★ The old business
Wood work · Pour the toilet
▓ Chen Hesheng / Mu Zuo and Wen Zhang Wen / Recommended
If I have time, I like to walk around the old streets and alleys of Nanjing, and see the old streets, alleys, and houses that I don't know how many days will survive, as well as the mottled walls and sparse tiles that record the past of Nanjing......
Occasionally, looking through the ajar, old-fashioned pivot door, the already small aisle, separated by a small room or a gas stove, looks even more cluttered and crowded.
If I see old people sitting at the door, I will occasionally come up to talk to them: the house is old and crowded, not to mention, when I am old, I take a bath, and I will be annoyed to death when I go to the "thatched house" (Nanjing dialect, meaning: toilet). They also hope that the government can carry out renovation as soon as possible while maintaining the original style, so that they can live in a new home and enjoy a new house with a bathroom in their lifetime.
Their words reminded me of the toilet, which was called "Huzi" before the Tang Dynasty, but because it was opposed to the nickname of an emperor, it was changed to a toilet, which is still used today. In the past, how could people have a special bathroom in their homes? Among the dowries that accompany her daughter's marriage, a red-painted toilet is indispensable, and the family will mainly rely on it to go to the toilet in the future.
At that time, the population of Nanjing was not as large as it is now, and there were many public toilets scattered in the streets and alleys, and the walls were ventilated on all sides, and some were equipped with men's urinals surrounded by "concave" shapes on three sides of the street, and it could be seen from afar that they were public toilets. Not far from my house, there is a public toilet in Ju'anli in the east, Huiwenli in the south, Tongren Street in the west, and Singing Jinglou West Street in the north. A high wall was built between the men's and women's toilets, with a square hole, and a small electric light shared on both sides was hung up, which was only turned on when it was dark. Relying on this very simple public toilet, it has been solving problems for residents in all directions for many years.
During the day, it is convenient for most men and children to go to the public toilet, but at night, or when the weather is cold, wind and rain, it is convenient for the family to use the toilet at home.
The filth in the toilet bowl has to be emptied every day. At that time, in order to consider the convenience of the toilet emptyer, an open pool would always be built next to the men's toilet, which was connected to the septic tank below for people to empty feces. People with average economic conditions carry a toilet to the public toilet to save money; Those who live a better life hire someone to empty the toilet.
In any case, helping someone empty the toilet is not a decent job. It's not life that forces it, who will do it. Here I have to mention the fish market street with a story. No. 52 on the street, starting from Yushi Street in the west and reaching Juanli in the east, a house number is divided into two forks, one or twenty houses in the north fork are low, perhaps "subordinate" live, and there are several two-story wooden buildings in the south, and the courtyards are staggered with them. It is said that this was once the residence of Zhu Yushi in the Qing Dynasty, although there is no specific research, based on the size of the mansion alone, I also believe that the residents have passed it by word of mouth.
As the old saying goes, you can't be rich for three generations. The previous accompanying article talked about the descendants of Zhu Yushi, who made a living by sending tap water to people. Then we have to talk about the past when his descendants poured toilets for people.
Among the other descendants of the Zhu family I know, the pillar of the family is a blind man, and his health is not good, and it is difficult to support the family by telling fortunes for others, but he died early, leaving a widow. The burden of the family of four sons and two daughters is bound to be borne by the wife (hereinafter referred to as Zhu's mother).
As is said in the community, after his family was supposed to be a scholar, several of the children wore glasses like glass bottles, but they did not have the opportunity to receive a good education. Zhu's mother is very thrifty, she always wears a big placket, although there are patches, she is clean and tidy, but unfortunately she has no skills. In order to support the family of seven, they started the work of pouring "horses" (Nanjing dialect: meaning: pouring toilets) for people.
Zhu's mother, who helped people empty the toilet, had to go to the door of many houses to collect the toilets, so she hung a string of iron hooks at each end of the flat shoulder, and hung a toilet at one house.
