They Say I Can Curse People (15)

Chapter 46

The village was finally trying to figure out a way to handle the Hukou registration.

They had no choice. The police were grinding them down, repeating the same thing eight hundred times a day until everyone was on the verge of a breakdown.

There are no secrets in a village. While one group of people fretted over the registrations, another group of busybodies began tossing out suggestions.

In any gathering of people, there are bound to be those with a knack for crooked ideas.

“There’s definitely a way to get all the over-quota girls registered without paying the fines. But I’m telling you, you’re only thinking of this now because you’re being pushed. Most of our tricks have to be done shortly after the birth.”

“Tell us anyway. Even if we can’t use it this time, we can use it next time.”

“You just register the first child normally. When the second one comes along and doesn’t meet the policy, you have to be smart. See if anyone else in the village is having a second child that fits the policy. If there’s no one in your own village, ask around in others. As long as the ages are close, no more than three months apart, you take some eggs, some rice, and a big old hen to talk to them. Ask if they can register the two similar-aged kids together as twins. The Hukou will be under the other family’s name, but that doesn’t hurt anything. They don’t have to raise the child; you still raise the kid in your own home. Who would say no to that?”

In a village, as long as there is no deep-seated blood feud, people will agree to such things. After all, they might need to ask for a similar favor later.

This method actually worked in the countryside. These small societies relied on human connections rather than the law. There was no fear that having a child on someone else’s Hukou would lead to them claiming the other family’s property later.

“Oh my, how did you think of that?” The listeners slapped their foreheads. It was such a good idea; why hadn’t they thought of it?

“It’s actually a funny story. Back then, the mothers-in-law of two families were washing clothes by the riverbank, both complaining. One was worried the kid couldn’t get registered, the other was worried they couldn’t put food on the table. Chang Fang from the Li family was also there washing clothes. She kept quiet at first, but after everyone finished talking, she suddenly said, ‘Isn’t it simple? For the one without a slot, send them some rice and a hen, then register the two kids as twins to use one slot. It’s not like you care where the paper says the kid lives.'” That girl was actually pitiable; she was the firstborn and could have been registered easily, but her family refused to do it just so they wouldn’t have to pay a fee when they eventually had a son.

“We can’t use that now, can we?”

“That’s why I said you weren’t paying attention. You should be asking around while the child is still in the womb and get it done as soon as they’re born. Then it’s perfect. Now that the kids are this big, even if a family with a similar-aged child is willing, the village brigade isn’t stupid. How would you register them?”

“How were we supposed to know they’d push this hard later? Ask around more, are there any other ways?”

Believe it or not, there were.

Privately, other methods began to circulate.

“Is there a bachelor with no kids of his own? Kill a chicken or a duck for him, bring some liquor, have the kid call him ‘Godfather,’ and put the Hukou directly under his name.”

“That won’t work. The bachelor in our village is a real piece of work. If a kid takes him as a Godfather, they’ll end up learning all his bad habits.”

“Our village had another way. It was the third child of the old Li family. When she was born, she didn’t meet the requirements, so the family claimed the baby died at birth. The brigade couldn’t say much to that. The couple went to the city, and a few years later, everyone saw them bring a young girl back from the city. Only then did everyone realize they’d lied. If you tell a lie like that, no one suspects a thing.” The sequel to that story was that they had gone to the city specifically to avoid the registration, but after living there for a few years and seeing the world, they insisted on getting her registered once they returned.

However, no one had the time to take their children to the city to hide. With so many fields and livestock, they couldn’t leave for even a single day.

Still, the idea of “hiding” was viable. Going to other villages was useless, though, since the police were cycling through all the nearby settlements.

“I think we should let the older kids take the younger ones into the mountains to hide for a while. Stay out of the village until this blow passes. I don’t believe they’ll chase this for a lifetime. It’ll probably blow over in two or three months.” Once the police stopped coming, the children could return.

The unregistered “black households” in the village weren’t just toddlers; there were also ten-year-olds. They were still asleep, dreaming of Bayan Ginger¹ that could be sold for money, when their parents woke them up.

“You and your third sister can’t stay at home for a while.”

Huh? Was this a nightmare? Were their parents finally abandoning them?

“The two of you follow Sister Yu from your fourth aunt’s house and your second cousin, along with some other kids from the village. You’re all going to live in the mountains for a while.”

Wait… what?

These ten-year-olds had been working like spinning tops lately. They had to help with chores at home, and on top of that, they had to carve out time to dig for medicinal herbs.

In the beginning, the mugwort and wormwood they cut had actually sold for money. Once they had cash in hand, their days felt full of purpose. Every day they thought about digging herbs and making money. In their dreams, it was all mugwort, Bayan Ginger, and Tiger Ginger²…

But their time wasn’t entirely their own. Between cutting pig grass and gathering firewood, they barely had time to earn money for themselves.

Now, their parents were saying: “Go hide in the mountains for a while. Pack your bedding and stay in the caves. Don’t be afraid; the adults will come up every morning and evening to bring you food.”

