It was around the 1960s and 1970s, when life was difficult for families, and there were almost no radios that could be afforded at home, especially for rural families. Many rural children have never seen the appearance of the radio. At that time, each production team in the countryside had only a few public broadcast loudspeakers, and some places called microphones. These small broadcasts are played at regular intervals, three times a day in the morning, middle and evening, each time for about two hours or so.
My house is in the countryside, and my front yard has installed a public telephone box, which I like to listen to very much, and as soon as the radio starts, I will sit next to it and listen carefully. Especially at night, I often hear the announcer say goodbye, and after the broadcast is over, I am willing to go home and rest. Winter is very cold, my parents are afraid that I am frozen, and often urge me to go home and sleep. At that time, I always thought about how good it would be to broadcast non-stop in the box. If only the family could have a conversation box, how good it would be to sleep in the bed.
Later, with transistor radios, some families in rural areas with better conditions bought radios. My neighbor was a coal miner with relatively good family conditions, and once brought back a radio when he came home to visit his family in the New Year. I don't remember exactly what brand it was. Every time I hear the radio playing, I am both curious and envious. I wondered when my family would be able to afford it.
My family has five sisters, all supported by my father's tutor subsidies and the work earned by my mother in the production team. I remember very clearly that my father's monthly allowance of six yuan was transferred to twelve yuan a few years later. The mother earned only about two dimes a day. Except for the family's food and clothing expenses, there is almost no surplus. Sometimes when you encounter something big, you have to borrow money to get by. At that time, the cheapest radio was more than twenty yuan. Buying a radio is a luxury.
Later, with the slow improvement of rural conditions, probably when I was in junior high school, my family finally bought a radio, and I remember very clearly that the machine was produced by Anhui Ma'anshan Radio Factory. I heard my father say that because the machine was cheap, there was a long queue when I bought it. However, there is no good price, and the background noise of this radio is a bit large. However, it is already very good to have it, and there are many families who cannot afford it.
After having the radio, don't mention how excited you are, it is common to sleep at night and eavesdrop on the bed, and you are often reprimanded by your parents for this matter.
I remember that in the winter, whenever the night was quiet, it was the happiest thing to eavesdrop on the radio in the bed. Since factories were very scarce in that era, and there were no various launch towers now, there was almost no electromagnetic interference of all kinds. In addition, my home is in the Huaibei Plain, and at night, I can use the radio to listen to the programs of the Chinese-Wave radio station thousands of kilometers away. For example, I can often receive radio programs from the three northeastern provinces, and once I heard Heilongjiang Radio broadcasting weather forecasts, and when I heard the temperature of more than -40 degrees, I was really shocked, and I thought that it was so cold that I didn't freeze people to death. We can't stand it here at minus ten degrees. At that time, I could receive the radio stations of the enemy Taiwan, and sometimes I could receive the songs of Teresa Teng, which was simply a natural sound. However, Teresa Teng's songs at that time were not casually listened to, and they had to be listened to secretly. If Caught, you will be punished. When I listen, my heart is always pounding, and I am afraid.
Decades have passed, and now many families have abandoned the radio, and Teresa Teng's singing voice does not have to be overheard, let alone a natural sound. But radios are still my favorite, and there has never been a shortage of them in my home, not only of all types of radios, but also of many. I would rather not watch TV and listen to the CCTV news every morning and evening with almost no interruption.
Although the quality of the radio is many times stronger than before, the FM medium-wave short-wavelength wave is complete, compared to my family's first Shanhua brand radio, there is only one medium-wave band. However, due to too many sources of interference now, coupled with the high-rise buildings everywhere, no matter whether the radio waves in the day and night can hardly receive any radio stations, all that can be received are FM radio programs in several nearby cities, and there are too many advertisements, and the listening pleasure is not as good as before.
The childhood radio nostalgia is gone. My first Mountain Flower radio didn't know where it was discarded. I really miss it. My radio my childhood!