1979 Golden Age

"Crunch!"

A red and white Czechoskoda bus pulled up near the front door.

Nowadays, the Czech Republic is still in the red camp. Its full name is Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. Many of the trucks and buses imported these days are produced in Eastern Europe. Skoda was later acquired by Volkswagen.

Sheng Yongzhi, a veteran reporter from China Youth Daily, squeezed out with difficulty, wiped his sweat, and straightened his cotton shirt to make his clothes look neater.

He has been working at the China Youth Daily, and returned to his job when the newspaper resumed publication, but he will retire after only a few years of work. There are few young people in the newspaper office, and it attaches great importance to cultivating the next generation.

"Less than, hurry up!"

"I'm coming!"

Yu Jiajia ran a few steps quickly and rushed closer.

She was in her early 20s, quite pretty, and had just taken over her father's position as a rookie reporter. She was holding a bag, which contained an extremely precious camera.

"Lesui, you can also ask a few questions later."

"Huh? I don't know what to ask."

"How can you not know what to ask when you are a reporter? I brought you here to let you practice more and accumulate more experience, so you can think about it carefully."

The two of them walked for a while and arrived at the east side of the Arrow Tower. Sure enough, they saw a tea stall with about ten people busy and many customers.

Sheng Yongzhi did not identify himself, but stepped forward in line and said: "Two bowls of tea!"

"okay!"

"Four cents in total!"

Huang Zhanying greeted him more and more skillfully. Sheng Yongzhi picked up the big bowl and looked at it, smelled it, then took a sip and said with a smile: "Is this jasmine tea?"

"Yes!"

"The water quality in Beijing is not good, so jasmine tea does not matter the water quality, so it is most suitable for setting up a stall."

"Hey, you are still an expert. Are you a native of Beijing?" Huang Zhanying chatted with him as usual.

"Well, you have so many customers every day?"

"Pretty much, more and more people know about us now, and everyone is very supportive."

Sheng Yongzhi chatted for a while, then smiled and stretched out his hand and said: "Hello, let me formally introduce myself. I am Sheng Yongzhi, a reporter from China Youth Daily. This is Comrade Yu, we are here to interview."

"Caicaicai, interview??"

Huang Zhanying was stunned and stammered: "Why are you interviewing us?"

"What interview?"

"What happened again?"

“Oh my god, China Youth Daily!”

When the friends heard it, they gathered around, shouting and being very happy. These days, print media has supreme authority, and journalists are a profession that everyone envies.

Sheng Yongzhi was experienced and controlled the situation and said, "Who is Chen Qi?"

brush!

Twelve eyes turned to the right side of the tea stall, where a man was squatting there, holding a box and counting money.

Are you responsible for financial work?

Sheng Yongzhi thought to himself, walked over a few steps, and stretched out his hand: "Hello! Is this the letter you wrote to the newspaper?"

"Hello!"

"I'm so sorry that I didn't pay attention to you. I was settling accounts just now!"

Chen Qi stood up quickly, with a hint of shyness and nervousness on his face. He looked like a handsome and shy big boy. He scratched the back of his head and said, "I wrote the letter. I really didn't expect you to come for the interview."

"Your letter is very good. Let's have a casual chat?"

"well!"

The customers were also in a commotion.

Yo, reporter!

Going to be in the newspaper? Then can we also be in the newspaper?

There were more people watching.

Huang Zhanying was very discerning and brought a few benches. Sheng Yongzhi was not polite. He sat down and asked about the general situation and said, "Can you tell me more about the conflict that day?"

"It was the first day of opening, during the lunch break. I was eating, and suddenly I heard someone laughing. I went over and saw that it was the employees of the Second Plastic Factory. They ridiculed us for no reason, and even sang The song of wandering made several girls cry."

"What happened next?"

"Fortunately, the police comrades arrived in time and stopped them, because we are all young, the eldest is only 21 years old, and half of us are lesbians. If the police comrades had not come, we really don't know what to do, alas..."

Chen Qi answered truthfully, with a bitter look on his face: "They are full of social prejudices. Some comrades wanted to quit that day, but we had to talk hard to stay."

