Chapter 52: Borrowing Sound

Early in the morning, Madam Su urged Sun Shan to get up while Guyu swiftly helped her younger brother wash up and served breakfast.

Sun Shan saw that it was salted meat and dried vegetable porridge. It tasted quite good and felt warm in the stomach.

Madam Su brought in the lunchbox and said to Sun Bomin, "Father of the children, hurry out and don't be late."

Sun Bomin let out an acknowledgement, grabbed the freshly fed Sun Shan, and strode out of the courtyard. He detoured to Third Uncle Sun’s house and shouted loudly, "Ge'er, time for school! Hurry up, you're going to be late."

Third Uncle Sun's wife opened the door and smiled, saying, "Eldest Brother, it's still early. Ge'er is just having his breakfast."

Sun Shan called out "Third Aunt" and slipped into the courtyard, where he saw his third uncle's three sons gnawing on sweet potatoes.

Ge'er picked up a large red sweet potato, getting his mouth covered in bits of it as he mumbled, "Eldest Uncle, Shanzi, aren't you guys way too early?"

Sun Bomin smiled and said, "Not early at all. If we go late, we'll be tasting the paddle."

In Sun Bomin’s childhood memories, he had tasted the paddle several times, one of which was precisely because of tardiness. Naturally, he did not want Shanzi to get beaten. Although Master Zheng was a kind man, his rules were extremely strict—when he decided to punish, he struck without the slightest hesitation.

Sun Shan chimed in, "Ge'er, before school started, the master already explained the school rules to us. If we don't go early and end up late, we'll get our palms hit."

Scholar Zheng had first explained the school rules to the new students and then arranged for Uncle Zheng to repeat them so that both students and parents would understand the school's discipline.

Ge'er quickly finished his sweet potato, packed his study supplies, and said in a rush, "Father, Mother, Eldest Brother, Second Brother, I'm heading to the schoolhouse first. Take your time eating and wait to get hit with the paddle."

With that, he grabbed Sun Shan and bolted out of the courtyard, with Sun Bomin following closely behind.

As for Third Uncle Sun, he had long made it clear that he would not be escorting or picking them up.

In the courtyard, Guang'er and Yong'er also quickly finished their sweet potatoes and said anxiously, "Father, Mother, we're off to school too."

They hadn't felt nervous initially, but stirred up by Shanzi and Ge'er, everyone began to feel tense—especially Yong'er, who had once been struck on the palm by Scholar Zheng for being late.

The two boys made a turn and went to Second Uncle Sun's house to call out Qing'er. The three brothers were all in the intermediate class and went to school together.

Sun Bomin and the boys soon arrived at the entrance of the Zheng Family Schoolhouse, where Uncle Zheng was already on duty, just like yesterday.

Sun Bomin instructed, "Shanzi, Ge'er, hurry on inside, study hard, and don't go looking for trouble."

That last sentence was aimed at Ge'er; Shanzi was sullen and obedient—it would take a miracle for him to provoke anyone.

Sun Shan, Ge'er, and Sun Bomin said their goodbyes, exchanged greetings with Uncle Zheng, and walked into the schoolhouse. They first placed their lunchboxes in the kitchen before stepping into the classroom.

Yang Qingbei was already there. Seeing the two of them, he called out, "Morning."

Sun Shan nodded and said, "Qingbei, morning."

Ge'er sneaked over to Yang Qingbei's side and saw him practicing calligraphy on paper. With a look of envy, he said, "Qingbei, the characters you write are so pretty."

Sun Shan curiously looked over and was also deeply impressed. The characters Yang Qingbei wrote within the grid lines might not have been exceptionally artistic, but they were uniform in size and extremely neat, clearly written with great care.

Because Yang Qingbei had a fair complexion, any trace of shyness immediately rushed to his cheeks. He said bashfully, "Not at all, my writing is just average."

Sun Shan wasn't truly a child; he knew that Yang Qingbei, being a little kid, would be delighted to receive praise. He smiled and said, "Qingbei, your writing really is lovely. You managed to fit all the characters inside the grid lines. I could never do that; my characters still turn out as big as oxen."

Ge'er shouted loudly, "Oh no, I forgot how to write! No way, I need to practice hard."

