Chapter 6: First Day at Sea

Mao Cuifang did not put the clam away but gave it to Jiang Wan and Yin Ning.

"Take this and play with it. Or you can go digging on the beach and pick up any similar ones you come across."

Jiang Wan didn't reach out to take it, but Yin Ning took it not wanting to be rude.

"Thank you……"

The little girl's voice was soft and very pleasant to the ear. Mao Cuifang felt a little embarrassed. She quickly turned around and grabbed the three adults to continue teaching them how to swim.

The two sisters followed behind without listening carefully. Jiang Wan wanted to get away from the main group and go farther away to look for crabs and shrimps, while Yin Ning was focused on the clam in her hand.

The round clams are small and dark in color but have beautiful patterns. They feel heavy in your hand and you can tell there is a lot of meat inside without even opening them.

A gurgling sound was heard and Yin Ning's face froze. He hadn't eaten anything in the morning and was now hungry.

"Cousin, let's go to the reefs over there. The book says there are a lot of crabs in the reefs."

Jiang Wan knew that her uncle would definitely not agree if she went alone, so it would be easier if she brought her cousin along.

Yin Ning refused at first, as she wanted to help dig more clams, but she finally agreed after hearing her little cousin's constant entreaties and hearing her say that crabs were more valuable than clams.

Hearing that the two little girls wanted to go to the rocks in front to play, Yin Huaixi had no objection.

My daughter has already grown up, and catching fish is something she is good at, so there is nothing to worry about.

Yin Huaishan and his wife were even more happy to see this. After all, their young lady's gloomy look was really worrying. Now that she was in the mood to go out and play with her cousin, of course they had to let her relax.

The three adults all agreed, so Mao Cuifang didn't know what to say, but she still gave a few serious reminders.

"If you want to play around the reefs, you have to be careful. Those reefs are covered with oysters and vines all year round. Their shells are very sharp. If you accidentally fall and bump into them, you will definitely get cut."

Even though the children in the village are warned every year, some still get injured. The reefs are quite dangerous for children.

"Also, sometimes crabs will come out from the cracks in the rocks, and there may be fish or other things in the puddles. You have to be mentally prepared and don't get scared."

When people are frightened, they tend to panic. If they are frightened and confused in the reef, it is easy for something to happen.

After hearing how dangerous it was, Yin Huaishan and his wife wanted to say no, but before they could say anything, they saw Jiang Wan pulling Yin Ning away.

“Run slower!!”

"Be careful and don't run too far!"

What else can adults say? They can only give a few words of advice.

"I know!"

Jiang Wan spoke cheerfully, pulling her cousin away without looking back.

Yin Ning habitually felt that she shouldn't run so fast, but she didn't want to disappoint her cousin who was so happy. And for some reason, she felt inexplicably happy when she ran against the wind, and even wanted to let go of her cousin's hand and run into the sea by herself.

She had never seen such a vast sea, its blueness was so enchanting that it made people want to sleep forever in its arms.

"Cousin? Cousin?"

Jiang Wan called out several times before her cousin came back to her senses. Her heart tightened at the sight of her indifferent eyes, and she immediately picked up a branch and brought it back.

"Cousin, take this branch and let's go poke the crabs!"

The reefs were right in front of them, and Jiang Wan stopped dragging her cousin along. Out of habit, she had already begun to scan with her naked eyes the places where crabs often appeared.

Yin Ning saw her cousin lying on the ground looking around, and suddenly she said she had found crabs and asked her to help.

"Cousin, I just saw a crab hiding under that big rock. Come and help me poke it here. Just poke it back and forth like this, and I'll go over there and watch and catch it."

Jiang Wan didn't dare let her cousin catch crabs, so now she just wanted her cousin to participate in the process of catching crabs.

"Cousin, poke it!"

"Okay, okay..."

Yin Ning didn't know where the crab was, but he did as his cousin said, squatted down, stretched the long branch under the stone slab, and swept it back and forth.