Why!

Yu Jiajia was moved. If she had not taken over, she would probably have been assigned to the cooperative to sew and mend.

Sheng Yongzhi then asked: "What do your parents do?"

"In Xinhua Bookstore."

"It's a good unit, why didn't you take over their position?"

"..."

Chen Qi hesitated for a moment and said: "They want to retire early. On the one hand, I know that this is a good choice and will be of great benefit to my life. But on the other hand, I tell myself that this is actually very useless." ”

"Promising?"

"Think about it, my parents are only in their forties and retired so early. What can they do? I am only 19 years old, I have hands, feet and education. I still have a long way to go. For my own benefit I can’t accept it if my parents make sacrifices privately!”

Chen Qi looked determined.

Sheng Yongzhi was also moved, what a good boy!

"Most people are very kind, especially comrades who are on business trips. They all praise our tea stall for its good layout and convenience for the masses."

“On the first day we opened, we sold more than 2,000 bowls!”

"There are too few commercial service outlets in the capital. I think cooperatives can fill this gap, but people's ideas are difficult to change, which makes us feel somewhat inferior psychologically."

As the conversation deepened, Chen Qi seemed to be less nervous and began to talk freely.

Sheng Yongzhi felt that it was almost time, so he left the opportunity to Yu Jiajia and motioned her to ask questions. Yu Jiajia thought for a while and said, "How do you envision the future?"

"At present, I just want to set up the tea stall. I love literature and movies, and I want to try to write something."

"Is it the spiritual home you mentioned?"

"Yes, the spiritual home has saved my heart countless times when I was negative and gloomy. I am still full of hope for the future. I believe that young people of my age will also be surrounded by flowers, and I believe that the motherland will become better and better!"

"Just like the sentence you wrote facing the sea, spring is warm and flowers are blooming?" Yu Jiajia laughed.

"Uh, I just wrote it randomly!"

Chen Qi scratched the back of his head again.

Sheng Yongzhi had a good impression of this young man. He was humble, thoughtful, down-to-earth, and had a bright future.

He is a very traditional intellectual, and he is not stingy with his advice to the young people who are making progress. He said: "We have read your letter and are very moved. We have decided to publish it, but the title is a bit inappropriate. Although you wrote some dark things in the beginning, the latter part is positive and you also said that you have the strength to keep moving forward.

Then the title "How does the road of life become narrower and narrower?" is not quite appropriate.

I suggest changing it to "How should we walk the road of life?" This is more in line with the content and can also highlight an attitude of communication with readers."

"You are right, it should be like this!"

Chen Qi immediately expressed his opinion.

It doesn't matter what it is called. The reason why he chose that crappy name is just to play a joke.

Because this "How does the road of life become narrower and narrower" is an article published in the magazine "China Youth" next year, which tells about the dark things he encountered and the part about committing suicide.

This article is very famous and caused a national discussion at the time, discussing the meaning of life.

But Chen Qi didn't copy. What he wrote was actually a soft article, which was to beat up the tea stall, set up a plastic factory, and make a name for himself, creating a good image of a positive young man - in short, to establish a persona!

"Well, I'll go back and talk to the editor."

Sheng Yongzhi nodded. A young man who listens to advice is a good young man. He asked again: "Do you want to take a pen name?"

"Pen name... Can I bring a knife but no umbrella on a rainy night?"

"What?"

"No, no, I can't think of any pen name, so use my real name."

"Well, that's fine."

Then, the two went to interview their friends.

They were very cheap, talking all the time like a group of ducks, talking too much, and not enough dry goods. Finally, Sheng Yongzhi took several photos of them and the tea stall, waved and left.

As soon as the two left, the friends surrounded him.

"Wow, we're going to be in the newspapers!"

"Chen Qi, I just want to admire you!"

"You and Sister Yingzi are really a perfect match, with you leading us, we will definitely succeed!"

No one thought it was wrong when these words came out.

Unconsciously, everyone has already tacitly accepted that these two people are leaders.