1994: Vegetable farmers strike back

Chapter 96: Even Being a Melon Requires Appearance

After coming out of the bank, the sky turned bright white again.

It’s not as sunny, but still hot.

Chen Jiazhi muttered, "It feels like it's going to rain again."

Yi Dinggan also looked up at the sky. "Rain is normal in this season. The market trend will continue. Brother, it seems that you are really going to make a fortune."

Chen Jiazhi smiled and said, "If you work hard, you will reap rewards. Come on, Brother Yi, you have to believe in yourself and make it bigger and stronger."

“Well, make it bigger and stronger!”

The two rode their bikes back home. After arriving home, they put the passbook away, locked the door, and went out to work.

Chen Jiazhi carried a hoe and came to field No. 7.

Li Xiu was thinning out the seedlings with a few female workers. The current management was a bit chaotic, with some tasks being done separately and some together.

But there are still not many people, so this is no problem, as we can focus on making progress.

Just like now, Chen Jiazhi called three male workers, Qi Yongfeng, Ao Dehai and Ao Deliang, to come together to shallowly plow Field No. 7.

Because he felt it was going to rain again.

So I want to grab two pieces of land to sow seeds first.

The land had been deeply plowed and fertilized with fermented pig manure, and the surface of the ridges was also standard, but it was compacted by the heavy rain in the middle of the night on the 17th.

It was dried for a day on the 18th and most of the day today. Even though the soil moisture is still not low, it is still okay to turn it over shallowly.

Sweat flowed down his temples, leaving salt stains on his skin.

The four people plowed the land quickly, and by almost six o'clock, the last acre of land on No. 7 had been cleared again.

"Dehai, Deliang, go pick up the vegetables. Yongfeng and I will dig out the last piece of number 8. We need to plant the next batch of seeds quickly."

In addition to Chinese cabbage, kale and mustard greens should also be sown.

Although the sowing time is a bit close, who knows when there will be another chance to sow if it rains later?
Therefore, Chen Jiazhi planned to sow the seeds tonight without delaying for a whole night.

"Okay, boss, let's go pick up the vegetables."

Ao Dehai and the other man put the hoe aside and would take it back with them when they came back to pick vegetables. Then they shouted.

"Zhao Yu, prepare to harvest the vegetables!"

"Good~"

Communication is basically done by shouting, and the competition is about who has the loudest voice. It's like a command, and the vegetable farmers have almost started to harvest the vegetables.

As soon as Chen Jiazhi reached Site 8, he seemed to hear someone calling him.

Turning around, he saw Li Xiu looking at him quietly beside the loofah vines.

Oh, I almost forgot that it takes two people to save the seeds~
"Yongfeng, you dig first and call Huang Juan over. I'm going to the loofah field and then I'll go sow the seeds directly."

"Okay." Qi Yongfeng responded, and then he shouted crisply: "Juan, start digging the ground~"

After arranging the work, Chen Jiazhi also followed Li Xiu.

After arriving, Chen Jiazhi discovered that the two puppies were also enjoying the coolness under the loofah vines.

When they saw him coming, they all stood up from the ground and wagged their tails vigorously.

Li Xiu also stood next to the vines, holding a pair of scissors in her hand. There was a bucket of loofahs at her feet, with paper and pen for marking in the bucket.

"Let's go, Xiu, let's go and save the seeds together."

So the two of them crawled into the loofah vines.

The loofah vines were so dense and covered everything that if someone who didn't know saw them, they would think the two people were going to do something shameful.

In fact, it is simply to leave seeds for loofah.

In addition to saving seeds, you also need to cut some loofahs to sell.

"Hey, Li Xiu, this loofah is good. We can save it for seeds."

"Oh." Li Xiu Yu replied reluctantly. She still wanted to sell it.

"This one on my hand is also good, it's OK."

"That one is good. The melon has a neat shape, sharp corners, and clear lines. You can tell it's bearing good seeds."

"That's not bad, keep it."

"Hey, this one is great. The ridges are like the veins of mountains and rivers, and it has a natural and wild charm."

Chen Jiazhi was nitpicking from time to time.

Suddenly, Li Xiu said, "Why don't you just keep them all?"

Chen Jiazhi knew she was upset as soon as he heard it.

"Are you angry?"

"No, let's keep this and that. Let's just leave them all together."

Chen Jiazhi smiled and said, "Those crooked and cracked ones still have to be cut off. Only the good-looking ones can be kept."

Li Xiu pouted.

Chen Jiazhi added: "Just like our child, you definitely want him to be good-looking, so you chose me and I chose you."

Li Xiu: "I think our melons are pretty good."

"There are also unqualified ones." Chen Jiazhi picked up a loofah at random.

"Look at this. The surface of the loofah is all bumpy and uneven, and covered with scabs. This kind of thing cannot be kept. It needs to be cut off."

"And those with sharp edges that look like strange rocks, or those tree roots that are sticking together and are twisted and unbalanced, also need to be cut off."

Li Xiu looked at the two loofahs and found that it was indeed the case.

After a two-second pause, Li Xiu handed the scissors to Chen Jiazhi again. Chen Jiazhi was stunned.

"Here, you cut it and I'll take notes."

So, you can just leave the ugly ones to me?
But there was nothing he could do.

I could only take the scissors obediently.

With two consecutive clicks, he put the two loofahs into the bucket with disgust.

Weird and ugly~
Actually, there weren't many loofahs left.

The two of them, one in front and one behind, one tall and one short, shuttled back and forth among the loofah vines, exchanging a few words from time to time.

The two puppies were also playing under the melon vines, running over there and then running back.

