The next morning, Gu Ning was awakened by a knock on the door.

"Who's outside?" Gu Jing ran to the door.

"It's me, Uncle Qiang. I made an appointment with your sister yesterday. I'll take you and Gu Lin to learn swimming this morning."

Gu Jing opened the door and let Gu Qiang in.

Gu Ning walked out with hazy eyes open, "Uncle Qiang, it's so early, have you had breakfast?"

"It's late. It's already half past eight. It will be past nine when I pick them up and take them back to the village. After two hours of swimming lessons, it will be almost eleven o'clock. I will take them back then."

"Sister, I cooked some porridge and eggs. Gu Lin and I have already eaten. Remember to eat later. We are going to learn swimming with Uncle Qiang."

After watching them walk away, Gu Ning packed himself up, had breakfast, and went to look for his comrades according to the address given by Jiang Ze.

I rode my bike around several streets before I found the Wuyun Sanda Gym that Jiang Ze mentioned.

As soon as I walked in, I saw a dozen men and women boxing in pairs on the open space.

The small ones hit the small ones, and the tall ones hit the taller ones.

There were a few spirited young men wearing grey shirts and camouflage overalls standing nearby, giving instructions.

Seeing Gu Ning coming in, a man about the same age as Jiang Ze walked out of the office.

"Little sister, who are you looking for?"

"Excuse me, are you Coach Chen? I was introduced by Uncle Jiang Ze."

"Oh! It's Gu Ning's niece. Jiang Ze called me. Come into the office and sit down."

Chen Bin took Gu Ning to sit down in the office and poured her a cup of tea.

Gu Ning took a sip of tea and said, "Uncle Chen, I want to sign up for three of us to learn Sanda. How is your schedule arranged?"

"There are classes every morning, afternoon, and evening. You can come and study anytime. Each class lasts two hours."

"We chose to come in the afternoon. We had swimming lessons in the morning and did homework last night."

Chen Bin nodded. "My niece has a very full schedule and a strong sense of crisis!"

"Once bitten, I'm afraid of the rope for ten years. There's nothing we can do. Our parents are gone, so we have to learn to protect ourselves."

"I heard that Jiang Ze is your guardian now. He will protect you."

"Yes! We all believe in Uncle Jiang!"

Gu Ning paid one year's tuition. Chen Bin gave them a 20% discount on the registration fee and told her that she could come to class tomorrow afternoon.

Riding a bicycle, Gu Ning went to the vegetable market and bought two kilograms of shrimp, one kilogram of pork ribs, two sweet corns, two kilograms of taro, two tomatoes, a handful of Chinese cabbage, and a bag of apples. He loaded the front of the bicycle with everything before returning home.

Blanch the ribs, green onion and ginger, put them into the electric cooker and fill it with water all at once.

After the water boils, add taro and corn and simmer for an hour. The soup is so delicious that you can swallow your tongue.

While the soup was cooking, Gu Ning heated up the oil in a pan, added some ginger and garlic, put in the shrimps, stir-fried them a few times, poured in a can of beer, covered the pot and simmered for five minutes, then added some salt and served.

Blanch the tomatoes in hot water, peel them, cut them into small dices, put them into hot oil and stir-fry until soup comes out. Beat the eggs and pour them into the pan, stir-fry quickly, add salt and MSG, and a delicious tomato scrambled eggs is ready.

Put a spoonful on the top of the rice. Tomato scrambled eggs with rice is the favorite of the three siblings.

Finally, stir-fry a plate of Chinese cabbage, and the three dishes and one soup are complete.

Gu Ning put three large bowls of pork ribs, taro and corn soup on the dining table. When Gu Jing and Gu Lin came home, the soup would no longer be hot.

It was almost half past eleven when Gu Jing and Gu Lin came back.

"Sister, I'm so hungry now that I can swallow a cow." Gu Jing went straight to the kitchen as soon as she entered the door.

Gu Lin followed him into the kitchen.

"Drink some soup first, then eat!"

Gu Ning lifted the cover of the dish and served a bowl of rice to Gu Jing and Gu Lin who were drinking soup.

