Diary of the Army in the 1970s

Blurb: Recommending pre-ordered stories: Another Day of Torturing the Baby-Raising System, Top-Tier Beauty, Becoming a Duchess After Fleeing Famine.

Blurb for this story: Wen Jiajia transmigr...

Chapter 019 Red Mushroom Fungus

Chapter 019 Red Mushroom Fungus

It's time for Wei Dai to return to the army.

Before going back, I came to Fuyang Brigade to meet Jia Jia.

The team is currently harvesting soybeans, which are summer-sown soybeans. It is said that there are also autumn-sown soybeans planted in the fields in front of the village, so they will have to harvest another crop in November.

Because of the good climate, people there have not been any hunger in the past two years.

But because the climate is good, there is work to do all year round.

Needless to say, in spring, the weather is not too cold, the soil never freezes, and the land can be plowed after the fifteenth day of the first lunar month.

Summer and autumn are the peak seasons for farming. Not only do farmers have to work on the crops, they also have to protect the forests.

There are many forests in several communes near the county seat, and wood is also a resource.

In the original owner's memory, every winter a car would come to the county and leave with a load of wood.

Therefore, during the free time, the team leader had to organize the team members to weed and plant trees in the mountains, and sometimes they would also transport trees. The original owner's parents were able to buy a new house by transporting trees for others.

As for winter, it is also difficult to be idle.

Winter comes late here. Even in October, you still have to wear short sleeves. You won't feel cold until the first light snow.

In winter, we have to cut sugarcane, dig bamboo shoots, and dig dams... Wen Jiajia felt a headache every time she thought about it.

The soybeans of the Fuyang Brigade are not economic food; after harvest, all of them belong to the team members.

However, Fang Baoguo would sell a batch to Chendun Tofu Shop, and the rest would be distributed to the team members.

You have to shell the soybeans yourself.

When Wei Dai arrived, he heard Jia Jia was transporting soybeans home. She had to carry the soybean stalks together, and her home was far from the soybean field, so the journey was quite tiring.

He took the wheelbarrow and started pushing it. "I'll do it. You put some more bean poles in there."

Wen Jiajia did not refuse. She ran to the field, moved some bean stalks and stacked them on the cart, and did not stop until the cart was about to fall.

She understood that Wei Dai was going back to the army.

Wei Dai glanced at her helplessly without saying anything. He went to the nearby hillside to look for something and pulled a vine to secure the huge pile of bean stalks to the cart to prevent it from collapsing during transportation.

He finally understood that Jia Jia was not being modest and she really was not very good at farm work.

"Hurry up, hurry up!" Wen Jiajia urged, "Someone will come to ask questions later."

These days, wherever she goes, people ask her when she will marry Wei Dai, and she is almost getting her ears tangled from hearing this.

It took Wei Dai three trips to transport all the soybeans from a field.

The soybeans that were brought back were placed directly in the front and back yards to be exposed to the sun, and it took several days for them to shed their shells.

Wei Dai drank a glass of water and said, "There will be about 20 kilograms of soybeans here. If you want to keep them for a longer time, you have to expose them to the sun for five or six days after removing the shells. They will grow for about half a year."

Wen Jiajia sat paralyzed in the chair: "Half a year? I can finish it in less than half a year." If there was a soy milk machine, it would be faster.

She likes soy products very much, especially soy milk. She would drink a bowl of it every day after she left the dormitory and lived alone in her previous life.

Wei Dai stroked her fluffy hair and said, "Then I'll go with you to the team to buy some more soybeans. If you don't have enough food, you can buy more from the team."

Wen Jiajia shook her head: "That's enough." Soybeans are not necessary to eat. With the money she would like to buy some cotton.

The team also grows cotton, and it is the women's team that grows it. They started to reclaim land several years ago, and so far, they have reclaimed more than 80 mu of land, which has directly saved the Fuyang team members from the plight of having no cotton.

This group was even featured in the newspapers and won the title of advanced collective. Director Fang Liuyu also wanted to recruit her into the Gengshan Sisters Team, but she was a hopeless waste and didn't even last half a day there, which really brought shame to the women's group.

Wen Jiajia was feeling a little down, so she held Wei Dai's hand and said, "What time is your bus tomorrow? I really don't want to leave you."

Her words hit Wei Dai's heart straight, and he stopped breathing at that moment. He was slightly stunned, and felt his chest was hot, as if bubbles were coming out.

Wei Dai stuttered: "I, I can't bear to leave you either." He had countless words to say to her, but he couldn't say them.

