Chapter 151: The Workers

After the workers’ formation was dismissed, some ran back to the workshop to get their wooden or ceramic tableware and then lined up at the small table. Others waited at the door. A moment later, with a rumbling sound, the workshop supervisor returned with a few men, pushing a small cart. The people waiting at the door quickly surrounded it, watching as the supervisor took out a key, opened a large bamboo cage on the cart, and took out lunch boxes one by one, handing them to the people around. And these people, once they got their lunch boxes, also quickly lined up in front of the small table.

The people delivering the meal were actually the waiters from a certain restaurant in Dongmen Market. The naturalized citizen workers of the optics workshop used a subsidized meal plan system. Each month, they would choose a supplier—either the industrial zone’s own cafeteria or a restaurant in Dongmen Market that had been certified by the People’s Commissar for Civil Affairs. This supplier was responsible for providing the evening meal for all the workers during that month. Generally, those without families chose to have all their meals catered to save trouble. Those with families would only buy the dishes and bring their own rice, which was steamed in the factory’s steaming cabinet. This was not troublesome either; when they came to work, they would put their lunch boxes, filled with rice and water, into a special cage in the optics workshop’s steaming cabinet, and the supervisor would be responsible for locking it. At the appointed time, someone would be responsible for opening the valve, letting industrial steam into the steaming cabinet, and the rice would be cooked quickly.

Lin Hanlong looked at today’s dishes. As usual, there should be a meat dish every day. Seeing him come over, the waiter delivering the food quickly stood up and said respectfully, “Chief Lin! Today we have fish with soft tofu and stir-fried shredded carrots. The soup is a mixed seafood soup. There are also a few refreshing side dishes, a gift from the restaurant.”

Lin Hanlong saw that one of the vegetable buckets contained something cooked red, which did indeed look like tofu and fish fillets. He took a ladle and stirred it in the pot to confirm the ratio of fish to tofu, then nodded. Fish fillets were quite common now. Since the construction of the gas-powered cold storage and the fish processing plant, they had been buying fish from individual fishermen without limit during every fishing season. There was a lot in stock. The cold storage would often clear out old stock to make room for new. Needless to say, this cleared-out old stock was warmly welcomed by the general native population and the catering industry. Lin Hanlong then looked at the shredded carrots in the other vegetable bucket. They glistened with oil under the light, looking very appetizing.

This dish was an “Australian dish”—in the past, there was no habit of eating carrots locally, and they were not even grown. It was only after Wu Nanhai established the farm that they began to be planted on a large scale to increase the supply of vitamin A, and carrot dishes were promoted among the naturalized citizens.

This time, Lin Hanlong sneered but said nothing. The waiter gave a dry, embarrassed laugh, his expression quite awkward. This little trick couldn’t fool Lin Hanlong: this so-called oil-fried shredded carrot was definitely “stir-fried” with salt water first, and after it cooled down a bit, some oil was added and it was stir-fried again briefly. This way, the oil could only coat the surface of the shredded carrots and could not penetrate the dish, making it look oily and appetizing. It was a common money-saving trick used by canteens and fast-food companies. He then stirred the soup bucket and glanced at the pickled radish skins, vegetable stems, and other “refreshing side dishes.”

He tapped the tin bucket containing the shredded carrots, shook his head at the waiter, and walked away without a word.

He heard someone behind him whisper: your chief is really good to you. He did not turn back and walked straight back into the workshop. A bitter smile appeared on his face. Carrots are rich in vitamin A, an essential nutrient for precision machinery workers who need good eyesight for their work. But the vitamin A in carrots is fat-soluble, and the nutritional value of such “oil-glazed” shredded carrots was greatly reduced.

Speaking of which, it was indeed only he who truly cared about the workers’ food. The workers themselves didn’t care about the quality of the food; as long as they could eat their fill of brown rice, it was a great enjoyment. The dishes were just something to go with the rice. Even if they were served pickled vegetables every day, the workers would be satisfied.