There is a well in No. 52, where Zhu's mother lives. Before going out, pick two buckets of water and put them in front of Nos. 31 and 33 Fish Market Street. Because there is not only a large cement floor there, but also a gutter on the side of the road, the key is that these two families are very good-hearted, so they follow Zhu's mother to do this work in front of their door.
On Jinxianghe Road, northeast of Yushi Street, is the Xuanwu District Sanitation Office, which is responsible for road cleaning, garbage and fecal collection, and transportation. The manure collection truck is in shift every day, and the day is just dawn to collect the manure.
Zhu's mother put away the more than ten toilets she had collected, and she and the housewives stood on the side of the street waiting to empty the toilets, for fear of leaking.
Although the fish market street was quite lively in those years, but the road surface was not wide, and the paving was still a kind of "bread stone" of about 12 centimeters square and 15 centimeters thick, and some people called it "bullet stone", and the people who pulled the dung were generally women, with a straps hanging obliquely on their shoulders, holding the handlebars of the dung truck, and struggling to bump and walk on the road, and from time to time they stopped to jingle the bell and shake the copper bell, or shouted: "Down...... Toilet...... "If someone dump......s the toilet on the way, the manure truck will also stop, and the manure collection truck will stop and stop slowly from the north.
When I arrived at Zhu's mother, the cleaner would definitely park the dung truck, and Zhu's mother opened the toilet lid one by one and handed it over, and the cleaner carried the toilet handle with one hand and the bottom with the other, and poured it into the opening of the manure truck......
Sister-in-law Zhu took the empty toilet and set it up. I used the clean water I brought to "pick up" the toilet bowl one by one (the sound of Nanjing dialect).
The brush for cleaning the horse brush, Nanjing people call it the horse brush, which is roughly square and about 2 feet long and thin strips cut out of bamboo, and the handle is made of fine strips.
In order to remove the dirt in the toilet bowl to the greatest extent, Zhu Ma also poured the cockle shell into the toilet, added a small amount of water, held the toilet with one hand to prevent it from moving, grabbed the toilet brush with one hand, and stirred in a circle in the toilet.
After brushing the toilet bowl in this way, pour out the cockle shells, pour clean water again, and wash the toilets one by one from the first to the last, and clean the inner wall.
Then, rub the toilet lid and barrel body clean with a rag in the remaining water.
This time, the water from the toilet bowl was poured into the gutter at the curb.
In the end, Sister-in-law Zhu sent the cleaned toilet back to the main family, as if there was some rule, in order to let the toilet dry as soon as possible, the toilet lid always crossed the ridge on the toilet mouth, and leaned under the wall.
After completing these things, it was almost dawn, and Sister-in-law Zhu carried the empty bucket with the horse brush and dragged her tired body home.
I do this old business, firstly, I am connected with the previous part "Water Deliverer", lamenting that the descendants of Zhu Yushi in the mouth of the neighbors are so down-and-out. In addition, in the early years, when I was working in Santiao Alley, I rode a bicycle near the Daxing Palace in Nanjing, and saw an old lady whose body had become 90 degrees, pushing a small cart with several toilets on it.
At the time of this trip reflecting the life of the old Nanjing market, in that year, no matter the scorching heat and cold, the scorching sun and rain, and the bright morning every day, the slow manure collection trucks on the street, the housewives carrying the toilets, and the busy scenes of people emptying the toilets would appear in front of their eyes.
When doing this group of woodwork, because only the big picture was seen in the past, the specific details such as: the overall proportion of the manure truck, the structure of the storage port and the discharge port on the manure tank, there are really many difficulties. There are also black inflatable rubber wheels for the southern dung truck, and how to "wear a tightrope" was solved one by one with the help of friends.
Also, the shoulder straps on the cleaner's shoulders; two types of toilets used by Nanjing people; and the flat pole with six hooks and the horse brush used by Zhu's mother were also made.
Times are advancing. Early in the morning of the sixties and seventies, the cleaners jingle and jingle the bells, or pour ...... The toilet is up...... The voice is inaudible.
Photo by Wang Li'an