While Chen Jiazhi was cutting off the crooked and cracked melons, he was also observing the loofahs for seeds and instructing Li Xiu to take notes.

Make the same record for the same type of melon.

In fact, most of them are the same, with regular flower shapes, beautiful patterns and smooth branches, meeting the standards for seed preservation.

When he was halfway there, Chen Jiazhi saw a loofah in the middle of a vine that caught his eye.

"Li Xiu came to see this melon, so I made a special sign for it."

Li Xiu took a look and asked, "Is there anything special?"

"Look at its edges and corners. The lines are as strong as bones. It feels natural and powerful. You can tell it's a good melon at first glance."

After a pause, Chen Jiazhi continued, "I hope our son can be like this melon, full of drive and strength."

Li Xiu: "How can you be so sure it's a son? What if it's a daughter?"

She had heard similar words many times.

Chen Jiazhi was choked with speech.

Could he say he knew the answer in advance?

Chen Jiazhi thought for a moment and said, "Why don't you also pick a loofah for the baby in your belly?"

"also."

After walking a few steps forward, Li Xiu also took a fancy to a loofah.

"Let's take this one, do you think it's okay?"

Chen Jiazhi took a look and said, "Okay, it's a good choice. The surface is concave and convex like natural carvings, simple and elegant. It seems that you, Li Xiu, like your child to be more quiet."

"..."

"You've said all the good and bad things, and it's all so pedantic. I don't understand."

"Oh."

The melon was finally kept.

As the sun sets,

When the two men walked out of the melon vines, the bucket in their hands was just barely filled with loofah and bitter melon.

Ok,
They are all ugly in their own way.

Although it is not ruled out that there are some interesting souls in it, but the reality is so cruel~
"I'll go and pick some seedlings~"

After leaving a word, Li Xiu left impatiently, leaving Chen Jiazhi alone to take the melon back and put it in the basket.

This work was also done by Li Xiu before.

But who made Li Xiu a face party, otherwise he would not have fallen in love with Chen Jiazhi in the first place~
Placing the last twisted loofah into the basket, Chen Jiazhi sighed, "It seems that even good melons have to be beautiful. You'd be rejected at the market. It's only because there's a shortage of vegetables lately that people want all sorts of crooked and cracked melons."

...

After planting the melons, Chen Jiazhi went back into the house to get some choy sum seeds.

There was no time to soak the seeds.

So he used a little more, and then went to field 7-5 and directly spread the cabbage seeds over an acre without spreading them over two days because he was afraid of rain.

By the time we finished sowing the cabbage seeds, it was already dark.

As we passed by 7-1, we vaguely saw someone thinning out the seedlings in the fields. "Li Xiu?"

"Hmm~"

Well, he had to go and "invite" Li Xiu back. It was probably like raising ducks in the paddy fields in his hometown. Every night there would always be a few ducks that refused to come home and needed the owner to find them.
Maybe ducks are easier to take care of, after all, they can only quack.

And Li Xiu would argue and glare~
"I just can't keep up with the farm work."

Chen Jiazhi: "I will hire more workers to take care of thinning and weeding."

On the ridge of the field, the two dogs seemed to sense the subtle atmosphere and ran to the eaves in a flash.

After sending Li Xiu home, Chen Jiazhi went out with some kale and mustard seeds.

Similarly, if the seeds are not soaked, the germination rate will be affected and the seedlings will emerge one or two days later.

But it’s much better than not planting anything.

I plan to sow Chinese kale and mustard greens to 8-5, also sowing 1 mu, 0.5 mu of each vegetable.

When he was sowing, Qi Yongfeng and Huang Juan also watered the soil at 7-5. The soil was already relatively moist, so only a shallow watering was needed, and then the shade net was covered.

At night, the vegetable fields are pitch black, with only the chirping of cicadas and birdsong to be heard, but the vegetable farmers know that they are not alone.
But as time goes by, fewer and fewer vegetable farmers remain in the fields.

I do not know how long it has been,

Ao Dehai and the other three who were collecting the vegetables also straightened their backs and said, "Call it a day, call it a day~"

Zhao Yu still felt unsatisfied: "There's still not enough vegetables in the field. I feel like there won't be any left in a few days."

Although it was pitch black, several people knew that the vegetables under their feet had been cleared out again.

Ao Deliang and Lai Guihui also stretched their bodies and looked at each other in the dark.

The plots of land where vegetables were recently harvested are nominally managed by Ao Dehai and his friend, and they earn commission from them.

What Zhao Yu meant by this might be that there are fewer vegetables now, and if there are two more of them to collect them, it will affect the commissions she and Ao Dehai can get.

Ao Deliang said, "In a day or two, Guihui and I will go back to the fields and not harvest the vegetables."

Ao Dehai lit a cigarette and said, "Let's harvest them together. We still have quite a lot of vegetables. There are still several batches left. We will definitely have 700 kilograms of choy sum every day."

He also looked at Zhao Yu who was about to speak, and said, "We have a lot of vacant land now. We must hurry and cultivate it so that we can plant seeds. If we don't plant seeds, how will we harvest vegetables later?"

Zhao Yu was stunned.

It seems so.

There have been a lot of vegetable harvests recently, so a piece of land becomes vacant almost every one or two days. Including the piece under my feet, there should be six or seven pieces of vacant land.

Mr. Chen has been sowing seeds on the 7th and 8th recently.
And after sowing today, there will be no more land on the 7th and 8th. If we want to sow, we can only rely on them~
Under the eaves,
Watching Ao Dehai and Ao Deliang bring back the last two picks of vegetables, Chen Jiazhi took a quick look.

This portion is a bit more normal.
(End of this chapter)