Lin Hanlong’s reason for caring about the food was simple: people in this era were generally malnourished and often lacked the stamina for fine work that required prolonged concentration. Especially since the optics workshop operated at night, the light was not as good as during the day, and many people couldn’t even see the workpieces clearly. Lin Hanlong could increase the lighting in the workshop, but that would consume precious gas and increase the fire hazard. So he would rather spend money to let his workers eat better. The problem was that Lin Hanlong had limited funds and couldn’t cover all their food expenses. So he came up with a subsidy method, letting the workers pool their money for a meal plan, and he would match their food expenses one-to-one. This improved the situation, but the cafeteria didn’t have the manpower to guarantee timely delivery: the Ministry of Science and Technology was too far from all the canteens in the industrial zone, and going back and forth for meals took too much time. The interest of outside merchants was to maximize their profits as much as possible. Although Lin Hanlong personally set the menu—for example, the oil-fried carrots—the merchants always had ways to cut corners. He knew that some things couldn’t be managed too closely, but if this happened again, he would have to consider changing suppliers.

Lin Hanlong walked a few steps and turned back, instructing his apprentice who was following him to heat up his meal. Seeing his apprentice nod in agreement, he walked into the office, went around to the back, opened a locked door, and entered his own small cubicle, then closed the door. The small cubicle contained several professional books he had brought and a large amount of draft paper, as well as a laptop computer. This ruggedized Panasonic Toughbook was specially purchased for the transmigration and had been working without any problems for several years. However, to be cautious, Lin Hanlong had removed the battery and stored it separately, instead using a simple rectified UPS powered by mains electricity and a set of lead-acid batteries under the computer desk. He turned on the computer and waited for a moment, watching Ubuntu Linux boot up quickly. Without him having to do anything, the computer automatically opened the transmigrators’ internal forum and video-on-demand server after booting up. Lin Hanlong didn’t have time to review the film and television works he had brought; he just briefly browsed the forum. Tonight, as usual, several active (or rather, talkative) IDs on the forum had proposed a bunch of reliable and unreliable proposals, and a bunch of people had replied, starting a war on the forum, plus more chatting, bitching, and complaining. Lin Hanlong quickly browsed through it, briefly replied to a few posts, and then closed the forum page. He then opened a terminal and connected to the transmigrators’ computing server.

His apprentice knocked on the door of the cubicle, telling Lin Hanlong that his meal had been heated. He opened the door, took the meal, and returned to the computer. Logging into the “National Computing Service Center,” he entered his ID number and the authorization number for the computing service center. He then ran a few programs, and a large number of charts began to appear on the screen. Lin Hanlong studied these charts while eating the “lunch” that his maid had cooked and his apprentice had heated for him. These charts were part of Lin Hanlong’s work. He used the relatively idle time of the main computing server in the middle of the night to run the large-scale design programs he had brought from before the transmigration, analyzing and optimizing various optical designs.

The Yuanen Senate’s computing server was assembled from an X86 system. After all, it was not an easy matter to procure a minicomputer or a mainframe in the old world—money was only one aspect. In comparison, the array computing server built with an X86 system was simple in structure and its function was not bad.

Lin Hanlong didn’t know where the main computing server’s machine room was, but it should be within Bairen City—the transmigrators’ communication lines were not luxurious enough to set up a machine room in the Gaoshanling area.

This “National Computing Service Center” provided large-scale computing services for various departments. Due to the large number of departments that needed computing, they had to adopt a queuing and registration system to obtain computing time. However, it was rare for anyone to use this system in the middle of the night, so Lin Hanlong always used the computing service late at night.

