Chapter 386

Tong Xuelu brought Guo Weiping with her to buy the ingredients for the day and, when they returned to the restaurant, Tong Xuelu saw Secretary Zhuo waiting for her at the restaurant with a document with her.

“What brought you here, Secretary Zhuo?”Secretary Zhuo smiled when she saw Tong Xuelu. “Minister Lin had me bring this over and hand it to you in person. I heard that you are qualified to enter into the competition. Congratulations!”Tong Xuelu smiled happily. “All thanks to you, Secretary Zhuo. Our shop had made some beef meatballs yesterday. Would you like to try some, Secretary Zhuo?”Secretary Zhuo smiled and said, “That sounds wonderful. In fact, my family asked me to bring some back with me.”Tong Xuelu brought her an entire bag in person. As for the price, of course she gave her a steep discount.Secretary Zhuo’s smile thickened when she saw the quantity inside the bag.After Secretary Zhuo had taken off, Tong Xuelu finally got around to reading the document that she had brought over in details.The competition was set for the middle of next month, meaning that she still have a little bit over two weeks’ time to prepare for it.There were a total of 12 restaurants entering into the competition and three of them were highly-rated.All three of them had been around for a while and were joint-efforts between government and private parties. For example, one of them was Red Star Restaurant. It was a very famous restaurant before they became a joint venture. Their stir fried crab butter and fermented bean curd with pork were very well-known.After all these years, the old family restaurant had been converted to a joint venture and subsequently changed to Red Star Restaurant. Nevertheless, the chefs there were still the descendent of the original owners and for certain the recipes had been preserved.They may not make those specific dishes all the time but, now that they were in a competition, for sure they would be showing off their best and most unique dishes.In short, there were many strong competitors in this competition and it was not a simple task for her to win out.Regardless, she had already signed up and she would have to do her best.Tong Xuelu was still contemplating about the details of her competition and Wen Rugui, on the other hand, had already arrived at the department store.He didn’t visit places like this often and had to walk around in a big circle before he located the women’s clothing section.The salesperson was normally very stuck up but, when she saw Wen Rugui, she had a shy smile on her. “Are you looking for something in particular, Comrade?”Wen Rugui, “Do you have women’s scarves?”The salesgirl was taken aback a little. “Is it for your mom?”Wen Rugui frowned a little. “No, it’s for my girlfriend.”The shy smile disappeared from the salesgirl in a second or less. “Wait here.”As she spoke, she pulled out a few scarves. One of them was bright red and one white.Wen Rugui pulled out those two, handed them over to the salesgirl and said, “I’ll take both.”The salesgirl sighed secretly. How was the other girl able to land herself such a handsome and generous boyfriend? She was so envious of her.The straight male took off right away after he was done with his shopping.Wen Rugui wanted to bring the scarves over to Tong Xuelu as soon as he had bought them.Low and behold, a woman was standing right behind him and he almost bumped into her.The woman smiled before he even started talking. “Hi, Comrade Wan. What a coincidence. Are you here to shop also?”Wen Rugui looked at her and asked, “And who are you?”Sun Manrou felt that she had been stuck again. “I am Sun Manrou. Do you really not recognize me, Comrade Wan?”Wen Rugui shook his head. “No, I don’t. I have something to take care of. I am going to head out unless there’s something else you want to talk about.”Sun Manrou quickly said, “I overheard you talking with the salesgirl. These are for Comrade Tong, right? I heard that she works at a restaurant. I have been meaning to try it. Why don’t I go with you?”Wen Rugui turned her down right away. “No. And I would like it if you can stay away from my girlfriend. I didn’t like the way you talk to her the other night.”Having said that, he walked past her without giving her a chance to explain herself.“……”Looking at Wen Rugui walking away from her, Sun Manrou’s face turned red and white.