Back To the Small Fishing Village In 1982 - Chapter 41

Chapter 41: Weighing

Ye Yaodong rolled his eyes. Everything was right in front of them, yet his mother was still asking questions, not trusting him!

“Mom, you can see it all, why are you still asking? It’s obvious.”

“When did you go out to sea? Why didn’t you say anything beforehand? Whose boat is it?”

“Didn’t I say at noon that I was going out, and asked Ah Qing to cook noodles for me early? I left after eating, and the boat was rented.”

“It’s only been a few hours, and you’ve already caught…”

“Ah, we’ll talk later, no time now. There’s still fish on the boat. Let’s finish moving and weighing them first, then I’ll tell you.” He frowned as he interrupted his mother’s questions. Now wasn’t the time for details; getting all the fish unloaded was the priority.

The curious villagers widened their eyes, “There’s more? Not finished unloading yet?”

“Tsk tsk tsk… The Ye family is getting rich again. How’s your family’s fortune been so good lately? Did you pray to Mazu?”

Ye’s mother smiled at the onlookers and said, “Of course! Before our first sea voyage the other day, we had to properly worship Mazu to bless our family with smooth sailing.”

“When luck comes, you really can’t stop it. Even when Ah Dong goes fishing, he can catch so many horse mackerel. He’s really made something of himself.”

“Hey, Ah Dong and his friends usually seemed like idle good-for-nothings, but who knew when they got serious, they’d be so capable, even catching a school of horse mackerel. These baskets look like quite a lot.”

“Yeah, must be several thousand jin, right? And each fish is so big…”

Under everyone’s envious gazes, Ye Yaodong and his crew finally finished unloading all the horse mackerel from the boat, everyone drenched in sweat, their backs soaked through their clothes.

Ye Yaodong handed a bucket to his mother, “I kept these – two horse mackerel and some other seafood. You can make fish balls with the mackerel tonight.”

“Why keep these? These two could sell for several yuan. We can just eat the smaller fish…”

Having lived through hard times, the elderly were reluctant to eat anything valuable.

“Come on, after catching so much, we should treat ourselves! We have so many anyway, these two won’t make a difference. Take them home and make fish balls, I want to eat them!”

“Eat, eat, eat, all you think about is eating. The money’s not even in hand and you’re already thinking of spending it. Each fish would sell for at least one yuan…”

Lin Xiuqing held back the muttering Mother Ye, “Mom, these two fish won’t make much difference. Dong’s other friends probably kept some too. Let’s take them home and make fish balls, the children haven’t had them in a long time.”

At this, Mother Ye fell silent. If everyone else kept some, she couldn’t very well return them, could she?

Ah Cai smiled at them, “All unloaded? Can we weigh them now?”

“Let’s agree on the price first. If it’s too low, we won’t sell to you. We’ll call a tractor and take them to Yujing Harbor!” Ye Yaodong wasn’t foolish. With so many fish, he could make a big profit just by being a middleman!

“0.20 yuan per jin isn’t low. I can only make 0.10 yuan profit per jin reselling them. It’s only because your father’s yellow croaker the other day helped me meet some fish dealers that I can even handle this many horse mackerel. There’s really not much profit margin. Others need to make money too, you have to leave some room for profit for others.”

His words made sense.

With multiple middlemen involved, everyone needed their share. Without profit, who would want to do the work?

Ah Zheng playfully put his arm around Ah Cai’s shoulders, “Brother Cai has such wide connections, making money is much easier for you than for us. We’re all working hard for our money, how about adding a few fen more?”

“You call this hard work? I heard you were only out for a few hours before coming back. No one has it as easy as you guys!”

Xiao Xiao got impatient listening to their haggling, “Hey, who cares how many hours we were out? Just say whether you’re adding to the price or not?”

Mother Ye chimed in, “Yes, yes, just add a bit more. With so many horse mackerel, even if you only make 0.01 yuan profit per jin, you’ll still make several dozen or hundred yuan.”

Ah Cai pondered for a moment, then gritted his teeth, “I’ll add at most another 0.01 yuan, and that’s coming from my own profit margin.”

Ah Guang frowned: “That’s too stingy, just 0.01 more?”

“That’s really not a small increase!”

“How about 0.22?”

“Usually, there’s no negotiation at all. I’m only adding 0.01 because you have so much fish. Even at Yujing Harbor, you won’t get 0.21, plus you’d have to pay transport costs. If you don’t sell to me, I won’t lend you my baskets – how will you carry all these fish?”

“Alright, alright, 0.21 it is, let’s not make things complicated.”

The harbor indeed usually didn’t negotiate prices, taking a take-it-or-leave-it approach. Ye Yaodong didn’t want to make things difficult either. Horse mackerel wasn’t particularly valuable, and the profit margin really wasn’t big. 0.21 yuan was quite reasonable for these times.

“Okay then, if Dong says it’s fine, then it’s fine. Let’s hurry up and weigh them.”

“Good, good, get paper and pen to record.”

Under the excited pointing and commenting of onlookers, they weighed all the horse mackerel.

“How many jin is it?”

“Where’s the abacus? With so many numbers, we can’t calculate. Brother Cai, use your abacus to count.”

None of them knew how to use an abacus…

Ye Yaodong could use a calculator, but there weren’t any calculators at this time – everyone used abacuses.

Everyone patiently watched as Ah Cai clicked and clacked away at his abacus.

“Done. Total 7,628 jin, at 0.21 yuan per jin, comes to 1,601.88 yuan.”

The watching villagers got excited, “Wow… 1,601 yuan! That’s even more than the yellow croaker catch from the other day.”

“Can’t compare, can’t compare. How many jin of yellow croaker was there versus how many jin of horse mackerel? Yellow croaker is worth more – if these were all yellow croaker, now that would be something.”

“Everyone knows yellow croaker is valuable, but you need the luck to catch this many horse mackerel too – that’s impressive enough.”

“With this much money, each person gets about 400 yuan, equivalent to two months of trawler work.”

“That’s like four months of a worker’s salary!”

“How is the Ye family’s luck so good lately?”

“I’m going to worship Mazu tomorrow too…”

…

Unlike the onlookers’ reactions, Ye Yaodong was confused by the calculation. How was it only 1,600? He thought it would be several thousand!

Perhaps still not adjusted to this era’s prices from his previous life, he felt 1,600 was so little…

“Did you calculate correctly?”

Ah Cai rolled his eyes, “If you doubt my calculation, you do it.”

“I can’t…”

“I’ll do it!”

At this point, Lin Xiuqing stepped forward. She had finished primary school, could read, and had learned to use an abacus, though she wasn’t very proficient from lack of practice.

She slowly moved the beads on the abacus, afraid of making mistakes. Ye Yaodong didn’t dare disturb her, calculating in his head, and realized it probably wasn’t wrong after all.

Workers only earned just over one yuan per day, so 1,600 yuan was equivalent to almost three years of wages – looking at it that way, it wasn’t little at all.