What he was doing now was using the Monte Carlo method to study the tolerance of various design schemes to manufacturing tolerances and temperature changes. Due to the primitive nature of Lin’gao’s optical production and the difficulty of quality control, Lin Hanlong felt it was necessary to start from the design aspect, and while maintaining a certain level of precision, to be as tolerant as possible to various production errors. While the computer he had brought was still working properly, he planned to analyze the configurations of common optical systems as much as possible, and then print the analysis results into complex tables to be used as a basis for creating an “Optical Design Manual” that could be used by naturalized citizens after the computer failed.

Looking at the results spit out by the computer, Lin Hanlong couldn’t help but nod. He had brought many professional books on optics with him during the transmigration, and the Grand Library also had some relevant materials. Over the past few days, he had simulated many of the classic designs introduced in several design manuals and felt that his understanding of these designs had deepened considerably. The optical instruments that the transmigrators needed at this stage were essentially of only a few types, and even fewer needed to be mass-produced. He felt that with his current level, meeting the needs was not a problem. Once he had collected all the necessary data, it wouldn’t be too difficult to do some more demanding designs.

Of course, being able to design did not mean being able to reliably manufacture. At this thought, Lin Hanlong sighed again. It was difficult to set up the entire process flow, and it was even more difficult to teach the illiterate-born naturalized citizen workers by hand. It would take at least a year or two before they could graduate and basically operate independently. Lin Hanlong did not consider himself a very patient person, but if he didn’t want to work himself to death, he had no choice but to be patient and teach people.

It gradually became noisy outside. The workers had finished their meal and were returning to the workshop one after another. It wasn’t time to start work yet, so many were either sitting or standing, gathered together and chatting casually. Some were squatting in the smoking area outside the door, smoking and drinking tea. Lin Hanlong looked at the computer; it was about time. He got up, opened the door, and went out, calling his apprentice and a few supervisors over to inspect the results of their work so far. Seeing that the processing quality of the workpieces was acceptable, he pointed out a few places that needed adjustment and had his apprentice write them down. He then returned to the computer room.

He minimized the simulation window and opened SolidWorks. An image of a sextant appeared on the computer screen. This was a project he was collaborating on with several other mechanically-inclined Yuanen. He was the lead, and the others were assisting. This was an important research project proposed by the navy. Like the marine chronometer, it was an important piece of equipment for determining latitude and longitude during long-distance voyages, and it was of great significance to the navy and the shipping department.

The sextant on the screen was already complete. The simulation of the light path was fine, and the mechanical problems had also been improved. They were just waiting for the final confirmation of the scale marking method before they could make a physical prototype.

Two clangs came from outside. It was the workshop supervisor ringing the bell to remind everyone to start work. Lin Hanlong sat still, just pricking up his ears to listen to the sounds outside. After a few months, he was very familiar with the noises made by the various machines in operation. As long as he listened carefully, he could tell the state of the machines. He could also see the actual level of the natives without being present. It seemed luck was good tonight; all the machines sounded like they were working normally. He turned his attention back to the computer.

Time always passed quickly in front of the computer. By the time he had reviewed the sextant design and uploaded the design files to his colleagues, more than an hour had passed. After shutting down the computer, he came out of the small room with his lunchbox and casually locked the door. His apprentice was at his own desk in the office outside, reading a book.

Lin Hanlong looked at the contents of the book. It was an elementary mathematics textbook compiled by the transmigrators themselves.

“Junjie,” the apprentice looked up at him. “In the notes for the day shift, make a note that the belt on the number two grinding machine needs to be checked.”

The apprentice nodded eagerly. “Yes! Master, I also thought that sound wasn’t right. It seems like a few of the studs are loose.”