“Just hide from the police for a bit, you understand?”

Did they understand?

It meant no cutting pig grass, no gathering firewood, and they didn’t even have to cook. The entire day would be their own. They could spend all day in the mountains digging herbs to make money… all day!

Nearby, an older sibling who actually had a Hukou immediately spoke up: “That won’t do! I’m going too! I have to look after my sisters!”

Spending the whole day without doing any chores at home, just digging for medicinal herbs in the mountains! She wanted to go too!

“You can’t go. Someone needs to help with the work around the house, and you have to bring food to your younger sisters,” her mother said.

It was infuriating.

And so, before the sun had even risen, this group of half-grown children packed their bedding, brought their water bowls and daily necessities, and headed into the mountains.

The mountains here were home to Tiger Ginger, and the cliffs at the peaks were covered in Bayan Ginger. Everyone had wanted to harvest them before, but they never had enough time. Now, they had time in abundance.

Consequently, when Yun Song and the others arrived, they were told that the children had disappeared.

Yun Song’s first reaction was that the children had been sent to relatives’ houses again, but it was very strange for all the undocumented children in the village to vanish at the exact same time.

The three of them began to panic, truly worried that the villagers might have done something to the children. Fortunately, the kids weren’t exactly the most obedient types.

For this group of children in the mountains, earning money was the most important thing. Today, besides the police coming up, their boss Chang Fang was also coming to collect herbs.

The Tiger Ginger they dug in the mountains could be sold directly to Chang Fang.

Once Chang Fang knew, Yun Song naturally found out. She followed along into the mountains and happened to encounter the group of children just as they finished digging Tiger Ginger and were preparing to head to the cliffs for the Bayan Ginger.

The cliffs here weren’t the kind of bare stone precipices, but were covered in a layer of lush green plants. This plant was the traditional Chinese³ medicine known as climbing rock ginger, which the local people called Bayan Ginger.

The children took it for granted that they could just dangle from ropes to pick it.

By the time Yun Song arrived, they were already enthusiastically hacking at vines to make ropes.

Yun Song looked at the cliff, then at the children, and felt like her heart was about to jump out of her chest.

“Vines…” Tong Jin didn’t even know what to say.

As the boss, Chang Fang was also terrified. There was always more money to be made, so she hurried to say, “I came up this time specifically to tell you that the town isn’t accepting Bayan Ginger anymore. It’s a good thing I got here in time, otherwise you would have done all that work for nothing.”

Yun Song also regained her composure and gave Chang Fang an appreciative look. She said to the children who were so eager to earn money, “Don’t feel too bad. We’ll find other ways for you to earn money later.”

Her focus lately had been on the children’s parents, and she had truly neglected the children’s own situation.

Regardless, she couldn’t let them stay in the mountains.

So, the group escorted the children back.

Upon their return, the villagers were even more resentful, and the three of them were once again subjected to a mountain of emotional garbage.

In the afternoon, the three of them had to walk back to town. Even the most grueling training sessions they had ever endured didn’t feel as bitter as this.

As soon as Tong Jin got home, she collapsed onto her bed, staring blankly at the ceiling, feeling an unprecedented sense of doubt about her career choice.

Across the room, Tang Chao started tidying up the moment she entered the dormitory. She changed her shoes, poured water, washed her face, and finally changed into her loungewear. Only then did she collapse onto her bed.

Yun Song didn’t go back to the dormitory. She was in the office next door, starting to organize the data and information they had gathered during this period.

“We can’t arrest anyone, we can’t argue with them… we really are the most frustrated police officers in the world,” Tong Jin couldn’t help but sigh.

“No, Sister Yun has it worse. Someone told her today that she’s working so hard because she’s definitely going to pocket tens of thousands of yuan from this assignment.”

Sister Yun must be dying of frustration right now.

Sister Yun wasn’t frustrated; she was simply reviewing the situation in these villages.

Through conversations and observations, she realized that the villagers’ craving for male children actually stemmed from the theory that having daughters was a losing proposition under the current social system, mixed with some inexplicable psychological trauma.

In reality, many people simply hadn’t realized that the times had changed.

She also noticed that the villagers were all somewhat superstitious. Every time she told them that children needed a Hukou to go to school and have a chance at a better life elsewhere, most villagers would snap back with the same line.

“People like us don’t have that kind of fate.”

She remembered Chang Fang’s obsession with destiny.

Yun Song began to flip through books about fate and fortune.

The people here seemed to believe most in “Yuan Tiangang’s Bone Weight Fortune Telling.” Perhaps because he was from Chengdu, his influence on Tonglin Town was very deep.

This bone weight system was too complicated and not easy to spread.

She remembered a rhyme about fingerprints related to fate from her own childhood.

“One whorl⁴ poor, two whorls rich, three or four whorls open a pawnshop, five or six whorls save money, seven or eight whorls become a top scholar, nine or ten whorls enjoy a life of leisure.”

This… wouldn’t work. What if a child only had one whorl? In this fingerprint song, the one whorl was the unluckiest. Why was superstition even engaging in isolation and bullying?

