Chapter Thirty-Three: The Ticket Purchase

The setting sun stretched the shadows along Tongcheng Road to great lengths. Xu Chengjun clutched his carefully folded recommendation draft as he walked toward the mouth of the alley.

“Wait!”

Liu Zuci suddenly rushed out from the courtyard, waving a brown paper package in his hand.

“Your teacher Su slipped this in for you—said it’s for ‘padding your stomach’ on the road.”

Xu Chengjun took the package and felt it—hard and solid. It turned out to be a thread-bound edition of “Selected Short Stories of Chekhov.”

“When you get to Shanghai, remember to bring Editor-in-Chief Li a packet of tea,” Su Zhong called from the doorway, leaning against the frame, the glow from his pipe lighting up the lines of his smile. “Don’t be like old Zhou Ming—his writing always makes people laugh. Your short stories show real promise!”

Xu Chengjun turned and waved with a smile.

“Thank you, Teacher Su, Teacher Liu!”

“I’ll come mooch a meal off you when I’m back!”

The pomegranate tree at the alley’s entrance dropped its last petal, sticking to the hem of his trousers.

“Ah, right!” Liu Zuci remembered something else.

“If ‘Harvest’ rejects your manuscript, send it to ‘Contemporary.’ I know their editorial board, though I bet you won’t need it!”

The wind carried the sound of cicadas past his ears, and the pages of his draft grew warm from his body heat.

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Hefei Train Station, ticket hall.

The gray lime walls were riddled with spiderweb cracks from top to bottom. Years of black grime had built up at the base of the walls, beside a red-painted slogan, “Grasp the Revolution, Promote Production.” Three ticket windows were set in battered wooden frames, each blocked by waist-high iron railings, with rusty wire twisted around the bars.

The line in front of the windows could last from dawn to dusk.

Those at the head leaned their elbows on the railings, tapping their knuckles on the worn wood, gripping a sweat-soaked work introduction letter.

Those further back clutched blue cloth bags, inside stuffed with wrinkled ration coupons, national food coupons, and coins wrapped three times in handkerchiefs.

Now and then, someone in the line would take out an enamel mug for a sip of water; the gold lettering, “Labor Is Most Glorious,” had faded to a ghostly shadow.

Xu Chengjun wiped his sweat, standing in the middle of the queue, his face showing a resigned smile.

He’d already been waiting for over half an hour, and the long line ahead seemed endless.

Scenes like this were only seen in train stations in the early 2000s in his previous life.

Really, it wasn’t even as bad as now.

How miserable!

People weren’t exactly disciplined about queuing in this era; disputes broke out from time to time.

“You’re cutting in line!”

“I was here yesterday, right at this spot!”

A policeman in a navy uniform, gun slung over his shoulder, walked by; the brass buckle on the holster jingled, and the crowd instantly shrank down, quiet except for the shuffling of feet.

The ticket seller inside was buried behind a mountain of hard cardboard tickets, the blue cloth sleeves of her uniform fraying at the edges.

She held a red-blue pencil in her left hand and flicked abacus beads with her right, each calculation followed by a quick withdrawal of a pale yellow ticket from the stack. The pencil tip darted across it, marking route and date, then dipped in red ink for a stamp.

The horse-clock on the windowsill ticked loudly; its glass cover was cracked, and the hands stuck at 10:15. An older woman nearby said the clock had been broken for half a year—no one had the time to fix it.

Suddenly, a steam locomotive rumbled through the station, shaking dust loose from the ticket hall ceiling; everyone in line looked up.

A young man in work clothes took the opportunity to move half a step forward, only to be yanked back by an older woman: “Behave yourself, young man!”

The broadcast speaker in the corner crackled to life, the announcement buzzing with static: “Train 143 from Hefei to Nanjing is now boarding…”

Someone in the crowd straightened up and counted their introduction letter again.

Air conditioning really is a wonderful invention ~

By now, Xu Chengjun’s shirt was soaked through with sweat, but thankfully, he finally reached the front of the line.

