Chapter 12 12. Chatting in the Village
The end of February and the beginning of March are the rare leisure time for farmers throughout the year.
The New Year has come to an end, and the children have flown away with their families. The swallows on the beams have not yet turned around. More and more land is abandoned, with yellow and gray tones occupying large areas of land. .
Except for the green mountains in the distance and the vast expanse of green, the entire village was lonely and silent.
Today, the fields beside the bamboo forest of the old Song family were bustling again.
"Song Sancheng, what's going on with your family this year? Are you getting rich and ready to do something big? Do you have to clean up so many fields?"
"That's right, Old Song, what are you going to plant? What are you planning to do in the fields?" There are still two tea trees, don’t you want them?”
Everyone was invited by Song Sancheng to clean up the fields.
In the corner, the cultivator was rumbling, and before plowing the land, they first had to clean up all the weeds and trees in the field.
Otherwise, the little machine might get stuck.
Fortunately, there are many people, so working together is not only fun, but also very efficient. After tidying up one piece at the front, the tiller plowed it twice more at the back, and the combination was just right.
The people who came were all about the same age as Song Sancheng.
At their age, they go out to work, and most factories don’t want them.
The age requirement can be relaxed for people who do hard work, but their bosses are also afraid of getting into trouble.
In addition, people in their forties and fifties, who endured hardships and hardships when they were young, often have physical ailments and the like...
Now that I stay in the village, I just work for a while and take a break, trying not to burden the children.
Therefore, Song Sancheng said that asking people to work, bending down and exerting force for 150 days is not a good job, but everyone is willing to come.
As I get older, I also want to have fun.
Song Sancheng also sighed: "This tea is not worth much, and there is still such a large area on the hillside. I haven't taken care of it for many years... What are you keeping it for?"
< br>That's true.
Their place is not a famous tea place, just ordinary tea in Shangouzi. After frying it, we take it out for takeout. It costs fifty yuan a pound to drink it and it tastes delicious. There are really not many people outside who are willing to pay for it.
The tea trees in this field were so bare that I couldn’t see them in the first place...
But they are old!
I really couldn’t do the farm work that required a lot of effort, so I slowly accepted my fate.
“Then what do you want to do, cleaning up the land and cleaning up the mountains?”
The person asking the question was neighbor Li Baoni.
Song Sancheng didn’t know how to speak when it came to this.
What do you say?
Your daughter is not going to work and plans to come back to farm?
How many young people these days know how to farm? People in the village will laugh to death if you tell them!
So he said lightly: "It's nothing. My Tantan works too hard and her body can't bear it anymore. I told her that she needed help in farming at home and let her rest at home for a year and a half before going out. Go to work.”
That’s true.
Whose young people don’t try their luck outside?
Neighbor Li Baoni also sighed: "That's true. My daughter came back during the Chinese New Year with a sallow complexion. When asked, she worked overtime until one or two o'clock - the salary was only so little, and there was nothing left at the end of the year."< br>
Li Baoni’s daughter sells clothes in a chain store. He is sweet-tongued and talkative. Now he is a supervisor. He often does inventory late at night and travels to expand stores and the like. It is also hard work.
However, the environment has been bad in the past two years, wages have not increased, and we have to worry about whether there will be layoffs...
When it comes to children, every household has a hard time to read.
Zhou Shunshui, who was further away, also sighed: "Last time, my son asked us, the old couple, to live with them in the city and help take care of the children. The chili peppers in the supermarket outside the door cost more than ten yuan. It’s a pound of money! How can I afford it?”
“I take my children to kindergarten in the morning and pick them up and take them to interest classes in the evening. They are not in the same place. The bus makes me confused. The air conditioner blows on every day, so we can’t keep warm by burning the stove.”
“I couldn’t bear it after staying there for a week, so I decided to come back first.”
As for the old woman at home, of course she still couldn't bear to part with her grandson and stayed there to take care of her as best she could. Regardless of whether farming is reliable or not, the reason Song Sancheng came up with is decent anyway:
"Tan Tan also said that the food in the past few years has not been as delicious as before. I I thought, since people are still here, I might as well plant some vegetables and rice for my children, and it will be delicious for myself.”
The villagers were happy to hear this.
"Song Sancheng, you are the one who farms the most in the village now and has become a landlord - when your rice is ripe, I will stop buying rice and buy your rice instead."
"Yes, yes, I will buy it too. The rice outside looks white. It is all polished and has no nutrition at all. It costs several yuan per pound, and it is not as fragrant as the rice I grew myself before."
Song Sancheng didn't dare to agree: "My family only farms two fields. It's not enough for my family to share. If I don't sell it, I won't sell it."
Who here has never planted a field?
Everyone was unhappy when they heard this: "The two fields combined are several acres. What, your family eats several thousand kilograms of rice a year?"
Song Sancheng also laughed. : "What should we do? My rice seeds are good and taste good, but they are expensive. The best yield is only one thousand catties per mu. Seven hundred catties of rice from one thousand catties is enough to feed two or three people for a year."
"Looking back, my old man and my wife, my children's grandma, uncles, aunts and uncles...don't every household get some points?"
"This is enough for my family to eat."
In the village This is how relationships go. Neighbors and relatives always have to give a little, not more, but they have to show their affection.
When everyone calculated, it was not much more, but it was definitely a lot: "No, I have to eat your rice this year, otherwise I won't come when your family transplants rice!"< br>
Everyone responded one after another.
What he meant by that was that he was helping to plant rice without asking for money.
Song Sancheng didn't dare to respond: "With just two fields, it won't take us two days to plant rice by ourselves... Eat, eat, eat. Come and help when the rice is actually harvested. The rice will make you full!"
Everyone was laughing and joking. When a piece of land was cleared and ready to be changed, someone thought:
"Then you clear out these 20 acres of land, plant a few acres of rice, and plant the rest What are you going to do?”
Song Sancheng didn’t hide it: “Grow vegetables.”
"I'm thinking that if we don't spray medicine, we can take the shuttle bus to the market to sell it, so we won't lose money."
That won't make much money.
If we don’t spray pesticides, there will be just one layer of grass and insects, and the couple won’t have time to clean it up, so they won’t have to worry too much.
What's more, the road is not easy for them. There is a shuttle bus to every village every day, and it costs 40 yuan for a round trip...
The vegetables need to be fattened and labored, and the vegetable market is so Many vendors are also from rural areas near the city. They are closer than them and the competition is greater...
Earning comes and goes is hard-earned money.
Everyone made a calculation in their minds, it’s really not a good deal!
But after thinking about it: "That's okay, Lao Song, your family Qiao Qiao has to be watched. We are old and no one wants to work. It's good to grow our own vegetables."
"When the time comes, I will come to the field to buy and select now!"
......
...
Most of the varieties grown in the village are single, and the ripening seasons of each household overlap, so vegetables often need to be bought.
In addition, it is now allowed to sell pigs in rural areas, and you can kill pigs to eat yourself. It is illegal to kill pigs and sell them, so you cannot.
Tan Tan’s next step is to grow rice, watermelon, various vegetables, chestnuts from the mountains...and beekeepers, because milkvetch nectar is really not to be missed! There are also many wild vegetables.
Raise pigs, dogs, chickens, ducks and geese, as well as fish, shrimp, and water chestnuts.
What other crops do you like more? You are welcome to leave comments!
(End of this chapter)