Wen Jiajia looked up at him, put her arms around his waist, and rubbed her head against his abdomen.

Wei Dai's body tensed up and his entire body tensed up. Wen Jiajia could feel his muscles getting harder through his thin clothes.

Well, there are eight pieces, Wen Jiajia counted secretly. She doesn't like skinny men, she must have strong men.

What seemed like extremely normal behavior to Wen Jiajia was considered outrageous by Wei Dai.

However, Wei Dai was reluctant to refuse. He felt that he had to consider getting married. Not only that, he also had to consider joining the army after marriage.

On this day, Wei Dai fixed the water pipe for Wen Jiajia's family.

Ever since he knew that the Wen family needed to collect water, he had been preparing to do this, but the water pipes were not purchased until yesterday.

Wei Dai fixed the last section of the water pipe to the mountain wall next to the vegetable garden, patted the dirt off his hands and said, "Just use it for now. It's almost the same as the tap water in the city, except that the water is smaller and the water may be cut off in winter."

I have to say, this water pipe really touched Wen Jiajia's heart.

God knows how uncomfortable it is for her to fetch water every day.

With this water pipe, the water from the mountain wall will flow from the pipe to the water tank in the backyard. She placed two large water tanks in the backyard. As long as the two water tanks are full, it can guarantee that the family will have water for at least three days.

The sky is a bit gloomy this evening, and there is no fiery red sunset in the sky. I guess the weather tomorrow will not be very good.

Wen Jiajia cooked more than ten tea leaf eggs and some wet peanuts and salted beans, stuffed them into Wei Dai's arms and said, "Take them with you on the road. Tea leaf eggs spoil easily, so it's best to eat them up tomorrow. The peanuts and salted beans can be kept until the day after tomorrow."

Perhaps because he was about to leave, Wei Dai's eyes were glued to her, not wanting to leave for even a moment.

When he was about to leave, he suddenly said, "When you are old enough, let's get married, okay?"

Wen Jiajia kicked his feet, put her hands behind her back and said, "We'll talk about it when the time comes."

Wei Dai smiled. Since she didn't refuse outright, that meant she was very likely to agree.

"I will get the application for joining the army as soon as possible, don't worry." After saying this, he plucked up the courage to kiss her forehead, waved and turned away.

Farm work was too hard, and he didn't want her to continue doing it.

The evening breeze was whistling, and Wen Jiajia watched his back disappear on the path at the entrance of the village.

She felt a little lost.

——

Wei Dai's departure did not make Wen Jiajia depressed for long. In less than two days, she struggled out of this state of lack of energy to do anything.

There's nothing we can do. We have to eat.

The third phase of autumn harvest has begun in the village.

Just as Wei Dai said, the first few days are the most tiring, but it will be much easier towards the end.

The rice in the village has been harvested. Captain Fang and the village's experienced farmers think that the land needs to be nurtured, otherwise it is likely that the land will not be fertile enough next year.

How is it cultivated? The local people burn straw and use the ashes to cultivate the land.

However, Wen Jiajia had seen the dish of “roasting rice husks over fire” in her previous life, and she was hesitant whether to say it out loud.

Let's not talk about it. At this time, food is lifeline. She also wants to make the land more fertile so that she can harvest more food next year.

Let me tell you...this practice comes from the neighboring island country.

These days, having any connection with a foreign country is a dead end, let alone an island country.

After hesitating for a night, Wen Jiajia felt that she still couldn't take the risk. The time-travel god was willing to give her two lives, but most likely he was not willing to give her a third life.

But she could hint at it indirectly, and whether the old farmers in the village could understand it and how much they could understand depended on them.

It's not that early to deal with the matter of fertilizer, so Wen Jiajia just wrote it down in her little notebook for the time being.

Wen Jiajia has a lot of things she wants to do, so she writes them down to avoid forgetting.

The soybeans and mung beans have been harvested. This year, there is a bumper crop of beans. I guess every household will have to make tofu and grow bean sprouts by the end of the year.

As for sweet potatoes, another staple food, half have been dug up and the other half are still in the ground.

There is no need to worry about the sweet potatoes. As long as it doesn't rain heavily and there are no wild boars, they won't go bad if you harvest them a few days later.

After taking a bath, dusk fell.

Wen Jiajia never liked to go out and had no close friends in the village. After taking a shower every night, she would stay in her room and strictly follow the health concept of going to bed before 9 o'clock.

She is the same today.

With the windows closed, the room became pitch black until a light was lit.

There was a straw mat on the ground. Wen Chun and Wen Xuan were sitting on the ground, fiddling with the small wooden blocks that Wei Dai had made for them. They were actually building blocks.