He smiled and handed the Education Department’s introduction letter through the iron-barred window.

“Comrade, one ticket to Shanghai please.”

The ticket seller was a woman wearing a blue cloth cap. She didn’t even lift her eyelids, her pencil tapping briskly on the register: “Which day? Hard seat, eight yuan forty. Berth adds six yuan, but you need proof from a county-level unit for a berth.”

“Hard seat, tomorrow.”

Xu Chengjun fished out his wallet, its contents—money and food coupons—carefully stacked.

Buying a ticket in these days was like passing a barrier; without an introduction letter, you had no chance. Want a berth? Unless you were on official business, forget about it.

Especially since the soft sleeper car was a key security zone—ordinary passengers couldn’t even see it.

The ticket seller took his letter, held it up to the light for a long look, then pulled out a thick book to check, before slowly clipping out a hard cardboard ticket.

“Hefei—Shanghai” was printed faintly on the ticket; the date was handwritten in fountain pen: “July 16,” the ink still fresh.

“Thank you.”

In 1979, direct trains from Hefei to Shanghai were rare; most routes required a transfer at Bengbu, passing through the Huainan line to Bengbu, then switching to the Beijing-Shanghai line.

Getting a direct ticket was a stroke of luck.

He was quite pleased with himself for it.

On his way out, he saw an old man selling tea eggs weaving through the crowd with a bamboo basket.

The clatter of porcelain bowls, the cries of children, the snap of abacus beads, all mingled with the distant whistle of trains.

Noisy.

But saturated with the everyday life of the seventies.

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Leaving the station, Xu Chengjun headed straight for the grain office across the street.

Traveling in this era was extremely inconvenient: train tickets were expensive and required introduction letters.

Most importantly, local food coupons were worthless once you left the province.

They were nothing but waste paper.

According to regulations, travelers had to present a unit introduction letter at the grain office to exchange them, at a rate of “one pound of local coupons for 0.9 pounds of national coupons.”

A blackboard hung at the window, chalked with “Local food coupons exchanged for national coupons, three cents difference per pound.”

“Comrade, I’d like to exchange ten pounds of national coupons.”

He handed over Anhui’s local food coupons—useless outside the province.

“Add thirty cents.”

The ticket seller was a plump auntie. “National coupons are precious these days; lots of people want them.”

Xu Chengjun felt a pang as he handed over the money.

Money is bravery!

Thirty cents was enough for six corn cakes—two meals on the train!

The state-run restaurants in Shanghai only accepted national food coupons. He thought about the fifty yuan he’d just gotten!

Fine, pay up.

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At the tea counter of the supply and marketing cooperative, the clerk was using tweezers to pack tea leaves into a paper bag.

In 1979, tea prices were set by the national price bureau, strictly enforced with “clearly marked prices” at the cooperative, with significant differences between grades.

The little blackboard read:

Second-grade tea, the lowest, about 0.6–0.8 yuan per pound; third-grade tea, 0.4–0.5 yuan per pound.

Mid-range first-grade green tea and jasmine tea cost 1.0–1.5 yuan per pound, limited to one pound per person.

The best special-grade Longjing and Qishan black tea, priced at 2.0–3.0 yuan per pound.

Of course, these were hot commodities at the time!

Luckily he was in the provincial capital—at county-level cooperatives, even second- or third-grade tea might be scarce.

Buying tea required not just cash, but also industrial coupons.

As an educated youth, he earned work points. For this trip, just in case, he’d converted his work points into “work point coupons,” then exchanged those at the commune’s cooperative for industrial coupons!

Since he was asking a favor, he had to bring good tea. He smiled at the clerk: “One pound of Qishan black tea, please, and wrap it up for me.”

He sounded especially confident as he spoke.

After all, buying a pound of Qishan black tea in these days was much more impressive than driving a Xiaomi SU7 in the future.

Money is bravery!

“Three yuan, plus two industrial coupons.”

The young clerk smiled—few people bought tea these days.

Xu Chengjun smiled too.

A bitter smile, indeed.