Our school is in Weizikeng outside Deshengmen, only one stop away from Qijiahuozi. At that time, there were no buildings around the school, only a crop. There is only a small restaurant near Qijia Huozi Tucheng, which sells baked wheat cakes and the like. Whenever students have disposable food stamps in their hands or are really hungry, they always ask their classmates to buy some fire in Qijia's small restaurant, or simply go there to have a fire. Although they can't solve the problem of stomach fundamentally, they will eventually become a little greedy and addicted.
Interestingly, I don't know who first called this kind of fire "φ 100". This is determined according to the diameter of the fire about100 mm. Because φ represents the diameter on the engineering drawing, 100 represents the length of100 mm. Therefore, this title spread among students.
Once in a Chinese class, the teacher was explaining Mr. Mao Dun's prose "Talk about Mountains and Rivers" with relish, saying that this article was ostensibly talking about scenery, but actually boasting people. Human beings are the builders of landscape, including human activities, human spirit and human vitality, so the scenery is the most beautiful where there are human activities (this central idea is still clearly remembered today).
Having said that, I can't help asking my classmates: "Students, where do you think the scenery around our school is the most beautiful?" What the students blurted out was "Qijia Huozi has the most beautiful scenery". The teacher was full of praise: Qijiahuozi was the site of the ancient city wall in Yuan Dynasty (before that, we didn't know it was the site of the ancient city wall in Yuan Dynasty, at least it was the first time I heard of it), how many touching stories our ancestors had staged on this site, and so on. As soon as the teacher's voice fell, the whole class burst into laughter and said almost in unison, "Qijia Huozi still sells φ 100." The teacher didn't know what we were talking about and who was selling the so-called φ 100 there, so he was surprised. Although the teacher was surprised, he didn't condemn us at all, and finally praised everyone. After all, because of people's activities there, the most beautiful scenery has been formed in our hearts.
After several decades, great changes have taken place in the area of Qijiahuozizikeng. Our life is no longer happy because we can eat a sesame seed cake. Looking back on that era, I still think that the dirt road, the lonely hut and the people selling fire around dirty aprons are the most beautiful scenery.