How sad is the reason behind the popularity of migrant workers at subway stations?

The Ge family has a WeChat group called "Dearest Person". Every day when he is connected to WiFi, Ge Yuanzheng receives dozens of WeChat messages - his son is learning stage construction in Hainan, and he takes short videos of the scene every day for him to listen to the music and see what's new; his wife and daughter have more free time during the day, and They chatted on WeChat one after another, and sometimes he couldn't wait to hear them all, so he would directly video call them.

On January 3, Ge Yuanzheng had a video chat with his family at the subway entrance.

Beijing News - Peeling the onion news, Ge Yuanzheng was called "Lao Ge" at the Shanghai construction site, and almost no one knew his full name.

Lao Ge is no different from other migrant workers. He wears a pair of black rubber shoes and is dusty. His dark blue work clothes are dotted with white lime dots. The only bright touch is the hat on his head. Yellow hard hat.

He is from Henan and came to Shanghai in October last year.

Some time ago, after a tiring day, Lao Ge went to the subway station as usual to use the free WiFi to make video calls with his family. He was caught by a videographer, who took the video and uploaded it to the Internet.

The number of views on Lao Ge's "Clicking the Internet" video quickly reached 7.78 million. Netizens said that they felt distressed after seeing this scene, and their "eye circles were red".

At the construction site where Ge Yuanzheng is located, there are more than one migrant worker like him who goes to the subway station to “use the Internet”. They "use the Internet" because they are not willing to spend too much money to buy traffic, and they "miss home and want to talk to their families."

You can surf the Internet openly

On January 3, it was raining in Shanghai, the temperature was only 0, and it was bone-chilling. People on the road shrank with the cold, wrapped in hats and scarves, only exposed A pair of eyes.

Ge Yuanzheng got off work at five o'clock as usual. Braving the rain, he rode a second-hand bicycle bought for 70 yuan and pedaled 7 kilometers back to the work shed where he lived. For dinner, I ordered a portion of green vegetables, a portion of tofu, and a portion of white rice, which cost 6 yuan and 50 cents.

After riding for seven kilometers, Ge Yuanzheng was soaking his hands in hot water.

The night is long and there is no entertainment on the construction site. Lao Ge’s greatest pleasure is chatting with his family. Last year, he bought a smartphone, learned how to surf the Internet from his son and daughter, and opened a 28 yuan monthly package, which allows him to have 50 minutes of domestic call time and 100M of data every month. If this data is used for video calls, it will be used up in less than an hour.

On the construction site, migrant workers can earn 200-300 yuan a day. "It's all hard-earned money." They are reluctant to eat meat. No one is willing to spend money on buying traffic. The workers gather together. I always feel annoyed, "This smartphone consumes data, and I spent 15 yuan more last month."

Later, some co-workers learned how to "crash WiFi", and Lao Ge also learned it - installing software to crack WiFi passwords on his mobile phone. After get off work, he used his mobile phone to wander around the surrounding neighborhoods and encountered strong WiFi signals. For some people, I would spend some time online and watch videos with my family.

Every night at seven or eight o'clock, it's video time for Lao Ge and his family. At first, my wife Su Xiuna was shocked when she received the video from her husband Ge Yuanzheng. It was dark on the other side of the phone, and her husband’s face could only be seen in outline under the street lamp. “He can see me, but I can’t see him. I thought. Chat with him."

On January 9, Ge Yuanzheng and Xu Haiting were surfing the Internet downstairs in the community.

After some time, Lao Ge discovered that there was free WiFi in the subway. He was so happy that he could surf the Internet openly. There were charging plugs and lights in the subway station, and it was not as cold as outside.

At around six o'clock in the evening on January 3, Ge Yuanzheng went back to his dormitory and washed his face with hot water as usual. He didn't even have time to change his clothes, so he went out to the nearby Changqing Road subway station. He carried the charger with him. When the battery ran out, he squatted down and video-recorded with his family.

It was the rush hour after get off work, and every minute or two, a group of office workers returning home would pour out of the gate. Most of them wore thick down jackets and coats, and looked in a hurry. Almost no one noticed that there was a migrant worker squatting beside the corner, and no one was curious about what he was doing here.

At around eight o'clock at night, a videographer passed by and felt something was touched in his heart, so he took this scene - the wind was pouring in from the ground, and a middle-aged man was huddled at the subway exit. , the blue overalls on his body were covered with lime and cement, especially on the cuffs and knees, which were mottled like an oil painting. He squatted next to the charging plug, holding the mobile phone in both hands, talking and laughing at the screen. On the other side of the screen was his wife who was far away in Henan.

