The matter of the cotton fields was a bad start for Zhou Ziang's journey to Xinjiang.
Zhou Qizheng's family had a few acres of fields, and Zhou Ziang had specially sought out the town mayor, hoping they would consider their family's special situation and allocate a few more acres of new cotton fields to Zhou Qizheng, which was the most direct solution to the Zhou Family's dire living environment.
After listening, the mayor simply said, "Young Zhou, you don't know our town's situation. These past few years, the cotton harvests have been good, Uighurs who can't find jobs outside are returning in droves, all clamoring for cotton fields. Zhou Qizheng already took those acres, and even defiantly declared in front of the big cotton farmer Ahmat, that by the time his own cotton fields bear peaches, all Ahmat could do is watch enviously."
What he meant was that the Zhou family's current plight was self-inflicted, no one else to blame.
