"Oh, it's the provincial capital, darling, it's a big place... Have you seen the governor?"

"Ha ha ha ha....."

Hearing this, Gu Zhunian suddenly laughed out loud, and he patiently explained:

"Uncle, how can the governor be seen by ordinary people like us? He usually squats in the government office."

Like a curious house cat, the boatman asked again:

"Then you came back from studying abroad and took a ship?"

"Yes!"

Gu Zhunian looks more delicate than Song Xiaoniu, and his eyebrows look like a scholar.

In the real society, everyone has a superstitious belief that "everything is inferior, only reading is high", and they have an inexplicable respect for scholars.

No matter what the boatman asked, Gu Zhunian tried his best to patiently satisfy his curiosity.

Time passed very quickly as they talked and chatted. Song Xiaoniu listened to Gu Zhunian chatting with the boatman, but he only understood half of it.

There are so many languages ​​in China, especially the southern languages, which can be said to be so diverse.

The distance between Hangzhou and Qian Qing Township in Shanyin County is more than a hundred miles. The dialects are definitely different. Song Xiaoniu couldn't understand the hometown dialect spoken in Qian Qing's area.

When they arrived at the village, Song Xiaoniu paid the boat fare, and the two of them disembarked and left.

When Gu Zhunian saw Cuntou, he couldn't help but get excited. Although he didn't speak a word, the expression on his face had already told something. His eyes turned red and his hands seemed to be trembling.

Wangfu Village was originally called Wangjiaba Village. It is the most remote natural village in Qianqing Township, Shanyin County, with few fertile fields and the poorest natural village.

The main reason is that the village is located in a low-lying area and is crisscrossed by rivers. Many river banks are not stone banks but mud banks, and they have been in disrepair for a long time.

Every year, the Qiantang River Basin is flooded by high tides in August and September. The water in the upper reaches of the river is too strong, and the raging peak is unreasonable. It rushes all the way to the corner of Wangjiaba, which can easily cause the dam to break and the river bank to collapse.

Low-lying areas are easily flooded, houses are washed away, and fields are harvestless.

Therefore, most of the men in this village choose to go out to work all year round to make a living and earn some money to support their families.

The left-behind women in the village would stand on a big rock at the head of the village and look into the distance during the busy farming season or at the end of the year.

Some come back as scheduled, and some don't.

Over time, this big rock was called Wangfu Stone, and the village was also called Wangfu Village by other villages.

Now, if you ask where Wangjiaba is? Some people will be stunned. Young people may not remember this name.

But if you ask Wangfu Village, someone will immediately tell you how to get there.

Gu Zhunian told Song Xiaoniu that his father was originally a private school teacher in Qian Qingxiang. He had attended a private school for several years since he was a child, and he was better than Xiaoniu in this regard.

Just hearing that his name is Zhu Nian, he is much more educated than Mavericks.

He also told Xiao Niu that he had two older sisters and they were married in a hurry when he left home. Otherwise, he would definitely betroth one sister to Brother Xiao Niu.

These words made Song Xiaoniu giggle. Finding a wife was a major event in his life.

There was a flood three years ago. Gu's father tried to save his family and retrieve their belongings, but he was swept away by the flood and drowned.

There was no other way. Gu Zhunian, who was less than fifteen years old, had no choice but to go out and make a living. Now more than two years have passed. How could he not be happy to return home? How could he not be excited?

Song Xiaoniu is no stranger to river flooding and disasters. His hometown, Qianli Huaihe River, is flooded frequently, and his hometown is also often hit by disasters.

Flood disasters in the Huaihe River Basin are very famous in history. They frequently caused flooding and people were sent to control them in the past dynasties, but with little success.

It should be the supreme instruction of the great man in later generations, "The Huaihe River must be well managed." Later, after repeated management by the people's government, the Huaihe River has basically been tamed.

Song Xiaoniu carried a package on his shoulder and followed Gu Zhunian, walking on the bumpy dirt road along the river bank. Looking around, he saw a deserted place ahead.

I couldn't help but wonder, could it be that the river flooded again before the Chinese New Year?

As he walked, he saw a sharp turn in the river ahead. Gu Zhunian was as excited as a child, and ran towards the bend in the river.

The river wind made his placket shirt hiss.

Seeing Gu Zhunian's slowly shrinking figure, Song Xiaoniu sighed slowly because of the scene. He had not returned to his hometown in Huaibei for more than two years and missed his parents and brothers very much.

This time, he was happy for his adopted brother Gu Zhunian. He was lucky enough to meet him and Zuo Gang at the East Bank Pier, just like he met the young master by chance in Meishan Town.

At least you can live now and bring some money home, right?

How many people are living in this impoverished and troubled world without knowing where they died, leaving their families alone and missing them without caring!

Although Gu Zhunian's figure became very small, you could clearly hear him running and shouting:

"Well, grandma, New Year's Eve is back, New Year's Eve is back!"

It seemed that he didn't get a response. Gu Zhunian stood on the festering earthen river bank, still shouting at the top of his lungs, "Ah, mama, where have you been?"

"..."

After no one responded for a long time, Song Xiao Newton felt something was wrong. He put away his thoughts of strolling in the courtyard and quickly ran to Gu Zhunian.

When I got closer, I saw that there were no houses on the back side of the embankment. Instead, I saw traces of earthen walls and bricks, and a low-lying paddy field covered with rubble and rubbish.

Gu Zhunian suddenly said "Wow..." and knelt in front of a dead tree in front of his house, hugging the trunk and crying loudly.

"Well, grandma, my son is back on New Year's Eve. Where are you? Where did our family move to?"

"..."

Facing such a scene, Song Xiaoniu's heart tightened. This should be the lowest-lying area in the village, and it was obviously washed away and submerged by the flood.

He couldn't stand it anymore, so he endured the throbbing in his heart and turned around to find a villager to ask.

After walking a few dozen meters and about to enter the village, I saw someone fishing in a small boat in the river. The fisherman was a man in his forties.

He stood barefoot on the deck of the small rowing boat and threw out the fishing net in his hand with all his strength. The boat inevitably shook.

Song Xiaoniu quickly ran up to the river bank, clasped his fists and bowed to the fisherman and shouted:

"Uncle, this junior wants to ask you something?"

Seeing that the stranger was very polite, the fisherman took off his straw hat and rowed closer to the shore. "Young man, what do you want to ask?"

"Is this the boundary of Wangfu Village?"

As the fisherman closed his net, he replied: "Yes!"

Seeing that the place was right, Song Xiaoniu asked again: "Then where have the villagers around this area gone?"

The fisherman smiled bitterly, raised his dark face and replied: "Where can poor people go? There were floods last autumn and winter, and this area was flooded again. There are more than thirty families in this area, and they should all move to the village in front of them.

It’s east!”

After hearing this, Song Xiaoniu felt happy and quickly asked: "Excuse me, uncle, how should I go?"
Chapter completed!