23: Chapter 23 – Starting School, Open-air Kitchen_1 23: Chapter 23 – Starting School, Open-air Kitchen_1 This day, from the gate to the courtyard and back room of Yan Fei’s house, people were packed tightly.
Yan Fei hadn’t caused any trouble; it’s just the start of school.
Most of the people were from Shanglin Village, and some from Yan Fei’s hometown, Yan Village.
They can’t squeeze into the school for enrollment now, so they’re waiting here for the afternoon.
Yan Fei’s uncle, Lin Xiuqing is already here too.
His two children, Yan Fei’s cousin Lin Lingling is in her third year of junior high, and her cousin Lin Haihu is in his second year.
Every year around the time when school starts again, Sancha River town becomes as busy as the Lunar New Year.
From pre-school classes to primary, junior and high schools, the small town’s students, along with their parents, spend several days in crowded streets and alleyways.
Meanwhile, Yan Fei was feeling rather pleased with himself.
He woke up early to register at the school and had already paid the tuition fees.
Despite only scoring three points in his test, he had successfully become a student of the third class in the first year of junior high at Sancha River’s First Middle School.
He had also met the class teacher, a newly graduated female teacher named Guan Yue.
Of course, he probably made an especially deep impression on the new teacher, as the first student to enroll was one who only scored three points in the test, likely casting a bit of a shadow over the new teacher’s heart.
During the evening self-study period, Yan Fei realized that junior high was not as simple as he thought it would be.
First of all, he no longer has as much free time as before.
It was a class schedule that was enough to engrave in everyone’s heart.
Before 5:30 in the morning, all students must arrive at the classroom for roll call, then line up to go running -— the school is too small, so they run on the main road.
After running, they start their self-study period and recite English or Chinese texts until seven when they break for meals.
At 7:50 in the morning, the preparation bell rings and classes start at eight.
There is a break for exercises between the four classes and school ends at twelve.
The preparation bell rings at 2:20 in the afternoon until 5:30, and from 6:50 to 9 in the evening.
That’s the schedule for the summer.
In winter, lunchtime is moved earlier, and the evening self-study period finishes earlier too.
2 Junior High School is currently being constructed in the town.
It’s said that it will be ready for use after the New Year.
This means that for now, there’s only one junior high school in the entire township.
Therefore, there are seven classes in each grade for first and second year junior high, while the third year of junior high has eight.
Each class is allocated between 120 to 130 students, meaning that desks meant for two students are used by at least three to four students.
The classes are too packed to be scheduled properly and even the sports field isn’t big enough.
Each class has two physical education lessons a week, one of which is scheduled for the last period of the morning or afternoon, so they can go straight home after P.E.
So in the evening, Yan Fei got two new desk mates.
Because Yan Fei was taller and stronger due to his indulgence in eating, he naturally was assigned to the back of the class.
The two people sharing his desk were not as strong as him, but they were not shorter either.
The three of them sitting together felt very fortunate because they are big, so only three people share a desk.
Some desks in the front have four people to a desk!
In any case, before the new school is ready, Yan Fei’s junior high life started off in a bustling yet uneventful manner.
During the break in the evening study session, Yan Fei saw Yang Qian and Jiao Bing, who were placed in a different class.
The two of them were assigned to the same class.
The three boys ventured to the restroom together— they couldn’t help it, everyone was still getting accustomed to the start of school, slightly nervous and excited.
Students from rural areas didn’t know they could go to the restroom next to the dormitory, so the restroom was a bit crowded, with students queuing up more than ten meters away from the door.
Yan Fei continued his elementary school style, simply getting to know the names of his desk-mates and then waiting peacefully for the end of the school day.
As soon as school finished in the evening, Yan Fei began to sort out the things his relatives brought to his house during the day.
These included sweet potato leaves, sesame leaves, and sesame oil, among other things.
Yan Fei has plenty of sweet potato leaves now.
He got a lot when he went to catch rabbits at night, some to eat and more to feed the rabbits in the cave.
In the quiet of the night, he continued to catch rabbits.
Although rabbits were getting increasingly harder to catch, before he thought of another way to make money, this was undeniably a viable way to earn money.
Even after the sweet potato field on the island was fertilized with chicken manure, it was still not something to rely upon in the short term.
After he returned from catching rabbits, he killed a few Compsognathus on the island and cleaned them, and then he faced a serious problem- where to stew the meat?
He needed to be at school before 5:30 in the morning, so he spent very little time at home during the day.
Therefore, he had to cook the meat at night so he could use it whenever he cooked meals.
He could spend a day or two stewing meat in the kitchen at night, but he couldn’t do this every day.
So, he needed a place where he could stew meat at any time without disturbing others.
The cave on the island wasn’t suitable, the only option was his territory outside.
He could just cook outdoors.
When the meat was cooked, he collected it in a pot and placed it in the cave.
For the next two days, some bricks mysteriously disappeared from several construction sites in Sancha River town – Yan Fei does have money, but he has no reason to buy bricks.
By Friday, Yan Fei bought two new pots, a large and a small one, and moved the two old pots to the island.
When the first wisp of cooking smoke rose from the island, Yan Fei proudly looked at his stove, extremely pleased with himself.
He had used plenty of bricks for this stove, and the nearby mall had already been built and was undergoing interior decoration.
Yan Fei “borrowed” quite a bit of their cement to reinforce the exterior of the stove, ensuring that even if an entire group of Compsognathus attacked, they wouldn’t be able to destroy his fortress-like stove.
While adding more firewood, he wondered whether he should build a small house, because those Compsognathus were already too scared to come over to the central pond to drink water, so maybe he could even leave this stove outside.
But one thing was certain, he didn’t have enough time.
The weekend arrived in the blink of an eye, and to make it easier for students from rural areas to return home, there were only two classes on Saturday afternoon.
As soon as school ended, Yan Fei took a long breath.
He could barely handle the days of the past week.
He would steal bricks to renovate the island at night, practice assassination on the island, sleep for less than three hours a night, and try to stay awake during classes during the day.
Yan Fei felt that he really needed a weekend to rest.
As soon as school ended, he entered the island.
Smoke was still coming out of the pot on the island!
Looking at the red embers still glowing in the stove, Yan Fei marveled: The wood on the island really did burn well.
At noon, he had stewed a wild rabbit in the back pot, and naturally stewed three Pterosaurs in the large front pot.
Before going to school, he had added a few large pieces of wood to the stove and closed the fuel hatch with an iron plate, leaving only a small ventilation hole.
Sure enough, two hours later, the fire inside had not completely gone out.
Yan Fei, who had been stoking fires since he was little whether it was for his grandfather’s blacksmithing or his other grandfather’s cooking, was very experienced in keeping a fire going.
After adding some more firewood, Yan Fei left the island, locked the door, and started gnawing on a piece of Compsognathus meat he had torn right from the pot.
He set off towards the county town—after all, a cut-off Compsognathus leg looked very similar to a chicken drumstick without careful inspection.
He had said during the summer vacation that he would deliver rabbit meat to Xu Xiaoyan every three days after school started.
With only two days off in a month to go home, Yan Fei could hardly imagine what it would feel like to stay at school for a whole month.
After all, he had only been there for a week and he already felt like each day felt like a year.
So even though Xu Xiaoyan hadn’t mentioned anything about him delivering meat when she left for school, Yan Fei still remembered it!
It had already been a week now.