Steel bars are the skeleton, concrete is the flesh and blood

After Lao Ge’s video of “grabbing the Internet” became popular, his phone often rang, and his co-workers laughed, “You have become an internet celebrity. ".

Before coming to Shanghai, Ge Yuanzheng was not called "Lao Ge". He was respectfully called "Master Ge" in his hometown in Zhoukou, Henan.

He has studied carpentry, bricklaying, and painting, and is willing to help anyone building a house. Fellow villagers say of him, "He is honest, talks little, and is willing to suffer losses."

This is a father who cares about his family. He has a son and a daughter. When the children were young, he was reluctant to leave home. He stayed at home doing odd jobs and growing watermelons. His best thing was growing black beauty watermelons. , the scoop of sand is crispy and sweet. When the children grew up, their son went to Hainan to learn stage construction, and his daughter went to health school. In 2013, 38-year-old Lao Ge became a migrant worker with his fellow villagers, working as a painter across the country, responsible for applying various coatings on walls.

Ge Yuanzheng is painting the wall.

In the past few years, Ge Yuanzheng has been building buildings in cities such as Beijing, Changsha, Zhengzhou, Yiwu, and Shanghai.

If you ask him what are the differences between these cities, he will have to think for a long time before he can answer, "It's better in the north, not so cold, but it rains all the time in the south, and my hands and feet are so cold in winter that I can't feel it." .

The city is beautiful. "There are more shopping malls in Shanghai than there are watermelons in my field." The place where Lao Ge spends most time is at the construction site - the steel bars are the skeleton, the concrete is the flesh and blood, the excavators roar back and forth, and the scaffolding is stacked on top of each other. There is no end, the dust rolls into the collar and lungs, and when it rains, there is mud on the ground with no place to stay. The only bright and eye-catching thing is the red slogan hanging on the wall: "Safety comes from vigilance, accidents come from paralysis." , "Safety lasts for ten thousand days, and accidents happen in an instant."

There are thousands of migrant workers here. They get up at five o'clock every day, ride seven kilometers to the construction site, work for ten hours, grab a few bites of food for half an hour at noon, and continue working in the afternoon. Their wages are not low, with carpenters 280 yuan a day, bricklayers 260 yuan a day, and painters 250 yuan a day. No one is willing to spend a penny.

The structure of the community building that Ge Yuanzheng was building has been erected. The cement is rough and the doors and windows have not yet been installed. A gust of north wind blows through the building, making people shiver with cold. The workers fill two-liter kettles with hot water. Put the water on the ground, "Put more hot water in it and let it cool down more slowly."

The workers don’t even know the name of the community they are building.

They only know that this is Pudong New Area, Shanghai, and express delivery sent here is marked with a bold black marker, "Hudong, construction site." There is a cafeteria on the construction site that provides lunch. Vegetables cost three yuan a portion, and meat dishes cost five to eight yuan a portion. We eat in an open work shed, but it gets cold before the meal is even served.

The workers are having dinner. On the left side of the picture is a migrant couple.

Not surprisingly, in two years' time, this "construction site" in Ge Yuanzheng's eyes will be called the "Riverside Arc de Triomphe". This is the future Lujiazui riverside luxury house, with an average price of 160,000 per square meter. Yuan, the community is equipped with a private club of 6,000 square meters. This place is only two kilometers away from Lujiazui, the national financial center, and less than three kilometers away from the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. Standing on the floor where Ge Yuanzheng is under construction, when you look up, you can see the waves of the Huangpu River rolling under your feet.

Migrant worker Xu Haiting heard about the housing prices here and silently made calculations, "The house we built costs more than 20 million yuan per house. I don't have food or drink. It will take me 7 lifetimes to afford it." ".

He once built a house next to Xiaomanyao in Canton Tower. He didn’t know the name of the community. He only heard from the contractor that the housing prices there were more expensive, with a house costing more than 50 million. He stared. He straightened his eyes and asked the reporter, "What kind of people can afford to live in such a house?"

In the past three months since he came to Shanghai, Ge Yuanzheng visited the Oriental Pearl Tower once. After get off work, he stared at the spire of the Oriental Pearl Tower and rode towards it, getting closer and closer. He discovered, "It turns out that the Oriental Pearl Tower changes color when the lights are turned on at night." Of course, he didn't go into the TV tower, "don't waste the money."

