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

Xia Qingyue learned the skill of making straw sandals from her grandmother.

When I was a child, my grandmother would make straw sandals before the summer every year. She had a pair of skillful hands and could weave many things, among which straw sandals were made quickly and well. She would weave them and sell them when she was not busy with farming.

Conditions were difficult at that time, and my grandmother wore straw sandals, but she always kept the good ones for her and used the money from selling the sandals to buy her beautiful sandals. Except for her parents, my grandmother did her best to give her everything that her peers had.

Xia Qingyue was knitting as she recalled the memories of her childhood living with her grandmother in her previous life, a happy smile on her face.

There was no oil lamp for lighting, so she usually worked at night at the square table near the stove where there was fire burning and light was coming out.

After sitting for a while, the backs of my hands and neck that were exposed began to itch, due to mosquito bites.

She would scratch it every once in a while.

Xia Qingyue knitted a pair of shoes that fit her foot size. She didn't dare sit outside anymore, so she quickly took a shower and went into the room.

She placed dried wormwood and mint in several corners of the room, and closed the doors and windows in the afternoon so that there were no mosquitoes inside.

Before going to bed, she thought about what she was going to do tomorrow.

Mosquito coils have to be made quickly. The reason they were not made a few days ago is that the medicinal materials need to be dried thoroughly.

Secondly, the matter of making candles also had to be put on the agenda. It would be very inconvenient to have no lighting at night.

The essential material for making candles is beeswax.

Or it can be made with Tung oil tree, but so far, she has not seen it in the mountains.

With beeswax, she can also make mosquito repellent and anti-itching cream with the same effect as floral water.

She wanted to go out tomorrow afternoon to the beehive she had seen by chance some time ago.

I didn't make sufficient preparations beforehand, so I didn't dare to act rashly.

Early the next morning.

Xia Qingyue gathered all the mosquito repellent materials and placed them on the dining table, including charcoal, dried lemongrass, mint and mugwort.

All the materials are crushed and ground into powder using a stone mortar. Take an appropriate amount of each powder. The charcoal mainly serves as a flammable ingredient, while the fragrance of the other medicinal materials serves to repel mosquitoes.

Mix all kinds of flour together, add appropriate amount of water and mix well to make a black dough like dough.

She brought the dough to a place under the tiankeng where it could get sun, rolled the dough into the shape of a pagoda, and put them down one by one.

In the past, mosquito coils came in circles, and if two circles were put together, they would break if you were not careful.

Xia Qingyue didn't like that, so she made it into a pagoda shape that could burn for about ten hours, which was easy to use and easy to take.

More than a hundred pagodas were built at one time, filling up a small area on the ground.

Just put it in the sun for a day to dry and you can use it.

In the morning, Xia Qingyue stayed in the tiankeng to build a pond. Before the first excavation, she took charcoal and drew a circle at the selected location. Hand-drawn ones are definitely not standard, so she just drew a rough outline and then started excavating in the area.

After digging for a few days, there was some success. A pit about ten meters wide and one meter deep was dug out.

She would dig and carry the excavated soil to the vegetable plot and pile it up. She didn't like to make things messy.

After lunch, she cut some garlic and wild onion roots into a bamboo tube, added water to make onion and garlic water, took the flint backpack, and called Heihei to go out.

About seven or eight days ago, she saw a beehive in the crevice between two huge rocks in the woods. It was bigger than a watermelon weighing dozens of kilograms, and was surrounded by buzzing bees.

Today she was fully armed for the decisive battle against the hive. Even her whole body, including her limbs, was covered with a long robe, leaving only her face exposed.

As they approached their destination, Xia Qingyue tied up her trouser legs and sleeves, covered her face with a layer of gauze, and sprayed a large amount of onion and garlic water on herself and Heihei.

Bees don't like things with strong odors like onion and garlic water.

buzzing-

There are scattered bees flying in the air, and the sound of their flapping wings can be faintly heard.

The boulder is about thirty meters high, and the beehive is seven or eight meters above the ground.

The surface of the honeycomb is covered with densely packed small holes, and many bees are crawling on them.

Xia Qingyue, who was wrapped tightly, asked Heihei to wait for her behind. She went to the ground under the beehive with hay and firewood and spread the hay and firewood there.

"Crack." The flint rubbed against the sparks and burned on the hay. The fire immediately grew bigger and thick smoke billowed up, directly smoking the beehive above.

She took advantage of the situation and hid behind a large rock at the back to observe the situation.

Disturbed by the thick smoke, groups of bees buzzed away from the hive and flew far away, while some did not fly far and lingered nearby.

The hay and wood burned for several minutes, and from time to time some bees flew out from the back.

After waiting for a long time, no bees flew out, so Xia Qingyue asked Heihei to wait for her in the distance. She climbed onto the platform protruding from the boulder and quickly took off the backpack on her back. She placed the backpack against the stone wall, facing the beehive above.

She stood on tiptoe, holding a thick wooden stick in her hand, and used it to fiddle with the beehive, intending to poke it down, but her progress was not smooth. She did not have enough strength and could hardly shake the hive.

Buzz, three bees flew out of the hive and flew near Xia Qingyue in the blink of an eye. They flew to the mask on her face.

Her whole body was stiff, and she kept holding the wooden stick, not daring to move. It would be terrible if she got stung.

Fortunately, the bee seemed to sense the strong and pungent smell of onion and garlic water on her body and flew away after a few seconds.

She hurried to keep poking, and poking, and the entire beehive was cracked, and one third of it fell into the backpack, and a few bees flew out in the process.

Three bees landed on Xia Qingyue's body, on her chest and arms. One stayed for a few seconds and then flew away, and the remaining two did not move.

She was secretly worried, fearing that the bee would sting her with the onion and garlic water.

In a hurry, she gritted her teeth and burst out with amazing strength to continue poking the beehive several times.

There was a "click" sound, followed by a "plop" sound, and the beehive between the rocks fell down.

A few frightened bees flew out.

The bees that were lingering nearby seemed to sense something and gradually turned around and flew over.

Xia Qingyue picked up the backpack, covered it tightly with a large piece of old cloth that had been sprinkled with onion and garlic water, and tried to lift it with one hand to put it on her back, but she underestimated the weight and failed to lift it up.

There were so many big beehives that they almost filled up the big backpack.

Seeing the bees getting closer and closer, she squatted down, carried the backpack, moved to the edge of the stone platform, supported herself on the stone and jumped down.

The moment she landed, the backpack was firmly on her body, and her shoulders and back felt heavy.

During the process, the two bees on her body fell and flew onto the grass.

She ran very fast, "Heihei, run!"

Heihei moved quickly and ran after her.

Xia Qingyue did not run in panic, but ran towards the stream with a purpose. If there were many bees chasing her, she could hide in the water.

On the way to the stream, she sprinkled onion and garlic water on her black body. Some bees that were catching up quickly retreated after smelling the onion and garlic water emanating from their bodies and backpacks.

More than twenty minutes later, at the stream.

Having completely escaped the pursuit of the bees, Xia Qingyue sat down exhaustedly on a rock to catch her breath. She was almost exhausted from running.

Hehehe——

My throat feels like it's burning and I'm so thirsty.

She looked around, trying to find some wild fruits to quench her thirst.