Chapter 455: Chapter 455: A Joyous Occasion

Jiang Baohua and Zhou Guizhi came all the way from Shangjiang Team, and Jiang Xingye drove to the train station to pick them up, which made him very happy.

Xu Qinghuan felt like this broken car was his second wife.

One daughter is getting married, and the other is engaged, so Jiang Baohua and his wife had to come in person.

They didn’t bring anything else, just two big bags of grain, a bag of rice and a bag of white flour, and carried them over with difficulty, which shocked Xu Qinghuan.

Also, it was very touching.

"Everything is good in the city, except there’s no grain tickets, and you have to buy high-priced grain to eat. Sigh, your uncle worries every day. It’s just too far; it would be nice if it were closer."

"Your eldest sister-in-law gave birth again, and this time, she finally had a son, so she’s overjoyed. I just finished taking care of her during her confinement. Sigh, I’m really too old to take care of her anymore." Zhou Guizhi secretly complained to Xu Qinghuan.

"Why does she even give birth to so many? She doesn’t cherish her own body!"

Xu Qinghuan laughed a lot, "Didn’t the second sister-in-law just have another son?"

"That’s different, this son takes Dong’s surname, and it’s Aunt Li who took care of her. I didn’t do anything," Zhou Guizhi nostalgically said. "Her grandmother had foresight, saying at the beginning to let Lan come with you two, saying there are more opportunities in the big city.

If she stayed in our remote place, could she find such a decent man?"

Zhou Jingsong was also divorced, but he had no children.

He had been in the military before and had a wife in the countryside; they rarely saw each other, and after three years of marriage, they had no children. His wife suspected he had problems. Later, when his leg became disabled, his wife didn’t want to be with him anymore, and they divorced.

That night, the family reunited.

Jiang Xingye brought back two roast ducks from Quanjude.

Xu Qinghuan cooked and, along with Zhou Guizhi, made a lot of dishes, filling the whole table.

Huo Chi also came, and he got along well with Zhou Jingsong.

Zhou Jingsong and Jiang Xinglan fell in love freely, and when they both were interested, they decided to make arrangements for the marriage quickly.

After his leg healed, Zhou Jingsong went to East Province to bring back the introduction letter. Zhou Guizhi came this time and also brought Jiang Xinglan’s introduction letter. After tonight’s reunion dinner, they planned to get the marriage certificate tomorrow.

"After you get the marriage certificate tomorrow, we’ll celebrate properly," Xu Qinghuan said with a smile.

Jiang Xinglan smiled, tears glistening in her eyes, as she looked at the man beside her. Her nurtured, fair, and delicate cheeks flushed with red.

After handling Jiang Xinglan’s marriage, it was time for the New Year.

The old man and woman were here, and Jiang Baohua and his wife definitely wouldn’t go back for the New Year. The house here was spacious enough, so they simply decided to stay here for the New Year.

Jiang Baohua kept busy helping Jiang Xingye renovate the store, while Xu Qinghuan took Zhou Guizhi around to visit all the attractions in Yan City.

Zhou Guizhi invited the old lady to come along, but the old lady waved her hand, "You go see for yourself; we’ve already seen it."

There were quite a few old men and women around here who often arranged outings to various places together. The old man and the old lady participated in many such city tours and weren’t very interested in going out to see attractions in the cold weather.

Xu Qinghuan took a lot of photos for her.

After the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, Jiang Baohua and his wife went back. Xu Qinghuan developed the photos and put them in an album for her to take home, along with gifts bought for them from the department store, filling several large suitcases.

Everything else was fine, but Zhou Guizhi treasured the album immensely.

As soon as she returned to Shangjiang Team, she took it out to show off before anyone asked.

The whole album was filled with her photos with attractions, and the only group photo was taken when she and Jiang Baohua went to watch the flag-raising.

The photos were in color, which looked much better than black and white.

With them organized in an album, it looked very fancy.

The entire Shangjiang Team was envious to death.

Zhou Guizhi stroked her hair with her hand, "My hair didn’t photograph well before, so Huanhuan said she’d take me for a haircut; a master barber specially gave me a cut, costing a high price, five cents, and the hairpin was bought at the department store, bought two in total, to wear alternately."