He also thought about whether to go to the World Expo Park near the construction site. "I heard it is very fun. It will waste a day's wages for a day, so I might as well not go."

The most touching thing is the recognition from city people

Compared with the housing prices in Shanghai, Ge Yuanzheng is more concerned about the price of vegetables in the canteen.

He doesn’t drink or smoke, and most of his expenses are on food.

The canteen at the construction site is "on the expensive side", with a chicken drumstick costing 5 yuan and three steamed buns costing 2 yuan. He prefers to buy food at a roadside food stall. For 10 yuan, he gets two meat dishes, four steamed buns and some vegetarian dishes.

Ge Yuanzheng has a ledger in his mind. In my hometown in Henan, my income from growing watermelons and doing odd jobs does not exceed 30,000 yuan a year. I work as a construction worker in the city. Excluding the time I go home during the Spring Festival, I work more than 300 days a year and earn about 250 yuan a day. Income is between 70,000-80,000.

At the end of each month, the foreman will pay a salary of 1,000 yuan as living expenses for the next month. The remaining wages need to be settled in one lump sum before going home for vacation at the end of the year. In the past five years, Ge Yuanzheng has been able to bring home 40,000 to 50,000 yuan every year. He used the money to build a new house. Ge Yuanzheng has been in Shanghai for more than two months. In this super metropolis, he lives a life between construction sites and prefabricated houses.

Every evening, he and his co-workers ride bicycles for half an hour on the roads in Pudong New Area. During this journey, they will pass the entrance to the Shanghai World Expo and some five-star hotels. When waiting at a red light, they would look at the cars on the road. There were many good cars. "One day when I went home, I counted thirteen BMWs on the road."

Ge Yuanzheng rode a second-hand bicycle back to the cabin.

It’s winter, and the electronic screens on the road are displaying the words “Yellow frost warning, drive with caution.” Ge Yuanzheng doesn’t care about this. He just wants to ride a bike quickly and have a hot meal early.

The prefabricated houses where the workers live are made of simple iron sheets. There are 12 bunk beds in the room of less than 20 square meters. There are 9 people living in the dormitory where Ge Yuanzheng lives. They don’t have many things. Each person has a plastic paint bucket with a lid for hot water, a quilt issued by the construction site, two sets of work clothes, and one set of his own clothes. "Go home." Wear it during the Chinese New Year.”

There was a couple in the dormitory, both migrant workers. Ge Yuanzheng didn’t know their names. He only knew that they were from Jiangsu. They pulled a curtain in the corner of the dormitory and slept on the same bed. , "Women like to watch TV series on their mobile phones, and men drink a glass of Lao Village Chief (a bottle of liquor priced at 16.5 yuan) every night."

The board house is like a small village. Almost everything that migrant workers need in life can be solved near the board house.

Before moving in, various small advertisements were posted on the walls of the dormitory. "Doctor comes to your doorstep" and "Spring Festival Jinbei train returns home" are the two that appear most frequently.

After five o'clock every day, the workers come back one after another. A row of stalls are set up at the entrance of the wooden house compound. The stall owner breathes white air and sells some daily necessities and snacks. "Three pairs of insoles for five yuan." ", "The manufacturer directly sells a 3-meter extended data cable for 10 yuan." The most popular snack here is "Peanuts, Melon Seeds and Salted Peas", which is cheap and kills time.

There is an "open-air barber shop" at the door of the board house. A Shanghai aunt, with a small miner's lamp on her head and an electric shaver in her hand. When the guests come, she sits on the bench and puts on a hairdressing scarf to start working. It costs five yuan per person and only cuts her head and hair. Beifeng With a huff, the broken hair is automatically blown to the ground, eliminating the need for a brush.

The open-air "barber shop" at the door of the board house.

At night, after everyone had eaten, they would soak their feet in hot water. While soaking their feet, they would chat and listen to their roommates telling them new things. "Did you know that people in Hubei say that people who ride motorcycles are called numb?" , others happily picked up the conversation and shared what they had experienced today. "Children" are the most proud talking point of this group. Ge Yuanzheng's best friend, Lao Cui, whose son was admitted to the graduate school of Renmin University of China, is known to everyone on the construction site. People who live in prefabricated houses do not shy away from calling themselves "migrant workers." Migrant workers work hard. "As long as I can breathe, I still go to work. As long as I have a smile, I still go to work." A 64-year-old migrant worker said, Even though my body is covered with plasters, I still work every day.

But migrant workers are also glorious. "Even though I am a migrant worker, I am very happy that China has developed a new weapon."

