Chapter Twelve: Listening in on Classes

  In the campus of Ma Touying Primary School, there is a loud reading sound. From outside the classroom, you can see students either standing with their hands behind them, fully focused on listening to the lecture, or holding their textbooks and reciting texts in unison with clear and serious voices.

  An Yiming led the way, doing things properly, measuring land, assessing budgets, and really preparing to build new schools in these rural areas.

  Lu Zhong became idle and had nothing to do, becoming a leisurely person.

  Zhao Pingfan originally wanted to accompany Lu Zhong, he quite liked listening to Lu Zhong's ideas about reform, and had a feeling of regret for not meeting earlier.

  Who would have thought that Secretary Zhang would let Zhao Pingfan take care of the important matter with An Yiming, while he himself stuck to Lu Zhong like a shadow?

  Obviously, in Secretary Zhang's mind, building a few new schools is far less important than accompanying this deputy department-level official from the city, let alone that it is rumored that Lu Chu and County Party Committee Secretary Liu have a deep relationship.

  Things in official circles are often like this: they are passed on with errors and by the time they reach the ears of people below, they have already become distorted.

  Director Zhang arranged for Lu Zhong to attend a lesson at the Commune Central Primary School in the third period of the afternoon, so that "the leaders of the Municipal Education Commission can inspect the results of the Ma Tuo education reform".

  The students attending the class are from Mei Xiaofang's third-grade class, where she serves as the head teacher. Mei Xiaofang holds multiple positions, including Chinese teacher, math teacher, and music teacher. In reality, however, she is just a substitute teacher and has not been formally appointed due to the lack of quotas in the past few years since the school was converted from a private to a public institution.

  Zhang Mingsheng, Secretary and Principal of the district, Old He, and Schoolmaster Guo of this school sat with Lu Zhong in the back row of the classroom to listen to the lesson.

  Mei Xiaofang didn't have a very good impression of Lu Zhong, but now she could only muster up her spirits and hope that nothing went wrong. After all, the three people sitting behind Lu Zhong had a great impact on her work, and whether or not they could convert to a private enterprise depended entirely on their words, especially Old He and Secretary Zhang - if one of them was willing to speak up, things would be much easier to handle.

  Mei Xiaofang is having a Chinese class, and the lesson is about the fable "South Pointing Chariot".

  In fact, students have learned this lesson long ago, but since there is a leader listening to the class, it's usually chosen from the textbook that has been lectured before.

  There were "big shots" sitting in the back listening to the class, and the students were all very nervous. Although it had been arranged beforehand which questions would be answered by which student, with so many students, Mei Xiaofang sometimes couldn't even remember the original arrangement herself. After all, every time a question was asked, the hands of all the students in the classroom shot up at once, not one of them failing to raise their hand - this was also an order given by Mei Xiaofang, and it was also an unspoken rule for elementary school classes.

  So when Mei Xiaofang forgot who was supposed to answer a question, she would usually call on the excellent students who were more confident.

  In this way, there was a student who was called upon to answer questions four times just before the end of class.

  It was originally just a minor flaw, but the principal of the district, Old He, who had high expectations for teachers, frowned and said, "The traces of human arrangement are too strong! Isn't this just pretending to be something it's not?"

  As soon as he landed on his face, he blurted out this sentence, and Principal Guo's face immediately turned black.

  Zhang Mingsheng looked at Old He with a puzzled expression, thinking to himself: Could it be that Xiaomei had offended him in some way?

  Principal Guo knew that Old He had personally introduced his nephew to Mei Xiaofang, but after meeting with her, she didn't agree at all, which made Old He very embarrassed.

  But now as the leader of the Municipal Education Commission, Lao He's words made Principal Guo somewhat annoyed, but after all, Lao He was his nominal superior, so Principal Guo couldn't say anything.

  The bell rang, and Mei Xiaofang saw several leaders walking out of the back door with dark faces. She felt a sudden jolt in her heart and rushed out of the classroom, only to see Zhang Secretary and He Principal getting into the car of that young cadre from the city, while Guo Principal was waving goodbye at the rear of the car.

  Mei Xiaofang walked over and asked: "Uncle Guo, was it that I didn't teach the lesson well?"

  Principal Guo shook his head and sighed, saying "Let's talk about it later." He turned around and left.

  Mei Xiaofang's tears welled up in her eyes, she was so disappointed in herself. How could she still want to change the school's management when she was in such a state? She turned around and rushed back to the classroom, burying her face on the lectern and sobbing uncontrollably. The students were all frightened, those who had been planning to sneak out and play also sat quietly, anxiously watching their beloved teacher.

  Mei Xiaofang wiped away her tears, and out of the corner of her eye she saw the concerned eyes and anxious young faces below the podium.

  Suddenly, Mei Xiaofang felt that nothing else mattered, with these lovely children and herself together, isn't this the happiest thing in the world?

  ……

  Although Ma Touying is small, it has everything, including state-run restaurants, hotels and supply and marketing cooperatives.

  At more than 6 o'clock in the evening, Secretary Zhang Ming of the Commune arranged a dinner party for the municipal leaders at the state-run restaurant next to the intersection of Dingzi Road in the center of the town.

