CH 20

In the afternoon, Mo Yan laid on the kang as she desperately racked her brains for money-making methods.

The medicinal herbs might be able to be sold for money. Selling the eggs from their ducks however, won’t happen for a bit longer. And growing medicinal herbs was even further off for them. The only stable money-making method they had was the eight hundred dollars a month they got from the Lu family. Mo Yan hoped from the bottom of her heart Lu Junming wouldn’t leave Chenzhong Village anytime soon; otherwise, they’d lose even that avenue of gaining wealth.

They had to do something to make money!

“Sis, let’s sell wraps. We can make the flatbreads and fry the eggs ourselves. Aside from that, we could also add mum’s salted eggs and her sauce. If we really have to, we can also buy some cooked meat from the market to add to the wraps.”

Mo Ling put down the needle in her hand, “Ok, I’ll buy some cooked meat when the next market day rolls around and we can test if the wraps would be profitable by making a few to sell.” She really wanted to make more money as well, and had thought of many money-making methods in the past. However, she had to give up as Mrs. Liang didn’t agree to any of them and she had no start-up capital. Now Mo Yan had proposed a good idea, she wanted to give it a try. She’d finally be able to marry if it worked.

“We don’t need a stall, just a wheelbarrow or even a basket to hold the wraps so we can sell them anywhere.”

The two sisters did the calculations for how many flatbreads and eggs they’d need, how much a wrap would cost, and even when they should wake up on the next market day.

They became so excited they couldn’t fall asleep for their afternoon nap. [1]

In the afternoon, Mo Yan grabbed the two bags of medicinal herbs and went to the Cao family. Mr. Cao had just returned from his clinic in the city then.

“Mr. Cao, could you help me see if these medicinal herbs can be sold?” Her voice was timid and small, completely different from when she was telling stories.

He took them to inspect, and replied, “They’re all very clean and can be sold. The market value of chinese foxgloves is four hundred dollars for a kilogram, and it’s eight hundred dollars for a kilogram of dandelion.”

After receiving a definite answer, Mo Yan instantly gained some confidence. “Then I’ll go harvest some more!”

Mr. Cao had a faint smile on his face as he shook his head, “These are all common medicinal herbs. I’ll take them, but my small clinic doesn’t need a lot of them.”

“Then where can I sell these? A medicinal herb market?”

“Those are far away from Chenzhong Village, and it’s probably not worth going there if you don’t have a lot of medicinal herbs to sell. If you harvest more, you can try to sell them at various clinics, or I can introduce you to some medicinal herb traders.

“Thank you Mr. Cao!”

Mo Yan knew that part of the reason Mr. Cao bought her medicinal herbs was out of goodwill. If she sold them to other people, it wouldn’t go as smoothly.

Mr. Cao noticed her bandaged hand and asked, “What happened?”

“I accidentally cut myself when harvesting medicinal herbs. Sir Lu applied some medicine to my wound and I’m alright now.”

“If golden sore medicine’s already been applied to your wound, then you’ll be fine.”

Mr. Cao went and weighed the medicinal herbs. She had a kilogram of chinese foxgloves and just over half a kilogram of dandelions, which would sell for nine hundred dollars.

Mo Yan cupped her hands in front of her and a string of nine taels dropped into them. This was the first sum of money she’d earned with her own hard work!

On the way back home, she clutched the money in her hand tightly. Her heart was full of joy.

Mrs. Liang wasn’t at home, and her sister was cooking dinner in the kitchen. She showed the money to Mo Ling, “Sis, we have start-up funds now! We can open our own business and make even more money!”

Mo Ling took the money, but didn’t display any happiness. She searched the entire kitchen for a piece of string, and split the string of nine taels into two separate strings.

“If mum found out about this money, she’d definitely pocket all of it. Quick, change the values so she won’t suspect a single thing.”

Mo Yan thought for a bit before replying, “I’ll reduce the market value by a half for both medicinal herbs, and reduce the quantity of them. We don’t have a scale at home so she can’t accurately figure out the quantity of medicinal herbs we actually had.”

“Let’s do that then. Mr. Cao isn’t a big gossip so she won’t suspect anything.”

