Daily Life in the Countryside After Being Reborn Chapter 505 - 37: The Senior Brother Who Hit a Wall

"Leaving already?" The old cotton farr Ahmat clutched his hookah, with two swollen blisters hanging from his tired eyes, looking like two dried dates.

"Young man, you can’t just leave so soon. It seems you’ll be staying in town for a while; I don’t know if you’ll go looking for that family of Zhou Qizheng," the town mayor relayed Zhou Ziang’s earlier question.

"Let him look if he wants, I’ve said it ti and again, this land of Southern Xinjiang is left to us by our ancestors; we can’t allow these Han people to call the shots. If he really makes the few plots of cotton trees next to Zhou Qizheng’s house yield peach [cotton bolls], I, Ahmat, will hand over the technique of growing long-staple cotton," Ahmat took a puff of his hookah, a thin plu of white smoke entered his mouth, swirled around his throat, then sprayed out from his tall, hooked nose.

The town mayor said nothing, just continued to fiddle with his cigarette case.

Zhou Ziang checked into an inn called "Man Se."

Inns in the northwest, compared to those by the coast and inland, are much worse off.

A small single room of about seven to eight square ters, with a bed, a cabinet, and a TV, with hot water available in the morning and at noon, was considered among the best accommodations locally.

Zhou Ziang didn’t plan to visit the local poor farr nad Zhou Qizheng right away. Judging from the mayor’s tone earlier, Ulucosa Town seed not so simple, especially the old technician Ahmat. Zhou Ziang planned to wander around the area first.

After settling his luggage, Zhou Ziang took a walk around Ulucosa Town. Daylight arrives later in Xinjiang than in other parts of the country, so people start their busy day later too; correspondingly, night falls later as well.

Ulucosa Town is not a tourist spot like Urumqi or Kashgar, rely a typical cotton-producing town in Southern Xinjiang, surrounded by unremarkable scenery.

Zhou Ziang initially thought the sa, but his opinion changed after wandering through the local streets.

Unlike other towns in Southern Xinjiang, there were hardly any Han figures in Ulucosa Town; it was predominantly Uighurs and the Kazakh people, with a main diet of Halal food. However, it wasn’t hard to find at, as the landlady of Man Se Inn was Han, who cooked delicious braised dishes, especially tasty chicken and duck.

Apart from the scarcity of Han people, Zhou Ziang noticed another characteristic: the local cotton farrs were quite wealthy, with almost every family owning two vehicles, a sedan plus a truck for transporting cotton.

The cotton farrs in town never worried about selling their cotton. During the cotton-picking season each year, there were dedicated buyers who would co to purchase, and the picked cotton was all sent to Ahmat’s agricultural processing company for unified transportation.

The real decision-maker in town was not the mayor, but the sixty-year-old Ahmat and his cotton plantation.

The information he gathered was not much different from what Zhou Ziang had in mind. He walked many roads in Ulucosa Town and finally stopped at a street that could not be considered prosperous.

Xinjiang is sparsely populated with wide roads and widely spaced houses, making it look particularly desolate and lonely. Zhou Ziang, accustod to the crowded scenes of Beijing, took a while to adapt.

He thought of the poor family the mayor told him about that morning, considering asking for directions to visit the poor farr’s ho.

His stomach inconveniently grumbled. Zhou Ziang shook his head helplessly; back in Yunteng Sect, his cultivation had accustod him not to require food.

But since arriving here, skipping als could easily cause misunderstandings, especially since his mother would want him to eat three more bowls at every al. Now that he suddenly stopped eating, he truly felt unaccustod.

"Tasty Baklava, fresh from the pan," a voice, youthful with a hint of timidity, called out. A Uighur girl, barely over ten years old, dressed in traditional garnts, pushed a three-wheeled cart that was disproportionately tall for her, wobbling down the street.

Zhou Ziang was feeling hungry and followed the sound of the girl’s voice to look at her cart.

That was a shabbily modified three-wheeler, with several rubber patches stuck on the tires, and the paint peeling off from the basket.

However, none of these could diminish the allure of the steaming, fragrant pastry displayed on Ata Ning’s cart.

The little girl was selling a traditional Uighur baked good called Baklava, which Zhou Ziang had seen a few tis in Urumqi, but due to a hectic schedule, he hadn’t had the chance to try it yet.

This kind of Baklava was later seen frequently around the country, especially near train stations, but those were not authentic.

The Baklava on the cart was caral-colored, topped with chopped walnuts and raisins, looking like a sponge cake yet softer than one. It tasted richly of sheep butter and milk.

Hearing soone call out to stop the cart to buy Baklava, the girl quickly brought her vehicle to a halt.

"Give a piece," Zhou Ziang glanced at the untouched Baklava on the girl’s cart, indicating that business hadn’t been good.

The little girl looked confused for a mont, uncertain if she had understood Zhou Ziang’s words.

"Don’t understand Mandarin?" The further you go inland in Xinjiang, the more common it is to find children who don’t speak Mandarin, and this was quite common in the early 2000s.

"I can speak Mandarin," the little girl hastily replied, not wanting to miss out on the rare custor.

Listening to her accent, Zhou Ziang thought it sounded like it was from around Shanghai. Looking at her face, she was not a typical Han person; her nose and eyes resembled those of Han people, but her skin tone and the ssy braids on her head were characteristic of a Uighur girl.

"How much do you want?" The girl licked her lips, which were cracked with deep lines from the strong sun and dehydration.

"Just cut and give as much as you show," Zhou Ziang said nonchalantly, gesturing towards the top layer of Baklava.

A flash of surprise appeared in the girl’s eyes. She pulled a slicer from the basket, lifted the clear plastic covering over the Baklava to protect it from dust, and was about to cut down when the custor behind her spoke up.

"Wait a mont." Zhou Ziang rembered sothing and took out an item from his bag behind.

Upon hearing the command, the slicer in the girl’s hand trembled, and the sharp blade brushed against the Baklava and fell to the ground.

**

It’s Monday, the start of a new week—ti for an auspicious beginning. All sorts of tickets, Fu Zi loves them dearly, rember to vote when reading!

**(To be continued. If you like this work, you are welco to cast recomndation tickets and monthly tickets at Qidian (qidian). Your support is my greatest motivation.)