  Lu Zhong originally said to wait for An Yi Ming, but the clerk sent by Zhang Ming Sheng reported that General An might not be free until 8 or 9 o'clock. Zhang Ming Sheng then smiled and said: "Then we'll eat first, I'll arrange for General An later."

  Lu Zhong could only nod in agreement.

  In the elegant room, the aroma of dishes wafted through the air, and the table was filled with meat and fish. However, Lu Zhong didn't like the first dish, which was a stew made with three precious ingredients. He wasn't fond of these supposedly nutritious but messy foods.

  Only Zhang Mingsheng and Old He accompanied Lu Zhong, so chatting and talking, there were fewer taboos.

  Zhang Mingsheng had long known that Lu Chu was a formidable figure, the kind of person who could slam his fist on the table and scold the Secretary of the Discipline Inspection Commission as "what kind of thing" during a Standing Committee meeting. When speaking in front of Lu Zhong, he was careful with his words, lest he inadvertently provoke him and suffer the consequences.

  Zhang Mingsheng originally didn't want Lao He to join in, it would be great if he could just chat with Lu Zhong about private matters.

  But together they had attended lectures, and Lao He was enthusiastically chatting with Lu Chuxun about the great mountains, with a look of "it's been too long". He even arranged for dinner, Zhang Mingsheng helplessly said that he had already made arrangements.

  Now watching Old He in front of Lu Zhong, speaking with saliva flying everywhere, discussing the overall situation and international trends. Zhang Mingsheng just smiled and poured wine for the two of them, thinking to himself: "Old He, you really don't know how to write the word 'death'. You only know that the person in front of you is Lu Chu from the municipal government, and he works with the Municipal Education Bureau a lot, so you think you've struck gold?"

  You see Lu Chu being polite to you now, wait till he turns hostile, let's see how you'll deal with it.

  Zhang Mingsheng is now a bit annoyed that Lao He has messed up his own good thing, so he doesn't mention it to him. The Lu Chu in front of him is such a difficult person to get along with, and he really is someone who turns his face and doesn't recognize people.

  Principal He had a somewhat literary air about him, and enjoyed discussing international politics. When he started talking about the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, Lu Zheng just smiled and listened to what he had to say, without interjecting much.

  After three rounds of wine, just as the conversation was getting lively, footsteps sounded outside, the curtain was lifted, and two women entered. One was a plump woman with a stout figure, fish-belly eyes, dressed in typical rural attire, speaking loudly: "Oh! Secretary Zhang is also here, this must be the young man from the city, so spirited!" Her loud voice was like a cracked gong, making people's ears ache.

  Zhang Mingsheng was taken aback and asked, "How did you come here?" This woman was the director of the commune's women's federation, named Zhu Daying. She was coarse and rough in her work style, and had forcibly taken many women to the county to be sterilized, earning a particularly bad reputation. The villagers of Ma Touying Commune hated her deeply, and behind her back, they called her "Pig Large Intestine".

  Zhang Mingsheng also looked down on her, but the family planning work was so important that it really needed someone to play the villain. So although the commune and county repeatedly received letters of accusation, Zhu Da Ying was still doing a great job as the head of the Women's Federation in the commune.

  Following Zhu Da Ying, walking together was Commune Elementary School substitute teacher Mei Xiao Fang. At this moment, she felt a bit constrained looking at the three men eating with steam rising from their food, her hands and feet somewhat not knowing where to place themselves.

  "What's the matter, Old He didn't say anything, asked me to bring Little Mei to toast and make the atmosphere more lively?" Zhu Da Ying replied casually to Zhang Ming Sheng's question.

  Principal He's face suddenly turned liver-colored, but since he had been drinking quite a bit of wine already, it wasn't very noticeable.

  Principal He and Zhu Da Ying are somewhat close, but one is refined and the other is coarse. Although the two families interact frequently, they usually don't have much to do with each other. Today, he asked her to handle this matter, but who knew she would speak out of turn in front of him. Principal He was annoyed for a moment, thinking that Zhu Da Ying was indeed not someone to be trusted.

  Zhang Mingsheng furrowed his brow, and could only help him save face, smiling as he said: "Since you've come, take a seat. Comrades Da Ying and Xiao Mei have worked hard too, let's just consider this a treat for them today."

  Zhu Daying was a blunt person, didn't notice the expressions of several people, and pulled Mei Xiaofang to sit down, even smiled at Lu Zhong: "People from the city are just different, so fair and white."

  Zhang Mingsheng glared at her and said, "This is Lu Chu."

  Zhu Daying was also unclear about the situation, in fact, she couldn't know whether or not she could be a county-level cadre, after all, every day was spent working at the grassroots level in rural areas, with her mind full of things related to this land.

  Although she followed Zhang Mingsheng and shouted "Lu Chu", she didn't take it seriously, just a young cadre from the city, not much to do with herself. Secretary Zhang and Principal He both loved to make a big fuss about nothing, every time someone came down from above, wasn't it all the same? Being polite was not enough, being respectful was not enough.