Chapter 0001 Siblings

“Brother, I found a five-jin grain coupon!”

With a cry of delight, a thin figure emerged beside a mountain of garbage. A little girl, only about five or six years old, waved a grain coupon in her hand, her pitch-black little face beaming with joy.

In this era when the planned economy and grain coupons were still a part of daily life, a five-jin grain coupon could be exchanged for two steaming hot sesame seed flatbreads—enough for two children to have a full meal.

“Grace, once I’ve saved enough money, I’ll send you to school. Old Wang’s son said, as long as you can pay the tuition, that’s enough!” About seven or eight meters away from the little girl, a boy’s big head popped out from the garbage heap.

Although the boy’s head was large and his body small, his face sallow and malnourished, his eyes were exceptionally bright. He looked to be about eleven or twelve years old.

“Brother, I don’t want to go to school. They call us trash pickers—I don’t want to play with them.”

The little girl pouted, pulled her feet out of the garbage heap, and stumbled over to the boy. Like she was showing off, she put the grain coupon into the boy’s army-green satchel slung across his shoulder, patted it with her little hand, and then said, “What’s so good about school? I want to be with my brother. Didn’t you not go to school either?”

“Your brother actually wants to go to school!”

Though the boy wasn’t very old, he doted on his little sister. He reached out and patted her head, saying, “Silly girl, how can you not go to school? Are we going to pick up trash for our whole lives?”

“Isn’t picking up trash for a lifetime just fine?”

The little girl’s eyes were full of confusion. In her heart, as long as she could be with her brother, that was the happiest thing. The hardships of life and the daily scorn couldn’t erase the innocence of a child.

“All right, then we’ll be the kings of trash picking in the future.”

Seeing that his sister’s eyes were already misty, the boy quickly dropped the subject. He couldn’t very well talk to his sister about going to college and making something of oneself—even if he did, the little girl wouldn’t understand, since the boy himself hadn’t figured it out yet.

Although he didn’t mention school again, the boy was still calculating in his heart: as long as he could get another 18 yuan, he could send his sister to school.

The boy had found out last year that, since they didn’t have local household registration, if they wanted to attend the railway elementary school a kilometer from where they lived, the fees would be much higher than for locals. The total annual tuition was seventy-six yuan. He had already saved fifty-eight, just eighteen yuan short of being able to pay the full tuition and enroll his sister.

As for the thirty yuan for textbooks, that could be saved.

In those days, many families had several children. The eldest’s textbooks would be covered with new paper and passed down to the younger siblings, so most schools didn’t require students to buy new books.

The boy had already collected all the textbooks for grades one through six from the recycling station and covered them with calendar paper, making them look almost new.

“Grace, let’s go. I’ll get you some flatbread!”

As dusk gradually fell, the boy looked at their day’s haul and shook his head helplessly.

In the early 1990s, extravagance and waste had nothing to do with people’s lives. Every household was so frugal that they wouldn’t even throw away used toothpaste tubes.

So, trash picking—a trade that would later make countless millionaires—was still a sunrise industry. Most of its workers were just getting by, so it’s easy to imagine what the siblings’ harvest was like.

Picking up the small bundle of rusty wire that could still fetch a little money, the boy took his sister’s hand and walked out of the garbage heap.

The garbage heap was by the railway. The setting sun cast its afterglow on the siblings, stretching their shadows—one long, one short. Though they looked so thin and frail, the scene was filled with warmth.

……

“Uncle Harris, here’s a five-jin grain coupon. Give me two flatbreads!”

More than half an hour later, after selling the wire at the recycling station, the boy and his sister appeared at a flatbread stall a little over a hundred meters from the railway elementary school.

Although there were rumors that grain coupons would soon be obsolete, the grain shops were still using them. But because of these rumors, the value of grain coupons had dropped sharply—a five-jin coupon could at most be exchanged for two flatbreads.

The two children’s dirty little hands had long since been washed clean. Though their clothes were shabby and worn, after washing their hands and faces, they looked completely different from when they were picking through trash.

Especially the little girl—her sallow little face was very delicate, and you could vaguely tell she’d grow up to be a beauty. But the future beauty’s attention was all on the fragrant flatbreads in front of her.

“Little Frank, your Uncle Harris can still afford a few flatbreads. You keep the grain coupon!”

The flatbread vendor, a man in his thirties, saw the siblings and quickly took two steaming hot sesame-sprinkled flatbreads from the side of the oven, blew on them, and placed them in front of the girl.