Chapter Ninety-Four: Happy Jasmine

  Jian Tuan and Mo Li had been traveling together for a few days when they finally received some good news: the National Day was approaching, and Wang Fan had also been freed from his home. Originally, Jian Tuan hadn't planned on bringing Mo Li to the wedding scene with him, but who knew that Wang Fan's big mouth had already spilled the beans about Jian Tuan accompanying Mo Li, this foreign girl, while touring Beijing? As a result, Mo Li naturally received an invitation as well. For her first time attending a Chinese wedding, Mo Li was still very excited and kept asking what kind of gift she should bring. In the end, Jian Tuan told her to just buy a red envelope and put 200 yuan in it.

  Then the foreign horsemate followed Ju An and learned two more Chinese sentences, that is, I want to buy red envelopes for weddings. After teaching twice, she could say it almost correctly. So far, Ju An has taught Molly five sentences: hello, thank you, then bring a plate of tomato scrambled eggs, this girl just likes tomato scrambled eggs, basically every meal must be ordered. The last two sentences are the ones that were just taught above. After Molly learned these two sentences, she asked Ju An where to buy them. Ju An casually said that there is a supermarket next to the hotel. Molly listened and turned around and ran out.

  As soon as Mo Li left the hotel door, Ju An used her arm to strangle Wang Fan's neck and said: "Let you little mouth, they may not think I have something with others, you don't know that these two days made me exhausted".

  Wang Fan pushed aside Ju An's arm and said, "Brother isn't doing this for your own good. Look at you, living a life that's even better than what ordinary people have. Nowadays, who else can live like this? Providing you with the perfect nightlife conditions, aren't Americans supposed to be very open-minded? Why are you still living in two separate rooms?" Wang Fan said, sizing up the room.

  "These two days my legs are almost running thin, as soon as I get back to bed I fall asleep, no energy to think about anything else. As agreed, even if Jasmine goes to the wedding you guys don't mess around, it's not what you think, I'm just bringing her here for tourism, at most I'm a free tour guide." said Ju An.

  Wang Fan looked at him and smiled, saying: "I didn't say anything, just that on QQ you said he was accompanying a beautiful foreign classmate to stroll around the capital. You said this group of people squatting in the office are so boring, they immediately spread it like that, it's as if you came to the capital for your honeymoon. Alright, I told them last night, this thing doesn't even count as three accompaniments, at most it counts as a human-shaped stupid wallet, following along to pay the bill."

  "Wallet's not a problem, you know these foreigners aren't like that. These past few days have all been AA system, Americans are used to this, even if they're buying a bottle of mineral water they won't let you pay for them, unless you say you're treating. Luckily I didn't lose both my labor and money. By the way, how come it took so long for you to see your old man this time? I thought you'd be back after just one circle."

  "When I brought this up, Wang Fan had a big smile on his face. 'As soon as I got home, I told my dad directly about my plans and said that I liked a foreign girl. My mom almost fainted, if it wasn't for the fact that we were in front of my dad, she would have come over and pinched my ears. I was waiting for my dad to get angry, but instead he looked at me for a while, didn't say a word, turned around and went back to his study. It scared the sweat off me.'"

  "You haven't even had a proper date, and you're already talking about having a result with Kora? No wonder your mom is angry," said Ju An, shaking her head.

  "Kora is just an excuse, my main point was to tell the old man the opposite of what I really think. I just wanted to break free from the system's framework. After all, I have my older brother at home and several cousins who are also in the system. In the end, you guess what happened? The old man had his secretary call me into his study after a while, and then told me that he agreed with me not going into the system. There's nothing good about it anyway, and my personality isn't suited for it either. I can live wherever I want, do whatever I want, and marry whoever I want. Finally, he said he would talk to my parents about it later, and then had me leave. It left me stunned. He even told me one more thing: 'Flowers don't bloom forever,' and that I shouldn't harbor any resentment towards my family. It left me confused for a long time before I finally understood." Wang Fan said happily.

  After listening, I understand the old man's arrangement. When a big tree falls at home, the descendants are cleared out, and every country has these. Arranging Wang Fan not to enter the system may be a way to protect him.

  "So you've decided to stay in New York from now on? You'll have plenty of time to chase girls then," Ju An said casually.

  "If it works out, I'll be running back and forth between New York and home. I just want to do some business, and now my wish has finally come true. The main thing is that the business is still domestic, anyway, this time, brother got the old man's token, it's like the sky is high and the bird can fly" Wang Fan said happily.

