An orphan girl from a farming family: Everyday farming in the mountains during natural disasters

Zhu Manfu said, "The elders of the Li family and Chen Yuzhen are here. Dad has gone out and hasn't come back yet. It's just me and grandma here. Mom, what happened?"

When Wu Chungui heard that Chen Yuzhen was also there, she became alert, as she thought that the other party was a difficult person.

As they were talking, Chen Yuzhen came out of the cave carrying a wooden basin and a wooden bucket.

When the two sides met, Wu Chungui was worried that the other party had heard her, so she put on a smile and said, "Sister Yuzhen, are you going to wash clothes?"

Chen Yuzhen nodded calmly, looked at Wu Chungui and her daughter's faces in surprise and asked, "Your faces?"

Wu Chungui's expression was a little unnatural. She gently touched her face. Her movements were very gentle, but it still hurt. She gasped in pain. "My mother and I went outside to find food, and we accidentally fell down the slope."

"Then you have to be more careful. The roads on the mountain are like this, bumpy and uneven. You guys go ahead and do your work. I have to go wash the clothes quickly." Chen Yuzhen went to the river.

Wu Chungui stared at Chen Yuzhen's receding back and muttered to himself, "Looking at her expression, she probably didn't hear it."

In an instant, her expression changed suddenly, "Fuer, go call your grandma out, let's go find your dad!"

Chen Yuzhen, who had already walked some distance, turned around and looked towards the cave, but could not see any members of the Zhu family.

She frowned and said, "They just mentioned Qingyue. Did I hear it right? Did they meet in the mountains?"

“This is not a good thing!”

Chen Yuzhen was worried.

Wu Chungui asked Zhu Manfu to call Old Lady Zhu out of the cave, and they hurried downstream to the river.

In order to eat fish, Zhu Sanbao has stayed by the river for several days, trying every way to catch fish. However, the results were not satisfactory. He only caught one fish twice, each time.

The Li family, who also lived in the cave, took the fish cages and put them into the river. When they collected them in the evening, they found a lot of fish and shrimp in the cages, which made the Zhu family jealous.

The Zhu family doesn't have a fish cage. When Grandpa Zhu was alive, all the woven items in the house were made by him. Now that he has passed away, no one knows how to weave a fish cage, so Zhu Sanbao brought a backpack today and thought about catching fish.

When Wu Chungui and his companions arrived at the river, they saw Zhu Sanbao standing in the river placing a backpack.

"Sanbao, come up quickly!" Wu Chungui shouted from the shore.

Zhu Sanbao got ashore, and Wu Chungui and her mother told him about their encounter with Xia Qingyue, adding exaggeration to the story.

Zhu Manzhen also told the story of finding mulberries but having them all picked by Xia Qingyue.

"What? She really said that she would feed the mulberries to the dogs instead of giving them to an old woman like me?" Old Mrs. Zhu was so angry that her face turned red and her saliva flew everywhere. "How dare this damned little girl be so disobedient and unfilial!"

Mrs. Zhu, who is over 50 years old, is in high spirits. She is not tall, about 1.5 meters tall, thin and old like tree bark. Her face is wrinkled and loose, with little flesh and dark skin. Her pair of slanted eyes exude a domineering look.

"Ah? Is her name Qingyue? Why do I remember it was Qing...yu?" Zhu Sanbao was puzzled.

"That's right, now she doesn't care about grandma, parents and other elders at all!" Zhu Manzhen hoped that the whole family would find Xia Qingyue and teach her a lesson to avenge the injury on her face.

Wu Chungui hadn't forgotten the important thing after all. "Um, Mom, Sanbao, do you still remember the black dog that Er Niang's family originally raised?"

"Black dog?" Zhu Sanbao fell into reminiscence.

"Yes, there was a black dog, quite black. How come the dog is still there?" Old Mrs. Zhu glanced at her daughter-in-law Wu Chungui with a thoughtful expression on her face, and it was obvious that she was also thinking about something.

"It's still there, it's grown so big!" Wu Chungui gestured with her hands, "I guess it must weigh several dozen kilograms!"

"It's such a big dog, and the dog meat must be extremely delicious!" Zhu Sanbao was greedy and swallowed his saliva.

"Dad, Mom, and Grandma, let's go catch a dog now. Dog meat is delicious!" Zhu Manfu was impatient.

Zhu Manzhen couldn't wait and wanted to find Xia Qingyue for revenge.

"It's getting late today. I'm afraid that damn girl has hidden in the shelter. We'll go there tomorrow. Then we can do this... that..."

Wu Chungui told his plan.

"That's great! Let's go see how the shelter of Er Niang and the others is. If it's good, we'll all move in. Ask Da Song to move the things. The Li family is not good people. They always quibble over everything!

When we move to a better place, the Li family will surely envy us."

Old Mrs. Zhu said this with a smile, thinking that this arrangement was perfect.

These words touched Wu Chungui's heart. She smiled and took Old Lady Zhu's arm, flattering her, "Mom, you are really thoughtful. We are a family. I think my second sister and her family will not refuse us to live together."

"They dare!" Old Mrs. Zhu's face turned stern and her tone was firm.

"My brother-in-law is a hunter. We can eat meat every day from now on!" Zhu Sanbao smiled happily. He took it for granted that moving in with Zhu Erniang and the others was the most normal thing.

"It's great that we have meat to eat!" Zhu Manfu cheered.

In this way, the Zhu family was immersed in the beautiful dream of moving into Xia Qingyue's shelter and eating meat every day.

-

Ever since she met the Zhu family downstream of the stream, Xia Qingyue no longer passed by that area during her daily activities.

In the following days, she stayed in the tiankeng in the morning to dig a pond, digging slowly, not rushing for too much fatigue that her body could not bear.

In the afternoon, she would carry a backpack and a wooden bucket and basket and go upstream to the stream. Sometimes, if she was lucky, she could find some mushrooms, ferns, and leeks. There were still a lot of them, so she would dig some extra and bring them back to plant.

When she couldn't find good wild vegetables, she would go to the stream to catch crabs and river shrimps and crayfish.

That afternoon she picked up a lot of yellow clams and planned to make spicy clams.

She had been abstaining from food for so long after her illness that she had long missed the taste of strong flavors.

Pour the washed clams into the pot and boil without adding water. The clams will release water during the cooking process. When all the shells are opened, remove them and let cool. Some of the water released by the clams will remain in the pot. It is light white and can be kept for later use.

When the clams have cooled down, remove the half of the shell without the meat, leaving only the half with the meat. Personally, I like to eat them with some shell on. You can also remove all the shells and leave only the meat.

Pour lard into the pot and heat until smoking, then add ginger, garlic, dried chilies and Sichuan peppercorns and stir-fry until fragrant. Next, pour in clams and add appropriate amounts of salt, soy sauce and fresh matsutake mushrooms. Add a circle of rice wine around the pot to remove the fishy smell and enhance the flavor. Then pour in a small half bowl of the remaining clam water, cover and simmer.

Cook for about three minutes, stir-fry a few times, remove from the pan and put into a bowl.

Although the clam meat is small, it tastes particularly delicious and chewy. Take a bite and eat it along with the spicy and fragrant soup, which is very satisfying.

Xia Qingyue ate until she was seven-tenths full.

After dinner, she dismantled the rack for smoking bacon and moved it to a cool and ventilated place. The bacon was completely smoked. It would easily go bad if not properly stored.

It was still early, so she took a walk to digest her food, then found some dry straw from last year, twisted it into ropes and made her own straw sandals.