My father has a rough definition of drinking liquor. The liquor may not be very good, but must be good for drinking. My father drank liquor for forty to fifty years and has indissoluble bond with liquor. He can know which brand of the liquor after he drinks it. For the inferior liquor, my father can know it very well after he tastes it. For so many years, my father has developed a habit that whether he drinks alone or with others, he also has Fulaichun liquor at home.

After seventy years’ old, even though my father like drink Maotai, Wuliangye or other good liquor, his money is limited. He pays for food and clothes with all his money. My parents raise three children who need to eat, study at school, build a house, has a family and career. So how can my father to pay more money for the famous liquor? But he must drink liquor, so my father chose to drink Fulaichun liquor.

When I was young, my family was poor, and my grand-father is still alive. It is said that the drinking capacity of my great grandfater is more than half of kilo. As he didn’t drunk excess, and there is no record for that. I always saw that a long rod pipe pole was hanged around the neck of my grandfather, and the other side is tied with a black bag which is full of smoking tobacco. He sealed it tightly with elastic and don’t show a little tobacco. After he finished a pipe of tobacco, my father saw that my great grandfater knocked out tobacco from the bronze pipe mouth by the upper of the shoe. He raised up his head and saw the sky. It has been noon. So he asked me to go there. At that moment, I knew it was time for lunch. It is not workable for having a dinner without liquor. Except the three children, my great grandfather, grandfather, grandmother and parents all drank liquor. At that time, my father picked out a basket of dried sweet potato in slices. He picked out the smaller one. To change for liquor don’t need good dried potato chips. My left hand carried the basket full of dried potato chips and my right hand raised the glass bottle for liquor. I run to the shop of Wang in the west of my home. He basket is hung on the scales. It is just 1.1kg, minus 0.1kg the weight of the basket, it is just 1 kg of dried potato chips, which can be changed into 0.5kg of Fulaichun bulk liquor. That has been calculated by my father by scale. It is not much or a little.

I don’t know why my father loves to drink Fulaichun liquor until my father drank too much to call the three children together to give a team talk. My father is an old party member and has principles in doing things. When our three brothers stood before the desk in the hall, my father sit seriously and gave us a talk. He said people must be honesty and don’t play pretty tricks. He said the Liu’s families are all honesty generations by generations, neighbors all know that. We have three brothers for this generation, originally it is only one children when it is traced back to the generation of my great grandfather. It is bounty of God for our good deeds. He said that a man should have a backbone. The words of Chairman Mao are right. We do not bully others, but we must not allow others to bully. He said people in the world must have pure quality like Fulaichun liquor. People being honesty don’t suffer losses. The god understood it very clearly. Only the pure grain can produce high quality liquor.

Even though my father drank too much, but he is very clear in his heart. My father said a lot. Even though we can’t make any record, we remember it in our heart. At that time, I have come to understand why my father loves to drink Fulaichun liquor. Now, the Fulaichun liquor in bulk is very rarely seen. I also don’t need to change liquor with dried potato chips for my father. But my father still ride electric car to buy liquor in the town every few days.

At present, our three brothers also can drink liquor and the liquor capacity is ok, which may inherit the genes of my father. When the family together in the New Year’s Day, my father put away the large round table just bought. After all the foods are put on the table, the family of twelve people seated around the table, my father took out Fulaichun liquor stored for many years in person and wore presbyopic glasses to look it up and down for a moment, then he opened it lightly. Suddenly, the house is full of aroma, smile is rippled on my father’s face. (MO WEI NONG)