With that, he immediately unfolded the Four Treasures of the Study, though substituting stone slates for paper.

Seeing that it was still early, Sun Shan did not practice calligraphy yet. Instead, he reviewed what they had learned yesterday—a mere twelve characters, yet extraordinarily difficult.

Sun Shan felt his brain was rather slow; trying to pronounce them using the Imperial Capital accent was terribly hard.

Reviewing them over and over again, Master Zheng finally arrived.

Upon seeing the master enter, the three boys immediately stood up, saluting and greeting him.

Master Zheng asked amiably, "Do you still remember what we taught yesterday?"

All three boys indicated that they remembered.

Master Zheng stroked his beard with satisfaction, pointed at Sun Shan to stand up, and said, "Sun Shan, recite it once using the official court tongue."

The twelve characters were not difficult at all, and he finished reciting them quickly. Ge'er and Yang Qingbei, who followed, were also able to recite them smoothly.

Yesterday, Master Zheng had assigned homework, which was to copy the twelve characters.

The three boys handed in their assignments.

Master Zheng called out by name, "Yang Qingbei wrote the best, very good. Sun Shan and Sun Dingde, you both need to step up your practice. Your stroke order is correct, but the characters are much too large; you must learn to write them smaller."

Sun Shan and Ge'er expressed their gratitude for the master's instruction and promised to practice diligently.

Afterward, Master Zheng began the formal lessons for the day.

This time, he taught twenty-four characters.

He taught the students how to write and read them stroke by stroke.

First, he read them once using the Guangnan dialect, explained their meanings, and told the stories behind them. Then, he read them using the Imperial Capital official tongue.

Master Zheng said, "Since you are just starting out with your enlightenment, I still teach you in the Guangnan dialect. After a while, I will conduct my classes in the Imperial Capital tongue. Remember, you must learn the Imperial Capital tongue well. Should you have the opportunity in the future to travel to different places, the Imperial Capital tongue is the universal language."

The three boys acknowledged this and promised to study well under the master.

Hearing Scholar Zheng's official tongue tinged with a heavy Guangnan accent, Sun Shan knew it was not entirely authentic.

But so what? Language is, after all, meant to be understood by others. Never mind whether you have a Guangnan accent or a Guangbei accent; this wasn't a professional broadcast on a national network.

After finishing his lecture, Master Zheng went off to teach the neighboring class.

Throughout the entire Zheng Family Schoolhouse, there was only a single master. Viewed this way, the workload was indeed quite heavy. Fortunately, however, there were very few students, making teaching smooth and manageable.

Seeing that the master had left, Ge'er slumped over Sun Shan's desk and whispered, "Shanzi, the master taught way too much today. I don't understand some of it."

Before Sun Shan could reply, Ge'er darted over to Yang Qingbei's desk and asked the same question: "Little Brother Qingbei, do you understand all of it?"

Without even raising his head, Yang Qingbei replied, "Yes."

That concise and straightforward answer dealt a critical blow to Ge'er.

Ge'er widened his eyes and asked in disbelief, "You really understand all of it? You're not teasing me, are you?"

Before Yang Qingbei could respond, Ge'er spun around and said to Sun Shan, "Shanzi, Qingbei understands everything!"

Sun Shan nodded and said, "I understand it too."

Raising his head, he said with a serious expression, "Ge'er, you have to listen carefully in class. The master explains things very clearly. If you don't understand, you need to look for the reason within yourself."

As for the twenty-four characters, Sun Shan knew how to write them; it was the Imperial Capital tongue that was hard to master.

Sun Shan came up with a method—borrowing sounds, much like how he used to learn English when he was young.

For instance, for the English word "lunch", Sun Shan would write down the phonetic approximation beside it using native characters.

Last night, he had even specifically asked Sun Bomin to fashion several makeshift charcoal pencils so he could mark down phonetic approximations for the words he couldn't pronounce or found difficult to read.

Here, learning the Imperial Capital tongue lacked any pinyin system; students could only rely on Master Zheng reading a sentence and the students repeating it after him.

It was a clumsy and repetitive method of learning, with no guarantee that the pronunciation would be accurate.