There is a saying in our hometown, called "take off the billet and build a house, live to see the king of Hades", which describes the difficulty of building a house, which is so difficult that it is almost to the extent that the color of the house changes. Today's young people probably don't understand this kind of difficulty, but I've experienced it myself. Build a house once, and how strong a man will take off a layer of skin!
This "difficulty" is not only reflected in the money, but more importantly, in the era of the people's commune, there were many things that you could not buy with money. For example, it takes labor to build a house, and at that time, every member of the company had to work in the production team, and you couldn't hire anyone during the busy farming season; For example, animals and vehicles are needed to transport materials, so how can private people have these? Wheat straw and sorghum straw are needed to build a house, and these have long been distributed to each household. ......Almost anything that is particularly small requires a lot of effort.
I remember that it was in the early 70s of the last century, and some days, I heard my parents almost every day when it was still dark, and the two of them couldn't sleep, lying under the covers and muttering about building a house. I know that my parents were preparing to build a house a few years ago. For example, the wheat straw and sorghum straw distributed by the production team every year are not used, and they are used when accumulating and mud and foil; The pear leaves we brought are not burned, but kept for the roof of the house; The willow trees on the river slope behind the house have long been cut, peeled, and dried, waiting to be made into ...... beamsThe parents must have carefully discussed every detail of building the house.
Finally, one day, my father made a decision: cover! Things are finally settled. The first step in building a house is to invite guests first, and all the cadres invited are large and small. The purpose of asking the cadres of the brigade is to let them approve the homestead; The team leaders were asked to arrange vehicles and labor. In addition, before the start of construction, it is necessary to invite the master bricklayer and the small workers to send them away, and the quality of the house is not *** The second step is to prepare materials. There are a lot of big and small things needed to build a house, and my father rushed several sets in a row, sometimes using bicycles to pack, sometimes using small carts to push, and sometimes applying to the production team for a set of cars, and soon, the yard was full; The third step is to beat the blank. Originally, it was debilitated, but because the amount of labor was too large and too troublesome, it was changed to billeting. When beating the blank, it is a group of two people, one to supply soil to the mold, and the other to carry the pestle to beat the blank. It's a really technical job, and it takes two people to work closely together. When making the billet, a pit should be dug first, and the person who supplies the soil stands in the pit, and first lays two bottom plates on the edge of the pit, and puts the mold on one of them to fill it with soil; The other stood on top of the mold and smashed the soil in the mold with a pestle, and the smashing was strong. The person who loads the soil unloads the mold and slaps the template a few times in order to separate the mold from the soil. After the shooting, the mold is moved to another board to continue to supply the soil, and the other person picks up the beaten adobe and stacks it into "billet yards" (also known as "billet stacks"). At the end of the day, each group can hit up to nearly 1,000 adobes. After beating, it will be dried for ten days and a half months before it can be used to build a house. Fourth, after the adobe has dried, you can start to base (lay the foundation). At this time, it is the time when the most people are needed, in addition to the small bricklayer workers invited, almost all men and women of the main family go into battle, men and women do logistics and prepare meals.
I belong to the miscellaneous work, I go wherever someone calls, carry water, mud, find things, do everything, at the end of the day, I am so tired that I can't straighten my waist. In this way, my father still reprimanded me for being rubbing. The worst thing was that the next morning it was still dark and rumbling, and before the workers came, my father was telling me to get up. Because before the workers came, my father and I had to carry water to soak the mud puddle. There are several mud pits in a few rooms, and each mud pit requires more than a dozen loads of water, so you can imagine how tiring the work is.
About a week or so, the house tube was up, and it was time to go up the beams. The upper beam is the most important part of the whole process of building a house, because according to the folk saying, this link is related to the future of the whole family's life is not smooth, there must be a grand ceremony. The time of loading the beam must be selected at about 12 o'clock in the afternoon. The wooden beam should be painted with yin and yang fish, and there is also a couplet: the upper beam coincides with the zodiac day, and the column is auspicious. In addition, it is necessary to kowtow and set off firecrackers; At noon, I have to take care of food and wine. After the beams are put on and the roof is laid, the main project is basically completed. At this time, the brigade retreated after eating and drinking, leaving only a few masons to do the fine work. Mud walls, press doors and windows, pad the heart of the house, pankang, build stoves, etc., it is ten days to be busy. After all this, the house was finally built, and I waited for the air to dry and live in a new house.
Of course, at this time, you look at the whole family, all of them are dark and thin, bent over and hunched over, and they have really shed a layer of skin. This experience is really more terrifying than meeting Hades once.