Chapter 145: Times Have Changed ⑤
He didn’t say any parting words. After thinking for a moment, he sang a currently popular song, “Youth Cultivation Handbook” by a boy band 《Youth Cultivation Handbook》. Many girls and boys in the class liked this group, so they also sang along excitedly.
Nie Qiu looked at her classmates singing along around her in astonishment. To be honest, listening to the lyrics, she could tell it was about youth, and it did evoke a feeling of her own youth. However, she didn’t understand the rhythm at all. Like many older people, she didn’t understand the current trends of this era. For example, the song Peng Yu Yang was singing, without accompaniment, and for someone who hadn’t heard it before, listening to it a cappella still felt a bit… strange.
Compared to Peng Yu Yang, Li Kai was much smarter. He knew that singing a cappella wouldn’t sound good, so he opened his mobile phone, played the accompaniment, and started singing Jay Chou’s 《Where Has the Promised Happiness Gone?》. While singing, he kept staring intently at Nie Qiu. He sang, “What happened, you’re tired, where has the promised happiness gone? I understand, I won’t say it anymore. Love has faded, dreams have drifted away, happiness and unhappiness, I’ll count them one by one, you’re reluctant…” The moment he thought about Nie Qiu saying that if he finished a volume of physics and had over ninety percent accuracy on his workbook, she would let him kiss her, and now she wouldn’t even talk to him, he felt uncomfortable. His voice even choked with sobs and sadness as he sang, making several girls in the class almost cry.
Nie Qiu lowered her head when she saw Li Kai staring at her. Teacher Yang was still here! This… this person…
Li Kai didn’t care if Teacher Yang was there or not. He sang his song. The song he sang with emotion was indeed different, and his voice changed considerably. After he finished singing, the classmates in the class applauded. Compared to the songs sung by Peng Yu Yang and Nie Qiu, Li Kai’s song received more applause, louder cheers, and more resounding screams.
Teacher Yang glared at Li Kai as he walked off the lectern. Even if he let Li Kai off and ignored his early romance, such blatant behavior was too disrespectful to him as the homeroom teacher! He shook his head secretly and walked to the lectern, resting his hands on the desk. He said with a smile, “All five students have finished their performances. Now, everyone will start voting. Remember, each person has only one vote.” After speaking, Teacher Yang wrote the names of Nie Qiu and the other four students on the blackboard.
“Starting with the first group, students will come up one by one. Behind the person you want to vote for, write a stroke. If five students support them, it will form a ‘just’ character. This is how you write it, understand? Each student has only one vote, remember?” Teacher Yang asked.
“We remember!” the students in the classroom responded loudly.
“Okay, starting with the first student to come on stage, one by one.” Teacher Yang said, and starting with the first group, students began to come up to the lectern one by one to cast their vote for their favorite performance.
The highest number of votes went to Li Kai and Huang Yan. Nie Qiu and Peng Yu Yang naturally cast their votes for Huang Yan, while Huang Yan, not afraid of being embarrassed, cast her vote for herself.
Bai Ya cast her vote for Li Kai, but Li Kai cast his vote for Nie Qiu. Out of fifty students in the class, Huang Yan and Li Kai both received fourteen votes, Nie Qiu received twelve votes, Peng Yu Yang received six votes, and Bai Ya received four votes as friendship votes.
This result made Teacher Yang hesitant. The classmates were still discussing when the dismissal bell rang. With two people having fourteen votes, he decided to let the two with the most votes be the art committee members. After all, this was the only art festival for the third grade. Teacher Yang smiled and said, “Alright, according to the votes, our class’s new art committee members are Huang Yan and Li Kai. You two, come to the office with me after class.”
Huang Yan got her wish and became the art committee member, but she wasn’t happy at all. Instead, she pouted. After Teacher Yang left, she glanced at Li Kai, who was following Teacher Yang towards the office, then stuck out her tongue at Nie Qiu and followed them.
Nie Qiu breathed a sigh of relief. The matter of electing the art committee member was finally over!
Peng Yu Yang walked to Nie Qiu’s seat with his workbook and placed it on Nie Qiu’s desk, asking with a smile, “How was it? Nie Qiu, did my song sound good?”
Seeing Peng Yu Yang’s expectant face, Nie Qiu helplessly told the truth, “Honestly, Peng Yu Yang, I didn’t understand what you were singing… I haven’t heard this song before.”
“Uh…” Peng Yu Yang’s expression stiffened. “Then what kind of songs do you usually listen to?”
“My home doesn’t have a computer, only a black and white television set that can only receive two local channels. They mostly broadcast in local dialects, and rarely play songs. When I get home, I do my homework and don’t watch TV. My mom’s mobile phone is an old Nokia model, and it doesn’t have a music playback function.” Nie Qiu wasn’t complaining about poverty; she just wanted to explain that she couldn’t understand the song Peng Yu Yang was singing. She just couldn’t understand it, not that she thought Peng Yu Yang’s song was bad. To be honest, she preferred retro music and wasn’t as fond of pop songs. Every era has its classics, and every era has songs suitable for its young people. So, it was understandable that Nie Qiu couldn’t adapt to this era. She smiled and said, “I watched 《My Fair Princess》 when I was little, and now I listen to songs played on the street.”
Markets like the vegetable market are filled with uncles and aunties, and the songs they play are older. Unlike commercial streets, where the songs played are usually pop songs.
Nie Qiu wasn’t complaining about poverty, but it sounded different to Peng Yu Yang. It was one thing that Nie Qiu didn’t have a mobile phone; several classmates didn’t have one either. But her family didn’t even have a color television? Just imagining not having a computer, a mobile phone, or a television made Peng Yu Yang feel uncomfortable.
He didn’t pay attention to Nie Qiu saying she didn’t understand his song. Instead, he secretly decided that he must buy Nie Qiu a gift for the art festival. A mobile phone would be too expensive for Nie Qiu to accept, but he would at least buy her an MP3 player that could play music! He didn’t mention the election anymore. Instead, he opened his workbook and said, “When I was doing my homework yesterday, I came across a problem. Can you help me look at it…”
As soon as the topic of problems came up, Nie Qiu’s spirits lifted. She put down the pirated original book she had rented from a street stall, took Peng Yu Yang’s workbook, and looked at the problem Peng Yu Yang was pointing to. As she looked, she took out a notebook specifically for drafts, calculated, and explained the principles to Peng Yu Yang. Peng Yu Yang nodded continuously. He also took out a pen from Nie Qiu’s pencil case. Upon seeing Nie Qiu’s pencil case, Peng Yu Yang frowned. “I remember you bought a pencil case! Why are you using this one again?”
Nie Qiu answered absentmindedly while doing the problem, “I accidentally lost it.”
