Niu male

The reservoir has to be built as early as possible, and it is meaningless to build the reservoir when the stream is dry. Xiao Shulin first lent 30 yuan to the village. The one who can stretch his head has implemented the matter of repairing the reservoir.

The reason why Luomeng's village is called Dawan Village is because when this small stream flows through here, it forms a big bay. The stream carries the soil washed down from the mountain, and a piece of fertile land is piled up here. Such a place Obviously not suitable for building a dam.

In the end, they chose the location in the valley a little above the blacksmith shop. The mountain slopes in this place are steep, and a long and narrow valley is sandwiched between the hillsides on both sides, and a small stream flows through the valley.The dam is built here. As long as the height of the dam is high enough, when the reservoir is filled with water, the water will cover the stream near the entrance of their village, and also provide water for irrigation.

The valley below the blacksmith shop happens to have a wide upstream and a narrow downstream, which is very suitable for building a reservoir. As long as the dam is built strong enough, the danger of the entire dam being washed away by the flood can basically be eliminated.

Because they are in a mountainous area, during the rainy season, as long as it is not a dry year, there will be a lot of rainwater from the mountain to gather in this creek, that is to say, the pressure on their dam will be very high. Therefore, safety issues must be taken very seriously, otherwise, if something happens, no one can afford it.

Xiao Shulin also expressed his opinion that the dam should be built as strong as possible, and 30 yuan is not enough, and he can pay some more money. With his words, Luo Quanshun let it go and arrange it.

Regarding the materials for building the dam, several people in the village decided to use stones to build the dam and joints with cement after discussion. The stones used the stones in the valley and collected as much as possible from the upstream of the dam. There are many large and small stones near their creek. It is not difficult to scrape together the stones to build a dam, and the cement is not troublesome.

The trouble is still labor. Nowadays, life is better these days, and many manual jobs have been changed to mechanized production. Nowadays, young people rarely engage in manual labor. It is necessary to find so many strong and strong men at once. It's really not easy for them to carry stones here to build dams.

The village head, Luo Quanshun, asked people to go out to find some people who were willing to work in his village. As a result, when they heard that they were going to carry stones in the ditch, they all shook their heads like rattles. It went up again and again until it reached [-] a day, and then more than a dozen middle-aged men from nearby villages were willing to come over.

These more than ten people plus a few from their village, a total of more than 20 people, just started working like this.People in the village like Luo Quanshun and his age have paved stone roads and even built bluestone bridges when they were young. It is not difficult for them to build this reservoir. There is no other way, just to be strong. After repairing the dam, the stones on both sides of the valley will be sealed tight. As long as the reservoir can store water and it will be heavy when the rain is heavy, then it will be done.

Sometimes Luo Meng and Xiao Shulin would come over to help with some work after feeding the crabs. There were also some men and women in the village who often came to help, and no one mentioned the salary.

These villagers are very particular about their work. Stones of various shapes are piled up layer by layer, and their positions are adjusted bit by bit. They use different shapes of stones to pile up a flat stone slope. Every time the pile is higher, there are people. Pick the reconciled cement and pour a layer of cement on it. After a while, another layer of stones will be placed on top of it. The cement will fill the gap between the two layers of stones tightly.

"Uncle, Sanmenxia is not as particular as we are." Luo Meng carefully tidied up the stone seams with cement on the Yingshui slope, which was just taking shape.

"Have you ever been to Sanmenxia?" Luo Quanshun was so tired that he had just lifted a big rock with someone. He wiped off the sweat all over his face and sat down under a tree with a crooked neck beside the creek. He scooped a cup of tea from a tea mug next to him and drank it down.

"I haven't been there, but I guess they must not be built with stones." Romon laughed a few times, and continued to work. After returning home for more than a year, he thought he was already a real farmer, but the result It was only after repairing the reservoir this time that he realized that he was still very tender.

He couldn't lift those big stones wrapped in chains. Not only did he have to be strong, but he also had to have experience. Otherwise, walking in the valley would not only easily injure himself, but also hurt others. Luo Quanshun would not let them do this. Novices do this, after all, these young people have not really suffered.

"I have made an agreement with the people in Xiawazi Village. After our reservoir is repaired, we must first store water for a period of time and ask them to dry it for a few days. The water on the mountain has not yet dried up, and they will not Be sure to point to this creek to irrigate the land, and after a while, if it doesn’t rain again, if their village is dry by then, we can help a little bit here.”

Luo Quanshun sat on the ground, took out the dry tobacco pipe, filled it with shredded tobacco and lit it on the fire. While puffing, he talked to Luo Meng about the completion of the reservoir.

"Then if we have water, we don't have to worry about sharing it with them." Romon replied straightforwardly.Xiawazi Village is a long way from here. If they hadn't worked hard, they wouldn't be able to come here to fetch water.

"That's what I said too. The two villages in the lower part of the valley don't point to our stream to irrigate the land. The stream east of the town is big. Isn't that where the water plant in our town will be built? If they even do it over there, they won't be able to talk about our reservoir." After all, he is the village head, so Luo Quanshun has considered all these matters from beginning to end.

"Can the water plant do it?" Luo Meng was surprised when he heard Luo Quanshun's words.

"Hey, don't look at the thin stream of our stream. It is collected from the springs on the mountain. It comes out of the deep mountain. It can't be done easily. In the past, when our stream was sunburned into several puddles The stream to the east has already dried up." Speaking of the stream near his own village, Luo Quanshun was rather proud.

"If that's the case, then our town will have to cut off the water." This is a major issue related to people's livelihood.

"It's okay, there are still a few old wells, people can't die of thirst." Luo Quanshun waved his hands and said nonchalantly.