They divided the money, leaving four taels on the kitchen table and keeping the rest for themselves.

Mrs. Liang returned from cooking dinner at the Lu family, saw the money on the kitchen table, and asked, “Where did this money come from?”

“Mr. Cao gave this to me after I sold him the medicinal herbs.” Mo Yan immediately said.

Mrs. Liang took the money and laughed, “We’re on a roll! Not only do we have the eight hundred dollars per month from the Lu family, we can probably sell medicinal herbs for a decent amount too. We can eat meat during meals from now on!”

Mo Feng had just entered the house and only heard the word ‘meat’. “Meat? Where?”

Mrs. Liang was still smiling as she replied pleasantly, “We’ll be able to buy all the meat you’ll ever want to eat soon.”

Mo Yan grabbed a bowl of sauce as always, “Mr. Cao doesn’t need a lot of medicinal herbs for his clinic. He told me to try and sell to other clinics nearby.”

“Other clinics,” Mrs. Liang thought for a bit before replying, “I know of two other clinics, one of which is in our village. There are probably also other clinics in the nearby villages. You can go ask around and try to locate them.”

“Ok, we’ll go harvest more medicinal herbs tomorrow.”

Even though Mo Yan had decided to go for runs by the pond in the mornings, it’s not easy waking up early every day. The sun was already high in the sky and Mo Yan was still fast asleep. Mo Ling had to attempt to wake her several times before she woke up groggily.

She quickly washed her face before stumbling towards the pond and started running as her eyes threatened to close. Suddenly, someone held her in place. Mo Yan had to look twice before recognizing him as Lu Junming.

“What are you doing, I’m running!”

Lu Junming didn’t let her struggle and put his hand in front of her mouth. “Open your mouth,” he said, and she blearily opened it. She tasted meat on her tongue.

“It’s marinated pork!”

Mo Yan’s drowsiness evaporated instantly. She looked at Lu Junming with wide eyes, and he smiled, “Do you like it? I intentionally chose a lean cut of meat for you.”

The meat was already in her mouth and she couldn’t spit it out, so she couldn’t do anything but savour the flavour of the marinated pork.

After seeing Mo Yan swallow the piece of meat, Lu Junming took out a paper bag and handed it to her. This time, she shook her head, “I’m not eating it.”

Lu Junming knew he wouldn’t be able to convince her with words. He put a piece of marinated pork right up to her lips. Mo Yan avoided it, and Lu Junming tried again, saying, “This piece of meat has already touched your lips. You have to eat it.”

He made her eat another three cuts of pork using this method, and then stopped, knowing that she might upset her stomach because she ate too much.

On the way back home, Mo Yan kept thinking about the meat she just ate. If we put marinated pork in our wraps, they’ll definitely sell well.

After they had breakfast, the two sisters set out to harvest medicinal herbs. Mo Yan’s wound hadn’t completely healed yet, so Mo Ling handed her a small shovel, “You just focus on digging up chinese foxgloves. I’ll harvest the dandelions.”

Because the patch of unowned land was far away from their home, Mo Ling took their wheelbarrow there, with water and rations placed in it. If there were really a lot of medicinal herbs there, they wouldn’t have to return home for lunch.

There was a small stream from the road to the unowned land which they couldn’t push the wheelbarrow through, so they left it there, taking their baskets instead.

After moving through the tall weeds, the sea of flowers came into view again. Mo Ling had harvested a large mound of dandelions quickly, and Mo Yan had already dug up half a basket of chinese foxgloves.

“This place really has a lot of medicinal herbs!” Mo Ling said as she straightened her back.

The sky was clear and the sun was hot that day. Mo Ling was afraid Mo Yan would get heatstroke again, so she told her to put the chinese foxgloves on their wheelbarrow, drink some water, and rest for a bit.

Post-edit notes: Meat! My parents recently made a large pot of marinated meat and if you haven’t had it before, trust me, it’s delicious.

[1] And in case I haven’t said this before, people in China take afternoon naps. It’s supposed to make them more productive since they aren’t doing anything during the hottest hours of the day, now are they?