Zhu family to have a successor.
Zhu Suniang worked hard to manage the household. Zhu Yanqiu also depended on the money Zhu Suniang earned from selling tofu to pay for his studies. Zhu Yanqiu was often sent letters home or sent telegrams to have Zhu Suniang send him money. The reason was always either to buy books or to buy pens.
Despite the Zhu family falling into dire straits, Zhu Yanqiu didn’t suffer much. He still always got the best of everything. Even the socks he wore were the most fashionable Western nylon socks. Western products at that time were luxury goods.
Every time Zhu Yanqiu asked for money, Zhu Suniang would send it to him. The family simply lived frugally and tightened their waistbands more. They lived very hard lives, especially Zhu Suniang. After giving birth, five days later she was off the bed and back to work.
What Zhu Suniang didn’t know was that Zhu Yanqiu now had a girlfriend. It was a student at his college. All the students in the college and accepted the modern ideologies and revered freedom in love. The men and women in college who shared similar ways of thinking easily got together.
It must be known that dating was a very high cost recreational activity. Hence Zhu Yanqiu had to often ask his family for money, and every time, Zhu Suniang just gritted her teeth and gave it to him.
Zhu Yanqiu naturally got together with his girlfriend Fang Feifei. On September 18 when Japan invaded Manchuria, this couple rushed to the battlefield without hesitation and became a legend. Zhu Yanqiu became a senior military officer and Fang Feifei became a battlefield reporter. People called her a hero in a headdress.
Meanwhile, Zhu Suniang died in sorrow. After so many years of hard work, her body could no longer take the strain, so she died before she reached the age of forty.
Even up to her death, she couldn’t understand. Zhu Yanqiu said that he was a member of the cultural revolution, that he wanted to uphold the principle of ‘one husband, one wife.’ She had given birth to a child for Zhu Yanqiu and they had grown up together. Were they not husband and wife?
Zhu Yanqiu said that he couldn’t communicate with her, but he rarely talked to her in the first place. Every time he did, it was just to ask for money and ask for more money.
Zhu Suniang’s wish: She didn’t want to work hard for the Zhu family anymore and wanted to live her own life with her son.
Zhu Suniang had no way of going to college like Fang Feifei. She couldn’t wear black leather shoes and pleated skirts. The things she couldn’t do wasn’t her fault. However, Zhu Yanqiu felt great disdain for Zhu Suniang.
What can be said? Zhu Suniang was simply a cannon fodder of the collision between the feudal way of thinking and the new way of thinking. However, it was also because Zhu Yanqiu had no sense of responsibility at all as a man. He didn’t fulfill any of his responsibilities towards Zhu Suniang.
After Ning Shu finished receiving the storyline, she shook her head. That was why she said Zhu Suniang was seriously nice. Even her wish was so humble. If she didn’t kill ofr Zhu Yanqiu, this kind of trashy guy who kicked his benefactor in the teeth, could it be that she should keep him for celebrating the New Year?
Ning Shu could sense the hatred and indignance Zhu Suniang harbored towards Zhu Yanqiu, but the environment she had grown up in made it so she didn’t dare to make a wish that was too excessive.
Zhu Suniang was simply a woman of the feudal era. She was kind and did all she could for her family. She used her own power to fulfill the wishes of her family, and hence, her status seemed lowly. Meanwhile, Fang Feifei was someone who had accepted the new ideologies. She was courageous and brisk, and pursued her ideals bravely. Dressed in western-style clothing, she walked through the streets with her head high and chest out, hence she gave off a unique charm and seemed to shine brightly.
One was dressed in gray clothes and black pants while the other was in a short-sleeve cheongsam holding a book of poems. Anyone who wasn’t blind would know who to pick.
In regard to this, Ning Shu could only give a polite laugh.
She rubbed her eyes sleepily, then added some more firewood to the stove. After that, she picked up the spoon to skim the foam from the surface of the soymilk. She didn’t know how to make tofu at all, she was completely relying on the original host’s memory. In the future, she’d probably end up holding each of the 3615 occupations at least once.
Ning Shu worked on making the tofu in a fluster. However, even after working until daybreak, she still wasn’t able to get it done.
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