It had to be changed.

Yun Song found Tang Chao and Tong Jin and told them her new plan.

“So, we’re going to spend some time making up some things related to fate and spreading them around.”

Finally, a new direction. Tong Jin sat up instantly. What she feared most now was going to the village and listening to the villagers repeat over and over how they still needed to have a son. It gave her a headache—not an exaggeration, her head actually throbbed.

“This fingerprint fate thing was popular when I was a kid,” Yun Song said, reciting the rhyme.

Tang Chao remarked, “Did the person who wrote this have a grudge against someone with one whorl? This is specifically targeting people with only one.”

“So we need to change a word.”

“How about ‘One whorl diligent’? Meaning hardworking? Would that work?” Tang Chao suggested. They needed a word that fit the rhythm.

“One whorl diligent, two whorls rich. If you put those together, I feel like the two whorl person is the boss of the one whorl person. Because the one whorl person is diligent, the two whorl person gets rich. If I were a one whorl person, I’d feel like my life was very bitter,” Tong Jin recited it once, then looked down at her own fingerprints.

“Whorls are the circles, right?”

“Right.”

“…I actually have exactly one whorl! Quick, quick, change it to a good fate for me!”

“How about ‘Blessing’? Meaning having good fortune. One whorl blessing, two whorls rich. The tones are different, but it flows well,” Tang Chao said.

“That works! Having a blessing is a good omen. Even if someone has one whorl, they won’t feel like they have a bad life.”

“Then we’ll settle on that character,” Yun Song said, making the final decision. “There are bound to be people without any whorls. When the time comes, we’ll just say they are rare talents whose destiny depends entirely on their own efforts.”

The three of them began researching facial moles, identifying which ones represented great wealth and which ones indicated a future university student. As long as the meaning was positive, they wrote it down.

All three were full of energy. After all, the more they fabricated now, the more children would later be instilled with the belief that they were born for a good life.

Relying on destiny alone certainly wouldn’t be enough.

The generation of villagers currently in charge had grown up in the sixties and seventies, a period of national hardship. The channels for upward mobility for people in the village were far too narrow; even going to a city factory for work required a letter of introduction⁵.

Many people felt that their lives were destined to be this way forever, and they accepted that the next generation would also spend their lives in the village.

The destiny-related things Yun Song was making up would certainly have a greater impact on the children, but the adults likely needed a stronger dose of medicine.

If they only heard that their luck was good without seeing tangible benefits, it would be difficult to shake those deep-seated, old-fashioned ideas.

How could she make these people see real benefits?

They needed to see others profiting directly. People feel a much stronger impact when they see someone they know succeed, because it gives them the impression that if that family can do it, mine can too.

At dinner, the three of them went to the faculty canteen to get food. While eating with the middle school teachers, they brought up the subject.

“Are there any female students from poor families who ended up making it onto the Honor Roll?” Yun Song asked. Most of the children who were “extra births⁶” and lacked a Hukou were girls.

Tonglin Town Middle School had started as a private school before becoming the town’s middle school. Children from the neighboring Baihe Town and Yulan Town all came here for middle school. There were too many students and not enough teachers, which meant that even a group of children who entered with good grades found it hard to compete with city high schools. Yet, no matter the environment, strong individuals would always emerge.

The Honor Roll posted on the school’s outer wall featured the students who had been admitted to top-tier universities over the years.

The same applied to the girls in this impoverished area. No matter how difficult the circumstances, there was bound to be a girl who could break through.

“You want to hear about that? Let me tell you about one who definitely fits the bill. That girl at the very top of the list came here from Yulan Town. Back then, she wasn’t going to come for middle school. It was the principal and I who went to her house to pick her up. That kid!” The teacher’s face lit up with excitement as he spoke.

As a teacher, nothing brought more joy than finding and teaching a genius. Encountering a student like that was something one could brag about for a lifetime.

An even greater joy was the fact that this genius had been personally discovered by him.

“At the time, I urged the principal to go because the child didn’t come from the central primary school in Yulan Town. She came from a village school in Yulan Town, a place that’s incredibly poor. Village schools usually only have one teacher for every subject, just enough to teach the kids basic literacy. Her handwriting was ugly, but she was the top student in Yulan Town. Even including Tonglin Town, she was third. The top two were both from the primary school affiliated with Tonglin Town Middle School. But don’t look down on that third place. All of that child’s lost points were in Chinese. On one hand, her handwriting was truly too ugly, and on the other, there are things in Chinese that you either know or you don’t, and intelligence can’t make up for a lack of exposure. But her math score was perfect. The moment I saw it, I knew this child was a genius. When she didn’t show up for registration after the term started, I immediately pushed the principal to go and invite her.”

Perhaps because the child was from Yulan Town, the people in Tonglin Town didn’t know much about her family background. While almost every generation of students knew of this legend, the story hadn’t spread widely throughout the town.

Listening to the girl’s story, Yun Song formed a general plan in her mind.

Superstition and self-interest. Two doses of medicine, administered together.

Translator’s Notes