The young fellow, who had nowhere to retreat in the dark corner under the stone slab, was poked a few more times and could no longer endure it, so he ran out from the other side.

I thought I had jumped out of the sky, but as soon as I popped my head out, I saw a big foot falling from the sky.

Jiang Wan had a trauma after being pinched while trying to catch a crab with her bare hands. After that, whenever she caught a crab, she would habitually step on the crab's back with her foot before reaching out to grab it.

"Hehe~ It really is a big crab~ Cousin, we can have delicious grilled crabs for lunch!"

The little girl sucked her saliva, she was so greedy.

“Is this a crab??”

Yin Ning looked at the guy in his cousin's hand curiously. The dark green carapace looked extremely hard, and the eight legs and the big claws were moving wildly, trying to escape from his cousin's hand. The two eyes were bulging out, and the mouth was weird and ugly.

Image source: Internet

So ugly...

“Is it really edible?”

"Of course, blue crabs are delicious!"

Jiang Wan was sure to get a suspicious look from her cousin because she was too exaggerated. She quickly added, "Anyway, the book says that blue crabs are very delicious. We'll find out when we get back and grill them."

Yin Ning swallowed, not daring to imagine himself eating this.

"Come on, cousin, let's go take a look ahead."

Jiang Wan picked up two pieces of dry grass and tied up the crabs in her hand, and was eager to catch the second one. Yin Ning didn't dare to touch it, but he could help by poking it with a stick.

The two soon saw another blue crab in a crevice of the reef. When they were poking it with the branches, they suddenly heard a snap and something fell down.

"Huh? Cousin, you seem to have touched a snail!"

The light in the crevices of the reef was not that bright, and there were already many oyster shells and rattan pots on the reef. Jiang Wan was so busy that she didn't even notice there was a conch inside.

After the two sisters had forced the blue crab out and caught it, she started to dig in the crack with a wooden stick. Yin Ning didn't know what the snail her cousin was talking about was, but after a while she saw her digging out a big stone from the crack.

"Hehe! Cousin, we are going to have a delicious lunch~"

Jiang Wan held the heavy oyster shells and smiled with her little white teeth showing.

Oyster snails are relatively large among conchs. The one in her hand took up most of her palm and weighed at least 200 grams. There was still a lot of meat after removing the shell.

Image source: Internet

"Cousin, you have a very good eye. Can you help me look for this snail or a smaller one nearby?"

Yin Ning took the oyster shell and looked at it carefully. It looked like a stone. But if my cousin wanted it, I would help her find it so that she wouldn't have any random thoughts.

The two sisters crouched and walked through the reefs, looking for crabs and picking up conches. Before they knew it, they had only walked a small part of the reefs and there were so many things that they couldn't move.

There was no other way. The three wooden barrels in the house were in the hands of adults, so they could only take the blue crabs and conches back first. Just as they were about to leave with the things in their arms, they were suddenly attracted by something that was constantly tumbling and jumping in a shallow puddle not far away.

"Cousin, that looks like a fish!"

Yin Ning finally saw something familiar to her, and immediately trotted over to check it out. As she saw, the thing jumping in the puddle was indeed a fish, a perch with very good nutritional value.

Image source: Internet

Jiang Wan had heard her grandma and mom say that sea bass was good for children since she was little, and she had been eating it to the point where she almost wanted to vomit just by hearing the name. But now that she saw this sea bass, all she could think about was how to eat it.

Steamed? Grilled? Boiled?

She swallowed hard, she could hardly hold it any longer.

"Let's go, cousin! Let's go back!"

Look at this pocket full of stuff, it will definitely scare everyone in the family.

"Cousin, this fish..."

Of course she wanted to take the lively perch back, but she didn't dare to catch it. Besides, she and her cousin had picked up a lot of things before, and it would be very troublesome to carry this lively fish.