At this time, Xiao Shulin also came down from the road. He went up the mountain with Sun Linmu and Li Hailiang early in the morning.Last year they dug a pond in the blacksmith shop, and pulled a water pipe down from the mountain, barely solving the irrigation problem of the blacksmith shop, but the weather has been so dry recently that the water pipe stopped flowing.

"How is it? Is there any water?" Seeing him coming back, Romon asked quickly.

"The spring water is too thin to flow out of the cracks in the rocks." Xiao Shulin shook his head and said.If the spring is on flat ground, it’s okay to dig a well on the spot, and you can get some water no matter what, but it’s not easy to do it deep in the rock wall.

"It's okay, the big deal is to get a water pump and pump water up from here." Luo Meng comforted him and said that they have contracted the reservoir, so it's no problem to pump some water to irrigate the grapes.

"Well, this dam should be built higher?" Xiao Shulin looked at Luo Quanshun.

"..." When Luo Quanshun heard that the smithy was dry, his complexion became a little heavy, he smoked a couple of cigarettes sullenly, and said to the workers below: "Let's hurry up and cut off the water tonight. It seems that God doesn't plan to rain, let's store water earlier, and then build the dam higher."

"Just increasing the height is not enough, it must be widened." Every increase in the height of the dam means that the water surface of the entire reservoir will be wider, and the pressure on the dam will increase a lot.

"Come on, try to fix it as strong as possible. I will mobilize again in the village tonight, and try to get as many people here as possible." The weather is not so dry yet, and the people in the village dry the tea every day, and then sell some vegetables and shallots grown at home. , can also earn some income every day, so although the wages for repairing dams are not bad, few people are willing to come here to suffer from this burden.

"Why don't you raise your wages again?" Xiao Shulin said.

"How much?" Luo Quanshun sighed, looking very helpless. You know, in the past in their village, let alone one hundred and twenty a day, there were many people rushing to do it when there was thirty or fifty. Now, ah, Their generation is old, weak-minded, and young people have big hearts and wide connections. Few people take this little money seriously.

"Let's see if it goes up to [-]." Xiao Shulin thought for a while and said.

"One hundred and five, in our town, a plasterer can only make this amount in a day." Luo Quanshun looked distressed.

"It's really not possible. When the time comes to go to my mountain to mobilize, those people in the city are greedy for new things. Maybe someone will be willing to do it." Romon gave him a suggestion.

"Forget it, those people are careless, I don't worry about asking them to repair the dam." Luo Quanshun shook his head, still would rather raise wages than let those city people touch the dam, let alone whether they can repair the dam, just It's just that the construction safety is not guaranteed. If someone falls and touches it at that time, it will be very troublesome.

"Do you still need workers here?" At this moment, another person came down from the road above, and the big guys turned their heads to look, and they all had a fresh look on their faces.

I saw a man with a beard on his face, his forehead and cheekbones were tanned by the sun, and his hair was a bit long. He looked like a homeless man. His clothes and his backpack were good, a bit like a professional donkey friend look.

"You know how to do this?" Luo Quanshun didn't care who came here at this time, as long as he could do the work.

"Yes, I used to help people repair the roadbed, which is similar to this." The man looked at the dam that had just been partially repaired below, and replied.

"Then you do it a few times and let me see." Luo Quanshun said.

"Success." As soon as the man put his backpack on the hillside, he walked to one end of the embankment, observed it, and then took a bucket of cement from the side, pasted a lump of cement on the gap, and checked the stone again. The shape was built up, and then the position was adjusted slightly... After a few stones were piled up one after another, a neat slope was extended on the slope facing the water.

"That's right, you can stay here. The wages are temporarily one hundred and twenty a day. If the wages of us people increase in two days, you will follow suit. By the way, where do you live?" Luo Quanshun asked the newcomer. Very satisfied, although this man has a beard, he is obviously young, but his skill in laying stones is not something that ordinary young people can have.

"I live in a tent," the man replied.

"What about eating?" Luo Quanshun asked again. Those who came to work lived not far away. At noon, they would either go home to have some food, or their family members would bring food over. It's good for someone to lead his own home, who made him the village head?

"Hey, that's not easy, let him eat at my place." Romon immediately took care of it.

"Then tell him to go to Niuwangzhuang for dinner?" Luo Quanshun thought to himself, although Luo Meng is sometimes very smart, but most of the time, he is very straightforward and generous.

"It's about a pair of chopsticks." Romon waved his hands, and greeted the outsider warmly, saying: "When we have lunch later, you can go with me first to find out the way. There are many people there, so you don't have to be embarrassed. "

"Oh." The man just buried himself in his work.

"Hey." Seeing that he was so diligent, Romon felt even more delighted.

When it was almost time for lunch, Luo Meng and Luo Quanshun greeted each other, and then left with Xiao Shulin and the newcomer who arrived today.

"Hey, you're good at laying stones, aren't you?" Romon spoke to the outsider.

"I did it for a while before." The man had just done the heavy work of carrying rocks, and now he was carrying a travel bag as big as a turtle shell, but he didn't seem to be struggling at all.

"Can a stone house be built?" Romon didn't mince words with him.

"What kind?" asked the other party.

"Simple, but big enough. I want to turn the cowshed on the mountain into a stone wall."

"It can be done."

"Hey, that's great. After the dam is finished, we'll talk about wages. By the way, don't sleep in a tent. I have a workshop there. You can sleep there."

"it is good."

"Aside from laying stones, what else do you order?"

"..."

Listening to the back-and-forth conversation between Luo Meng and this outsider, Xiao Shulin silently walked aside. He is now a little numb to Luo Meng's behavior of abducting people to Niuwangzhuang every now and then.