Wei Dai was not only good at carpentry, but also good at electrical work. It was said that he was also good at electrical work. One day, there was a problem with the commune's electrical wires, and he was the one who repaired it.

Wen Jiajia felt that even if he retired in the future and was not assigned a good job, he would not be worried about having no food to eat.

Very capable.

There are two sets of building blocks, each with 188 blocks, which are now assembled into a small house by Wen Chun and Wen Xuan.

This was something the two girls put together after arguing for a long time.

Wen Chun wanted a two-story building, but Wen Xuan wanted a three-story building. In the end, Wen Jiajia was annoyed by the quarrels and made a decisive decision, asking them to build a four-story building.

Listening to children's talk is not boring. It is much more interesting than going out to chat and gossip.

At this moment, she took out her little notebook from the drawer and opened the folded page. Well, the next task was to pick red mushrooms.

There is a very famous mushroom species in the area - the red mushroom.

This kind of mushroom was hard to find a few decades ago and was a rare and precious mushroom. But now, it is everywhere in the mountains.

It grows in mixed forests or broad-leaved mixed forests, and mixed forests are more common in the area.

It rained a little last night and the temperature rose at the right time, so the red mushrooms, which love moisture and high temperatures, broke out of the ground.

Although it looks gorgeous and is nicknamed the "red umbrella", it is not poisonous and is said to be very fresh.

You can't eat meat casually these days, so when Wen Jiajia comes across this kind of wild delicacy, of course she has to try it.

Even though the time coincided with the autumn, it couldn't stop her harvest from enjoying the wild delicacies.

While Wen Jiajia was thinking about how to cook, there was a soft knock on the door.

Sometimes wooden houses are nice, too. No matter where she is in the house, she can hear the knocks on the door.

Not surprisingly, the person who came was Chen Qianyue. Chen Qianyue was very cautious and chose to come in the dark night.

Wen Jiajia knew that she was going to come see her someday, but she didn't expect it to be until now.

The last time I ran into her she asked for a water bottle, two if possible.

Wen Jiajia, who had been waiting for the funds to be deposited in order to balance her income and expenditure during this period, welcomed her arrival very much. She invited her to the main hall and even made an exception to light the candles on the table.

"Here, these are water bottles." Wen Jiajia took out two water bottles from the house and said, "Check them."

This thing is expensive, so the surface must be free of scratches and dents.

Chen Qianyue did not refuse. After all, she was buying for someone else, so of course she had to be extra careful. If she did not think Wen Jiajia was someone she could get along with and wanted to find an opportunity to interact with her, she would not have done this thankless favor.

She turned the kettle over and over in the candlelight, examined it twice, nodded, and handed over the money and the goods.

Chen Qianyue asked her, "Will you have more of these kettles later?" She thought that after taking these two kettles back, many people in the Youth League Home would be tempted because they were indeed very sturdy.

Wen Jiajia didn't plan to sell too many, so she shook her head and said, "No more, it will be hard to buy them later, and I had to ask my friend to help me get these two."

Chen Qianyue nodded: "Okay then."

She left with two water bottles.

As soon as the person left, Wen Jiajia immediately grinned. She unfolded a few pieces of paper money, examined them carefully under the candlelight, and nodded with satisfaction.

Great! The first income has arrived.

This sum of money is enough to make up for the money and tickets she has spent recently.

"Chun'er and Xuanxuan, stop playing and go to sleep!" Wen Jiajia rushed the two children to bed after returning to the house. "I won't take your house. You can continue to fight tomorrow."

Wen Xuan hesitated and looked at the house that was about to be put together: "Aunt, can't we put it together a little longer?"

Wen Jiajia patted the bed and said, "No, come up quickly. Auntie has to get up early tomorrow."

I got up early to pick mushrooms.

The most important thing is that there is not much kerosene left at home, and she has no kerosene coupons to buy it.

Wen Jiajia's intimidation was very strong, so Wen Chun and Wen Xuan finally climbed onto the bed reluctantly. With a "whoosh", the room fell into darkness again.

After a moment, Wen Chun said in surprise, "Aunt, where is Uncle Wei?" Last time he said he would take me and my sister to dig out bird nests.

Wen Jiajia was speechless. Your Uncle Wei has been gone for two or three days and you're just thinking about him.

"Go to sleep. Your Uncle Wei has gone to work. Can I tell you a story?" She patted Wen Chun's back.

Wen Chun and Wen Xuan, on the other hand, immediately perked up and turned to face their aunt, with eager looks on their faces.

