Chapter 637 - 633: Ideological Education Class
"Team Leader, look at all these pigs. Shouldn’t we assign the pig-rearing job to a few specific people? That way, they’ll be better cared for."
One of the villagers eyed the pigs, an idea forming in his mind. He immediately sidled up to the team leader and tentatively broached the subject.
As it turned out, the man had hit upon the very issue now troubling the team leader.
Ever since the piglets had arrived, everyone had been taking turns looking after them. It really would be better to have a dedicated group of people handling the feeding.
The only problem was who to choose.
Everyone wanted the pig-rearing job. It might be smelly, but it was much easier than farming and offered a good number of work points. They were all scrambling for the opportunity.
If he didn’t handle the assignments well, it would easily cause resentment.
The team leader hadn’t even figured out what to do with the villagers when the educated youth approached as well.
Chen Beiguo felt an instant headache coming on.
As the team leader, he had to be as fair as possible.
With farming, they could take turns. If you did the hard labor today, someone else would take over tomorrow.
But the pig-rearing job required dedicated staff. The villagers were already fighting over it, and from the looks of it, the educated youth intended to compete for the positions as well.
Sure enough, when Li Fenggu came forward, he brought up the pig-rearing job.
The villagers were immediately displeased to hear this, and Chen Shulan, in particular, was quick to jump in.
"Team Leader, give the pig-rearing job to anyone, just not the educated youth! When they first came to the countryside, they didn’t even know how to farm. They couldn’t tell millet from wheat! They have no experience raising pigs. What are we going to do if we hand the job over to them and something goes wrong?"
These pigs were treasures; they couldn’t afford to let them be mishandled.
Quite a few people agreed with Chen Shulan.
Chen Shulan might be a nasty piece of work, but her words made some sense. ’How could these young kids possibly know how to raise pigs? If something really went wrong, who would take responsibility?’
"What Shulan said makes sense."
"Team Leader, we can’t give the pig-rearing job to these educated youth. They don’t know the first thing about it."
"That’s right! The way I see it, we should let the experienced villagers handle the pigs!"
Buoyed by everyone’s agreement, Chen Shulan shot a provocative glance at Gu Jiaojiao. "Gu Zhiqing, you may be an educated youth, but you married one of our villagers, so you’re one of us now. And yet you still side with them? You’re nothing but an ungrateful traitor."
She finished speaking, looking smug, and expected everyone to continue backing her up.
But they didn’t. The moment she stopped talking, a sudden silence fell.
Leng Yuan, who had been standing beside the team leader recording some figures, stopped abruptly upon hearing Chen Shulan’s words. He snapped his notebook shut and glared coldly in her direction.
The team leader had gone to great trouble to get Leng Yuan to help him, and now, before the work was even finished, that woman Chen Shulan had to go and offend Gu Jiaojiao.
Knowing Leng Yuan’s fiercely protective nature, if this wasn’t handled properly, he would likely wash his hands of the entire pig-rearing project.
Not daring to delay, he walked straight over to Chen Shulan and began to reprimand her.
"Chen Shulan, what’s all this nonsense you’re spouting? What’s this ’us’ and ’them’? The educated youth came to the countryside to help build our Qingshan Team, which makes them part of our team. These comments of yours show that your thinking is out of line. For the next two days, you will come to the team office for a re-education class after you finish work."
"What? Team Leader, I..."
Chen Shulan was dumbfounded.
The thing villagers feared most was attending these "re-education classes." Having to listen to a lecture on an empty stomach after a long day of work was sheer torture.