A Salted Fish Job

Chapter Sixty-Five

The shimmering water stretched to meet the sky, while layers of clouds spread across the summer heavens like an unfurled blanket.

Hearing Uncle Zhang, the owner of the water chestnut field, complain about poor sales, Su Mingwei held up a water chestnut and asked, "Uncle, have you ever considered opening an online store?"

The question stumped Uncle Zhang. It was not that he had never considered it, but for many reasons, he had not followed through.

The production crew did not focus all their cameras on the guests. They gave the people of Shangyang Village quite a bit of screen time as well.

The director had initially only wanted to make an entertainment show. But these people gave him greater inspiration. He had never been so glad that, for the sake of complete footage, he had made his staff film so much material. It all came in handy during post-production.

Everyone saw Uncle Zhang's daily life. The middle-aged man rode a tiny motorcycle covered in dust down country paths, the deep furrow between his brows holding stories carved by time.

"The young people have all left, and it's hard for the countryside to develop." Dust swirled along the road, and some stretches of cement pavement had cracked. "But I don't know what else I could do if I stopped doing this."

The crew watched him get off his bike at his own doorstep, park it, then go tidy up the firewood stack. "But there might be better opportunities outside. Maybe you could earn more than you do now."

Uncle Zhang smiled honestly as he drove his chickens out of the vegetable garden. Much of the fence had been pushed apart by the chickens, so he would have to find time to reinforce it. "With my level of education,