The stories my aunt tells are more interesting than those told by the teachers in the nursery.

"Talk about Wukong, aunt." Wen Xuan said hurriedly.

Wen Jiajia: "Okay, then I'll send Wukong."

"Where were we talking about last time?" She thought for a moment, "Oh, we were talking about Sun Wukong crossing the Tongtian River. There was a fish in the Tongtian River, it was the fish of Guanyin Bodhisattva..."

Wen Jiajia has not read the book, but has watched the drama dozens of times, so the story she tells is all based on the drama.

Anyway, the kids are only three years old. When the drama comes out more than ten years later, they probably won’t remember the story they have heard.

It's late at night.

From time to time, there were cries of wild animals coming from the back mountain, which sounded like an owl, sometimes far away and sometimes close, making people feel scared.

Because it rained two days ago, there was plenty of water in the mountains and mountains, so the water tank at home was full all the time.

The overflowing water flowed happily along the ditch to the outside of the yard. The gurgling sound of water was extremely clear in the silent night.

This is excellent white noise, and Wen Jiajia quickly fell asleep to the hypnotic sound of flowing water.

The next day.

It was still dark, probably before five when she woke up.

After traveling through these days, Wen Jiajia finally developed the ability to tell time by astronomy.

There is no way, life without a watch is too hard to bear.

While Wen Jiajia was boiling water, she could hear people walking outside the yard. It turned out that there were people who wanted to go up the mountain to pick red mushrooms just like her.

She quickly quickened her pace, quickly cooked a pot of pumpkin porridge, and fried some pumpkin cakes with the pumpkin, which were delicious when eaten together.

Autumn is the season when pumpkins ripen.

Because the space for vegetable gardens is limited, most people will grow some pumpkins in the yard.

Pumpkin is definitely a cost-effective food. It only takes a few seeds to produce fruits that are larger than a ball.

The key is that it is not picky about the location.

The Wen family, for example, planted pumpkins under the walls of the front and back yards. They also inserted a few bamboo poles for the pumpkin vines to climb on, and when the pumpkins grew big, they propped up a wooden frame. This way, they could harvest hundreds of kilograms of pumpkins without occupying the land in the vegetable garden.

After dinner, Wen Jiajia went up the mountain.

Before going out, he woke up the two girls and said, "The food is on the table, eat by yourselves. Each person can only eat two pieces of cake." Otherwise, Wen Chun and Wen Xuan would have to eat themselves up.

The two girls nodded.

Wen Jiajia added, "There is sugar in the porridge. You are not allowed to put more. I know how much sugar is in it."

The two girls nodded again.

Yes, my aunt has very sharp eyes. She can tell whether they have stolen the rock sugar in the cupboard without even counting.

Wen Jiajia: …

That was because she had pinned a piece of hair on top of the rock sugar jar, and she always felt that the rock sugar was gone too quickly, so she suspected that someone had stolen it.

She finally said, "Don't wash the dishes after dinner. Bring the blocks to the living room to play, okay?"

"Know!"

Wen Jiajia was still worried, but she had no choice but to leave.

At daybreak, she carried a bamboo basket up the mountain.

Red mushrooms mostly grow on rocky mountains, and the trail leading into the mountain is more than 800 meters away from Wen’s home.

"Jia Jia is going to the mountain too?" someone I met on the road asked, "Just follow us, or you won't be able to find the way."

Wen Jiajia smiled and said, "Okay, thank you, Auntie."

She wasn't very familiar with the mountains here, and it would be easy for her to get lost without someone to lead her.

I would run into people on the road from time to time, and every one of them would remind me, "Don't pick all kinds of mushrooms."

I was afraid that she would follow the same path as her parents and sister.

Wen Jiajia cherishes her life, so how could she eat any mushroom? She would only eat mushrooms that she recognizes.

Thanks to the short videos and the fact that she once lived in a famous mushroom-producing province for some time, she can still recognize quite a few mushrooms.

The mountain road was difficult to climb after the rain. Wen Jiajia had no experience, so she used both hands and feet and it took her nearly an hour to reach the hillside where many red mushrooms grew.

Looking far down the mountain from this hillside, you can even see her backyard.

This made Wen Jiajia feel a little uneasy, and she thought that she should be more careful in the backyard in the future.

There are many mushrooms in the mountains, and red mushrooms are particularly conspicuous. Wen Jiajia soon found clusters of red mushrooms under the fallen leaves.

Wen Jiajia was overjoyed and immediately squatted down to pick them.

How should I put it? This feeling is almost like picking up money. You can gain something just by bending over. It is so attractive.

