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

At noon, Xia Qingyue stewed a pot of pig's trotters and mushrooms.

After cooking for more than an hour, the yellow skin of the pig's trotter was stewed until it was soft and sticky, and it made a duangduang sound when touched. The lean meat was darker in color than when it was not cooked, and the soup was milky white, which looked delicious.

In fact, it is really delicious, very fresh, salty and fragrant, the mushrooms have absorbed the soup, are crispy and juicy in one mouthful.

In addition to stewed pig's trotters, there is also a dish of stir-fried tender pumpkin shreds.

The pig's trotter was a bit big and couldn't be held steadily with chopsticks, so she simply grabbed it with both hands and ate the meat in big mouthfuls. She bit down and it was delicious, including the skin and meat.

The meat was too salty and she felt sick of it, so the shredded pumpkin was so juicy and refreshing. She ate a bowl and a half of rice with the dish.

After eating, her stomach was slightly bulging. She burped twice and squinted her eyes happily.

The sun was strong and hot in the afternoon, so she simply washed up, changed her clothes and went to bed for a nap. Carrying water back and forth made her whole body sore whenever she turned over and moved.

She was really tired. She frowned and fell asleep in a daze.

After sleeping for an hour, she felt a little more energetic. It was around three or four o'clock in the afternoon, and the sun was still quite bright. She lay on the bed in a daze, emptying her mind.

For no reason, she recalled what she had said to the family she met in the morning.

She supported herself on the bed and sat up, leaning her back against the headboard, thinking seriously.

Normally, in the current situation, if one finds a good shelter in the mountains, wouldn't one wish that no one else knew about it except oneself, like her, so that one or one's family could live in hiding?

According to what the family said, they heard from others in the mountains that the cave by the river was a good place, and then they found their way there.

How could such a good thing happen out of nowhere?

She never believed in free pie falling from the sky.

The more she thought about it, the more she felt something was wrong and that there was something fishy going on.

She shook her head, unable to figure it out, and stopped thinking about it, getting up and doing something.

Wearing a straw hat and carrying a hoe and a shoulder pole, Xia Qingyue went to move soil from the unfinished pond.

All the soil was piled together, and there was already quite a lot of it. She didn't just move it here and dump it randomly, but dumped it in an orderly manner bit by bit from the beginning.

Originally, she intended to cultivate this piece of land to plant sweet potatoes. The sweet potatoes have sprouted branches and are growing well. They need to be pruned moderately, and the cuttings can survive if planted in the soil.

However, the weather did not go as she wished. The climate was hot and it had not rained for a long time. She was afraid that the sweet potatoes would not survive, so she used the trimmed sweet potato branches to feed chickens, ducks and rabbits.

Although she can't plant now, she can plant in the future, so she will still take good care of the land.

After carrying soil for more than ten times, she was sweating all over and her cheeks were red and hot. She was afraid that she would catch a cold and faint suddenly like last time, so she quickly stopped to sit down and rest and drink some honey water.

After sitting for twenty minutes, she felt less tired and picked up the hoe to dig the pond.

As the sun sets in the west, the blue sky is the background, and the colorful sunset glow is like sparkling gems dotted in between, which is beautiful beyond words.

Under the warm yellow light, Xia Qingyue's figure swinging a hoe and working was stretched out.

Next to the shadow, there was a black shadow with a pair of pointed ears, silently accompanying it.

They dug until dark, around 6:30, and then she went to harvest the cowpeas, eggplants, gourds, cucumbers and loofahs that she had dried in the morning.

It was such a big piece when cut, but after drying, there was only a little bit left, and it looked thin and small on the not-so-big bamboo raft or the large round winnowing basket.

With such a strong sun, the clothes have been dried out in two days.

The harvested dried cowpeas weighed more than two kilograms and were divided into two bundles and tied with straw ropes.

There are three pounds of eggplant and gourd each.

There are barely two kilograms of cucumber slices.

Dried food will become a little bigger after being soaked in water.

She packed them up and temporarily placed them in the utility room with other dry goods.

In a couple of days, when she comes back from cutting bamboo, she will make a few more shelves to organize the items so that they can be separated and opened separately, one for dry goods and the other for medicinal materials.

The kitchen also needs a medium-sized shelf to store seasonings and other things.

In the evening, she hastily ate dinner with leftovers, then lay on a large rock at the bottom of the tiankeng, using one hand as a pillow and the other hand to fan herself with a cattail leaf fan. When she raised her eyes, she was met with a sea of ​​brilliant stars.

She had seen such a beautiful starry sky when she was a child in the countryside in her previous life. Later, when she went out to work and lived in a big city, she had never seen such a night view.

Slightly retracting my gaze and looking straight ahead, under the bright moonlight, the camellia tree that looked like a circular wreath hundreds of meters away came into view.

There is sometimes a night breeze at night. Although it is hot, it can bring soothing floral scents.

It is said that if you keep calm you will feel cooler. Xia Qingyue feels that this statement makes sense.

For example, I am watching the night view now, lighting two pagoda-shaped mosquito coils below, without any mosquito bites, and I feel calm. I really don’t feel that hot, and I even feel a little tired.

The stone was big enough for her and Heihei to lie on, but it was really hard and hurtful.

She lay there for half an hour and then left, went back to wash up and rest early, as she had to get up and work before dawn from now on.

early morning.

Xia Qingyue got up early and carried water from the jar to water the camellia.

The camellia was watered every three days. After being exposed to the sun during the day, its flowers and leaves looked much more wilted. Several times she thought the flower was going to wither and die.

Fortunately, they were strong and recovered some strength the next morning.

She stroked a petal and sniffed the fragrance. "I will do my best to feed you."

That day, she stayed in the tiankeng, digging a pond when the sun was still young, and went to the fields to loosen the soil and weed in the evening.

She didn't pick many peppers to eat. In addition to saving some for seeds, she also wanted to wait for them to grow red and then dry them for easy storage.

In two or three days, a lot of cowpeas, gourds and cucumbers have grown, and we can dry another batch of them in a few days.

One day passed.

Before dawn, Xia Qingyue got up early, steamed some eggs, and ate them with Heihei Cao.

This morning, she is going to the bamboo forest to cut bamboo.

It is early now and people are still asleep, so it is the safest and most appropriate time to go out.

bamboo forest.

The sky is dark and the bamboo shadows are swaying.

The sound of chopping bamboo seemed abrupt in the quiet morning. She was afraid of attracting people, so she tried to pick bamboos that were still green and not rotten when they fell to the ground. They couldn't be too long, otherwise they would be too heavy to carry, and she had to pick bamboos of both thick and thin thicknesses.

The branches and leaves of the bamboo are removed and tied up with vines. Ten thin bamboos can be carried back at a time, and three or four thick ones.

After more than an hour's work, when the day was bright, she had carried more than twenty thin bamboos and ten thick bamboos back home, switching between her two shoulders, but she was still exhausted.

Passing by the stream, she caught a glimpse of the densely packed wild sweet potato vines growing on the shore.

In her previous life, wild sweet potato was one of the snacks she often ate as a child. It ripened from June to October every year. The fruits grew between the vines. Some were big and some were small. When ripe, they were red, and the flesh was a bit like a fig.