"How was your swimming lesson today?"

"I learned how to inhale, hold my breath, and swim with the help of a swimming ring. Gu Lin has already learned how to do the dog pose," said Gu Jing.

Gu Lin took a bite of the ribs and said, "Sister, I will study hard. I know you are worried."

"By the way, sister," Gu Jing said, her cheeks puffed up from eating, "Aren't you going to learn how to swim?"

Before Gu Ning could answer, Gu Lin glanced at Gu Jing and said, "Sister, you grew up in the village. Who can't swim?"

"Why wouldn't we?"

"Because before we started learning to swim, our parents moved to the county."

Gu Ning looked at Gu Lin approvingly, "Gu Jing, pay more attention to your daily life."

"I have tried my best, sister. Do you still remember Lotus?" Gu Jing said.

lotus?

After his memory improved, Gu Ning thought about it for a moment and remembered it.

It was Lotus who came out to work after graduating from elementary school. She was a famous beautiful girl in the area.

Her family is well-off. She is the third child with two older brothers. She does most of the work at home and outside, while her two brothers just need to study hard.

Although Gujia Village is not rich, all the boys and girls in the village go out to find jobs after finishing junior high school.

The only difference was that their family sent the 13-year-old Lianhua to work in a small restaurant in the town at an early age.

There was no such thing as child labor in the 1990s. As long as you could work, the boss didn't care how old you were.

Lotus, who was as pretty as a lotus flower in clear water, had been working in a restaurant for less than three months when she was won over by a man in his twenties from Fengjia Village with just a few pieces of clothes and a few bowls of midnight snacks.

The two of them lived together naturally. Lianhua's parents knew about it but didn't care. They just asked the man for a betrothal gift of 5,000 yuan and acquiesced to the matter.

When Lianhua was fifteen years old, she gave birth to a boy and often brought the child back to Gujia Village.

I heard from people in the village that Lianhua had bruises on her body, obviously due to domestic violence.

The elders in the village asked Lianhua to leave her child to the man while she was still young and had not registered for marriage, and to go far away to work and never come back.

Since Lotus's parents didn't agree, she didn't leave.

If you don't leave now, you will never be able to leave.

Lotus, who had not even turned sixteen, was forever frozen at the age of a flower.

Her husband said that Lianhua died accidentally when she fell. When villagers went to pay their respects, they saw scars all over her body and said that she died from falling. But who would believe it?

The villagers wanted to call the police, but Lianhua's parents said no. If their son-in-law was arrested and put in jail, who would raise their grandson? They would not do that.

If the people do not report, the officials will not investigate.

As time went by, people began to talk about Lotus as a beauty with a tragic fate.

"Sister, are you listening to me? Why are you distracted?" Gu Jing waved her hand.

Gu Ning pushed away Gu Jing's mischievous hand and asked, "What's wrong with Lianhua?"

"Oh! Her parents didn't let her go to junior high school and asked her to work in a small restaurant in town."

"Hurry up and eat, little chatterbox, let's get down to business now. Gu Jing and Gu Lin, I have already found a Sanda gym, which is run by Uncle Jiang Ze's comrade-in-arms.

I have already paid one year's tuition. I have to go there every day during the winter and summer vacations, and go on weekends when school is still a thing. I am not allowed to skip classes without special reasons.

Starting tomorrow, you will go to swimming lessons in the morning, learn Sanda in the afternoon, and do homework at home in the evening."

"Got it, big sister!" Gu Jing and Gu Lin answered in unison.

Half of the summer vacation has passed and the next semester has started. Gu Ning is in the third grade of junior high school and the two younger ones are in the second grade.

Two days passed in a flash, and Gu Ning handed two bags of snacks to Gu Jing. "Give one bag to Uncle Qiang to take back for the children, and one bag to fill your stomachs when you are hungry. Learning to swim is the most physically demanding."

After watching them walk away, Gu Ning packed up, locked the door, and headed straight to the fruit factory.

It was working hours, and Gu Ning walked into the fruit factory carrying his bag.

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