  "Then I'd like to congratulate you on reaching new heights, but be careful up there, the wind is strong and you're just a small bird." Ju An said with a smile, teasing him as he looked at the genuine joy on his face.

  Two people were happily chatting when their classmate Molly had already gone to the small supermarket downstairs and bought red envelopes, and Ju An and Wang Fan looked at this foreign classmate proudly holding a dozen or so red envelopes of different sizes in plastic bags. Upon closer inspection, it was found that not only were there wedding red envelopes, but also birthday ones, and even those for having children, with over ten varieties in total.

  Looking at this foolish girl with a helpless expression, she said: "Didn't you tell the salesperson that you were buying for your wedding? Why did they prepare so much?"

  Jasmine happily said with a smile: "I only remembered the two words 'red envelope' from what you taught me, and I forgot the rest. They didn't understand what I was saying, so they gave me many to choose from. I saw these several good-looking ones, so I bought one of each kind, and took the rest back as a collection. And it's not expensive, there are ten in a pack for just two yuan! Look, this one has two little dolls printed on it, isn't it lovely?" Looking at this naive girl, Ju An could only shake his head. Then he helped her pick out one of the dragon and phoenix patterned red envelopes, and told her to put 200 yuan in it tomorrow, write some auspicious words on it, and that would be fine.

  Jasmine listened and immediately sat down at the table with a happy expression, picked up a pen and seriously wrote blessings on the red envelope, looking at what she wrote, such as "love forever", then took out 200 yuan and put it in the red envelope, sealed it, and looked at the red envelope, muttering to herself: "It's really interesting". This made Ju An and Wang Fan confused, not knowing whether she meant that the red envelope was interesting or that giving the red envelope was an interesting thing.

  The next morning, the three of them took a plane directly to Jiangnan. After arriving in Jiangnan, Wang Fan contacted a car that was already waiting at the airport. After leaving the airport, Wang Fan took the two people to his home, put down their extra luggage, and then drove directly to the city where Wei Dong was. The city was about an hour's drive from Jiangnan. Along the way, Jasmine looked very happy, constantly exclaiming: "It's not like what I imagined, China is really different."

  "Then what kind of China do you imagine?"

  "I thought it was like when I was in school, everyone wore similar clothes, basically no high-rise buildings, and everyone had a red badge on their chest, just like the ones I saw in my grandfather's photos," said Molly.

  "Has your grandfather ever been to China?" Wang Fan asked curiously beside him.

  "At that time, it seemed like the US and China had just established diplomatic relations, my grandfather came to China and took a lot of photos" Molly said happily: "But now it's completely different from what's in the photos, the city is full of skyscrapers, even compared to some cities in the US, it's not much different, like Jiangnan City for example, with so many skyscrapers".

  It's been ages since I last heard from you. We just started communicating in 1979, and at that time, I hadn't even been born yet.

  They chatted all the way and arrived at Wei Dong's home. Wei Dong hurried out to greet them, then had his mother take the three of them to a hotel to rest. His family had arranged for their classmates to stay in hotels not far from their home.

  As soon as the three of them arrived at the hotel, they found that many classmates had already arrived, and almost all of those from Jiangnan City were present. Wu Ming was waiting for Ju An and the others at the entrance. The classmates greeted each other warmly, and after the warm greetings, Ju An discovered that a group of people, both male and female, were very interested in Mo Li. No wonder, after all, it's not often that you meet a foreigner who can chat in university, and many haven't even had contact with foreigners before. Now they finally had the opportunity.

  Jasmine was very happy, following a group of people, chatting in slow English.

  When it was time for the dinner party, I was even more excited. The camera in my hand basically didn't stop, and every song and dance performance on stage had to be captured. In the middle of the event, I even changed memory cards twice. Although Jiu'an and Wang Fan have attended several weddings before, as Chinese people, we all know that the procedures are roughly the same. The key is to focus your attention on the dishes on the table.

  After finishing the banquet, it was evening and time to make noise in the bridal chamber. Fortunately, a group of classmates were relatively polite, just hanging an apple for two people to bite a few times, nothing out of line happened, then returned to the hotel, classmates gathered together to chat and play cards.

  In the evening, Jasmine got excited and suddenly felt hungry, so a group of female classmates took her out to eat at a big restaurant, and also tried some local snacks. It's possible that this place prefers sweet food, which suits Jasmine's taste as a foreign student. When everyone was about to disperse the next afternoon, Wang Jingjing whispered to Ju An, "This girl is not bad, she's not pretentious, eats with big mouthfuls, you should seize the opportunity." This made Ju An want to cry and laugh at the same time.