The most touching thing for them was the recognition of their labor from the city people. Once, an old Shanghai man met Xu Haiting at the subway station. He nodded to him and said, "You have worked so hard to build so many high-rise buildings in Shanghai for us." He could never forget those words, "I felt really comfortable after hearing them."

Dearest Person

The sight of Ge Yuanzheng huddled at the subway entrance looking for WiFi moved many people. Many netizens commented that they were "heartbroken" and "life is not easy."

There are also some people who don’t quite understand why they care about tens of dollars for mobile phone data?

Ge Yuanzheng’s family burden is relatively heavy. His wife has undergone surgery and has a waist injury, so she cannot do heavy work. His daughter is studying in a medical school, and the tuition and living expenses for a year are about 30,000 yuan. His son has already gone out into the world and can support himself, but Ge Yuanzheng still wants to make more money, "In the future, the children will start families and build houses, and we will get older." Seeing a doctor costs money, so let’s not cause any trouble to our children.”

His frugal appearance reminds many people of their father -

"My father is like this. He doesn't need to be so tired anymore, but he still doesn't want to rest for the sake of his children. I Love him and thank him for everything I have today."

"My father is the same. He is reluctant to buy delicious food when he is hungry. He has the worst food and clothing. He saves money and uses it to support the family."

At the construction site where Ge Yuanzheng works, most of the workers are men over 40 years old, fathers of children, and some are even grandfathers.

Statistics from the National Bureau of Statistics in 2016 also show that in our country, there are 76.66 million migrant workers across provinces. Most of them are young adults, with an average age of 39. One trend is that the number of migrant workers The average age is still rising.

A sad fact is that Ge Yuanzheng’s wife, Su Xiuna, also used the neighbor’s WiFi to video chat with him in her hometown in Henan.

She is using a Redmi phone from 3 years ago, and the screen is broken. During the day, she was busy picking peppers and doing farm work. After dinner, she waited for her husband to video chat with her.

In the days when Ge Yuanzheng was in the news, there was a heavy snowstorm in Henan, and Su Xiuna’s network signal was intermittent. When she turned on her phone, she only heard someone say, "Your man is in the news." She was frightened, thinking that her husband was out of touch. After an accident, she quickly called to ask. Ge Yuanzheng explained over and over again, "I'm fine, don't worry." She felt relieved.

Later, the Ge family saw the video of Ge Yuanzheng huddled at the subway entrance and surfing the Internet. Su Xiuna cried for two days. The sight of her husband squatting on the ground made her extremely distressed. The son and daughter also saw the video and called their father to tell him to go home. "If he doesn't let me do it, I won't even hang up the phone."

Ge Yuanzheng called his wife in the cafeteria.

Su Xiuna said that every Chinese New Year, her husband always comes home cleanly dressed. During the video, he smiled and said everything was fine. He also always told her, "Wear thicker clothes and don't patronize them." Just spend what you have to spend on work, don’t worry about the two dollars.”

They almost never quarrel. They have endless things to talk about, and the video lasts for an hour.

The Ge family has a WeChat group called "Dearest Person". Every day when he is connected to WiFi, Ge Yuanzheng receives dozens of WeChat messages - his son is learning stage construction in Hainan, and he takes short videos of the scene every day for him to listen to the music and see what's new; his wife and daughter have more free time during the day, and They chatted on WeChat one after another, and sometimes he couldn't wait to hear them all, so he would directly video call them.

"Homesickness", these are the two words that should not be mentioned on the construction site.

Ge Yuanzheng wants to go home every day, “I want to talk to her every day, eat her cooking, steamed buns and steamed buns, and my favorite is her roasted eggplant, cut into slices and wrapped in flour.” Fry it in oil and simmer it with peppercorns and star anise. The taste is so fragrant."

His good friend Lao Cui's son is a graduate student in the Journalism Department of Renmin University of China, and he watches it silently on his mobile phone every day. News, "I want to go home and chat with him, and read more news about the same topic."

Xu Haiting already has a granddaughter. When he saw a three- or four-year-old girl in the subway station, he couldn’t move his eyes away. The first thing he did when he connected to WiFi was to video chat with his granddaughter. He kept teasing the child, "Call me grandpa." Call me grandpa."

If the construction schedule is tight this year, these workers will not be able to go home until the 29th of the twelfth lunar month. Ge Yuanzheng has already made plans - after receiving his salary, he will buy a better mobile phone for his wife, wear the new shoes bought by his daughter, and have a good New Year.

It’s not easy for everyone.