Seeing the envious and jealous glances from everyone, Zhou Guizhi enjoyed it greatly, "Ah, I’m old, but I can still be stylish, thanks to the kids!"

Sure enough, someone asked, "Did your Lan really find such a good one, who was in the army, now what’s he doing?"

"Now he’s following Xiaowu doing business," Zhou Guizhi said. "I thought the daughter was going to be married off to East Province, but who knew, the son-in-law bought a house in Yan City, now the whole family’s household registration can be moved there, so I don’t have to worry anymore."

The onlookers exclaimed in admiration.

Hu Hai asked, "Aunty, is Brother Ye not coming back? If he doesn’t come back, what will happen to our factories?"

The longer it went on, the more the team and the members appreciated Jiang Xingye’s talents. In just a year’s time, the business of the factories had shrunk significantly.

If there were issues with production, there were no solutions, and sales problems weren’t dealt with properly, only the lumber mill was doing okay.

Without designers, the garment factory was still making the same old three types, and with increasing imitations outside, it was harder to sell.

"I really don’t know!" Zhou Guizhi thought for a moment, "He bought a car over there, why would he come back?"

"Ah, Jiang Xiaowu even bought a car; goodness, how does he live so well? Your family’s Xu Zhiqing really is bringing prosperity to her husband!"

"Isn’t that the truth!" Zhou Guizhi flicked her hair back from behind her ears and raised her face proudly, "Without Xu Zhiqing, how would my Xiaowu have today? My Jiang family must have smoke coming from the ancestral graves to have married Xu Zhiqing."

But most people were still concerned about their own wallets.

"If Brother Ye doesn’t come back, our factories will have to close."

"That’s not necessary!" Zhou Guizhi was scared these people would make a move to bring her nephew back, "Xiaowu is still studying; how can he come back?"

In May, after the store renovation was completed, Jiang Xingye got his personal business license.

He wasn’t the first; the first person to get a personal business license nationwide was a woman, who obtained it last December.

During the summer vacation, Jiang Xingye took Zhou Jingsong to the south again, and this time, they sent back quite a lot of goods. He even asked Luo Jinhao in the distant Shangjiang Team to send over a lot of small wooden items from the furniture factory for display on the shelves.

With a total of five storefronts, Jiang Xingye opened three, and Yan City’s first supermarket started operating.

The supermarket mainly sold clothes, electronic products, and small furniture.

Because it operated in a self-service manner, this novel business approach attracted many customers.

In addition, with indeed low prices, business was very booming.

Jiang Xinglan was in charge of collecting payments.

The security hired for the supermarket were all veterans, and Zhou Jingsong recommended a few people, and Jian Jingchuan also helped select a few people, with some sent to East Province and four staying here to help.

The second courtyard was renovated by Jiang Xingye and used as employee housing.

At this point, Jiang Xingye’s business map was officially established.

The old man, having heard that the vegetables he grew could be taken to the supermarket to sell, was extremely excited and had greatly increased enthusiasm for gardening every day.

On the first day, the sales were over three dollars, and the old man was invigorated, no longer walking the bird or playing chess, just tending to his garden. Morning and evening, he would prepare the vegetables according to how Xu Qinghuan taught him, weighing and labeling them with name, weight, unit price, and selling price, and then sending them there for sale.

Gradually, the old men and women nearby also wanted to have their vegetables sold on consignment.

Jiang Xingye agreed to all of them, but first, the quality had to be good, and second, a part of the management fee had to be collected.

No one disagreed with this.

His next step was to open a fresh food supermarket, but currently, the policy hadn’t been widely opened up, but he could start preparing on his end.

Indeed, not long after, someone came to discuss with Jiang Xingye, and nearby production teams wanted to deliver goods to his supermarket.

By this time, the commodity market started to become active, and ticket management was increasingly relaxed. Jiang Xingye had many sources of information, and it was already suggested above to cancel tickets and to align internal reforms towards free trade.

After weighing the options and discussing with Xu Qinghuan, he agreed to their request.