The red mushrooms gradually filled the bottom of the bamboo basket, and when she went around a huge rock, she found a cluster of Panax notoginseng.

What is Sanjiu mushroom? Actually, it is Lactarius pine, and because it grows in March and September, it is called Sanjiu mushroom locally.

I heard that Jia Jia had eaten this mushroom before. After all, as a blogger who loves to reproduce ancient food, "Suiyuan Food List" is a must-read book.

According to the Suiyuan Food List, cooking Panax notoginseng with soy sauce and stirring with sesame oil makes a great snack.

It's true. The most delicious ingredients only require the simplest seasoning and have no other disadvantages except that they are difficult to clean.

Wen Jiajia quickly put a bunch of pine milk mushrooms into a bamboo basket. Because the pine milk mushrooms were small, she spent a lot of time here.

Then I followed the villagers to the other side uphill, where there were also many mushrooms.

The mountains are thick with fog, and walking through the woods will also make you feel a little damp.

Wen Jiajia touched her sleeves and found them damp. It seemed that she had to get ready to go back.

"Auntie, shall we go?" she shouted towards the woods.

"I'll pick for a while longer, you go first," she said.

Okay, Wen Jiajia’s memory is pretty good and she can remember the way down the mountain.

On the way, she also found a fish that had escaped the net. She found a fungus on a rotten wood beside the road. This was authentic wild fungus, so she certainly couldn't let it go.

"Chaoyangpo."

Wen Jiajia looked around the environment and thought this was the most suitable place for wood ear growth, so there was a high probability that there was still wood ear growth here.

Sure enough, when she stepped into the dead wood and swept away the fallen leaves that had accumulated on the rotten wood, she found many fungi.

Wen Jiajia couldn't help but laugh out loud. These fungus filled up the bamboo basket directly. Even if they were dried, there would be one kilogram, which was enough to stir-fry several dishes.

"Come back tomorrow," she said to herself.

I made note of the location and covered the area with dead branches and leaves before going down the mountain.

It is difficult to go up the mountain, and it is even more difficult to go down the mountain.

Especially on the rain-soaked roads, Wen Jiajia stumbled and fell from time to time. By the time she reached the foot of the mountain, the mud on her buttocks was half a centimeter thick.

Wen Chun and Wen Xuan have been picked up by Chen Ai, and their beloved building blocks are still in the main room.

Wen Jiajia hurriedly poured out the mushrooms and black fungus from the bamboo basket without having time to wash them or change her pants. She then used two large leaves to pack two bags of black fungus and mushrooms and went to the cowshed.

She had to go to Hegou Township to catch fish and to Chendun to buy tofu immediately.

Hegou Township.

"Uncle Wei, I'm sorry I'm late." She hurried but was still five or six minutes later than the scheduled time.

Because it was not too late, Wei Chengmin, who was in charge of the handover, was not angry and said, "It's okay, these three baskets of fish are yours. I specially left three baskets for you."

As for Wen Jia, she is now a couple with Wei Dai, a well-known and promising young man in the village. So Wen Jia is also from their Hegou Township, so naturally they will give her a few baskets of the best fish.

"Thank you, uncle." Wen Jiajia handed him two bags of mushrooms and black fungus wrapped in leaves and said, "I have a favor to ask of you. One bag for you, and one bag for Wei Dai's parents."

"Hey, what are you doing..."

Wen Jiajia said hurriedly, "It's not something special. I picked it up today. I have a lot at home. You can take it without worry."

Since it was a mountain product, he didn't refuse.

As a result, he had a much better impression of Wen Jiaguan, who seemed to be as capable as Wei Dai.

He shook his head, thinking that he had to hurry up to find a blind date these days, otherwise all the good girls would become someone else's daughter-in-law.

"Drive!"

Wen Jiajia hurried away in the car. Daqiang was curious and knew her urgency. Even though there were still three baskets of fish in the car, her speed was still quite fast.

"Hey, hey, hey, Daqiang, take this road!"

She still has to go to Chendun.

Daqiang changed his route with a "click, click, click" sound, while Wen Jiajia held the reins in one hand and the stick in the other.

When she left the village and walked to the deserted forest road, she took the stick in her hand. She even hid pepper spray on her body, just in case she met any bad guys on the road.

Fortunately, the security in the county town is pretty good, and there are no people who value money over their lives for the time being.

But... her heart started beating faster for no apparent reason, and even her hairs stood up as if attracted by static electricity.

Wen Jiajia moved the reins again to speed up, deciding to quickly leave this road that few people had ever traveled on.