Lin Hanlong grunted and held out his hand. “Have you finished your physics homework?” In over a year, he had taught his apprentice basic arithmetic and helped him learn over a thousand Chinese characters. After the optics factory switched to night shifts, his apprentice would follow him to work every evening. So, Lin Hanlong arranged for him to attend the first two classes in the morning, mainly middle and high school level math, physics, and chemistry courses. When he had time, Lin Hanlong would also give him extra lessons. A while ago, he had been responsible for rewriting the “Introduction to Optics” for external distribution, and he had managed to analyze several optical instruments that already had prototypes in this time using only junior high school level principles of convex and concave lenses. His apprentice, by right, became the first reader of this book. Because he was exposed to it every day and had some foundation in math and physics, his apprentice roughly understood the book. However, Lin Hanlong privately believed that even if this book were distributed, at most it would leave people in a fog. It would be very difficult for someone without a junior high school level of mathematics to understand the calculation process. His apprentice’s level was already far beyond that of any native of the same era.

Lin Hanlong quickly looked over his apprentice’s homework, marking it with ticks and crosses with a pen, and circling the more critical areas.

“Here, and here, I see you still don’t quite understand. I’ll explain it to you again after work.” He looked up and turned. “Also, those glass jars on my desk, take two home with you. Remember to bring the jars back.”

“Master!” the apprentice exclaimed. “I-I can’t accept this.” Those jars were “prototypes” sent over by Wu Nanhai, containing fried dace in glass jars, a trial product from the Tianchu Food Factory, quite similar to the classic canned product that had endured for generations.

The apprentice knew that this was a “super high-grade food” that only the Yuanen could enjoy. Not to mention a naturalized citizen apprentice, even the wealthy masters in Dongmen Market who didn’t know how to spend their money couldn’t buy it.

Lin Hanlong glared at him. “Take them when I tell you to. One for you and one for your brother. You need to eat well to have the energy to study, understand? Also, bring your brother’s math and physics homework to me tomorrow.” Cai Junjie’s younger brother, Cai Si, was a full-time student at Fangcao’di, and his grades were very good. He had interned at the optics factory a few times, and Lin Hanlong felt he had a good aptitude and was keen on cultivating him as a technician for the optical industry.

“Yes, I’ll bring it tomorrow night.”

Lin Hanlong waved his hand. “Put on your jacket. Let’s go for an inspection.”

By three in the morning, the workpieces on the grinding machines had finished their current process one after another. Lin Hanlong watched as the workers used the locally made Foucault testers to check the radius of curvature of the workpieces one by one. The workers in the grinding machine group worked in pairs, one calling out the numbers and the other recording. After one person finished measuring, they would switch roles and repeat the measurement process. After they were all done, Lin Hanlong himself went up to check a few, and only after seeing no problems did he let them sign off and finish their work. A while later, someone came over with a few boxes and placed them in front of Lin Hanlong. These were a new batch of telescopes assembled in the assembly workshop. Lin Hanlong casually picked one up, looked at the standard calibration pattern pasted on the wall, and then handed the telescope to his apprentice for a detailed inspection.

There was a faint glimmer of dawn on the horizon. The workers in the grinding machine group were sweeping and wiping down their responsible areas with brooms and rags. The mechanics were busy oiling and maintaining the machinery. Lin Hanlong, holding a cup of strong tea, yawned as he watched the remaining few workers finish their work. At six o’clock, the day’s work at the optics workshop was declared over. The workers, following the 4S standards set by Lin Hanlong, put all the workpieces into designated boxes and cabinets, set the machinery to the off state, and placed various supplies in their designated locations. Lin Hanlong was too lazy to give another speech. After assembling, he let them disperse and go home directly.

“Junjie, what’s on my schedule for this morning?” Lin Hanlong asked as he led the supervisors on a final inspection of the empty workshop and had someone lock the main door.

“Master! After the 8 a.m. regular meeting, there’s another meeting with Chief Zhan between 8:30 and 9:00. Do you want to go back to eat and rest first?” the apprentice reminded him, following beside Lin Hanlong.

Lin Hanlong nodded. A short while later, the three of them left the optics factory and walked along the street in the factory district. The sky was already bright, and the street was crowded with workers coming off and going to work. Fortunately, the weather was still cool, and it was quite comfortable to walk on the street. He planned to go back and eat something first, then take a nap. The night at the optics workshop was over, but his day was not yet done.