Just as Yin Ning finished speaking, he saw his weak little cousin grab the fish by the tail and throw it hard against the reef. With two snaps, the perch instantly became obedient.

Frightened Yin Ning: "..."

"Look, it's well behaved, let's go, let's go back quickly."

Jiang Wan lifted the hem of her skirt to make a pocket, put the crabs, conchs and fish together and then held the cloth. From the outside, one could only see that there were a lot of things in her pocket but no one knew what was inside.

"Cousin, this is not good, please put down your skirt..."

Yin Ning had learned the traditional rules of a lady from a noble family since she was a child. Lifting her skirt in public was too much, so she stopped him immediately. If it was the original owner, she would not do this. But now it was Jiang Wan, she would not listen.

"Cousin, you still have pants under your skirt, it's okay. And look at the kids around here, they're wearing more revealing clothes than me. This is how it is in a seaside fishing village, we should follow the local customs."

Yin Ning consciously looked up at the children nearby.

The children who came to catch the sea were more prepared than they were. They brought buckets or baskets, and with small shovels and rakes in their hands, they were happily looking for clams on the beach.

The boys wore short jackets and pants that exposed their calves, while the girls' tops had sleeves that exposed a good portion of their wrists, and their pants were similar.

If people wore clothes like this in Kyoto, they would definitely be criticized by old Confucian scholars as being immoral and corrupt, but in this fishing village, it seemed like every family wore clothes like this.

Yin Ning was a little shocked. Compared with this, her cousin's skirt lifting didn't seem so outrageous.

Jiang Wan didn't give her cousin time to think wildly. She held up her cousin's skirt with one hand and held her cousin's arm with the other, and the two sisters trotted to catch up with the adults at home.

At this time, Mao Cuifang was talking to the three about the local tide time. Her eyes widened when she saw the pile of things the sisters brought back.

"Wow, you two girls are really amazing!"

Four blue crabs, nine large conches, and a sea bass weighing about two or three pounds! The two girls were only away for about half an hour, right? It was really amazing that they could get all these things back in such a short time.

"Have you ever caught crabs before? You tied them up pretty well."

Mao Cuifang's casual remark scared Jiang Wan so much that she broke out in a cold sweat. She was careless. She caught the crab and just subconsciously found something to tie it up. She forgot that a girl from a noble family would never know how to tie a crab.

Yin Huaixi smiled faintly and filled the hole for her daughter.

"The little girl likes to play. She had a maid from the mountains who always said crabs were fun and delicious. The girl pestered me to buy crabs for her. But we don't have such big crabs there, only small crabs from the river. Later I bought a few for her to play with."

Mao Cuifang was envious for a moment. Although the family in front of her was now in a bad state, they were once the ladies of a wealthy family and had lived a good life that she could not even imagine.

What a pity...

"That maid may have deceived you. If you can play with crabs and eat them, then don't do that. You can't eat these snails either."

The mother and daughter were shocked when they heard this and asked subconsciously, "Why?"

"Because eating them can easily make you sick. In the past, when people in the village were very hungry, they would get conchs to eat, but after eating them, people would often feel sick and vomit. Some would even have severe abdominal pain and die. As for crabs, men can eat them, but women cannot. This is a tradition passed down by the elders in the village, saying that crabs are extremely harmful to women's bodies. Two years ago, a greedy daughter-in-law in our village couldn't help but eat a plate of them, and she miscarried that night. Anyway, there are many clams on our beach, and we can occasionally pick up fish and shrimp, so there is no need to eat those."

Mao Cuifang briefly explained which seafood should not be picked up when fishing. In the local people's perception, conchs, crabs, and sea urchins are not edible. The mother and daughter's eyes lit up when they heard this.

People here don't eat crabs and conches, so isn't that a bargain for them?

Jiang Wan was not afraid of the dangers Mao Cuifang mentioned at all. Some conches would cause nausea and vomiting if eaten if they were not cooked or cleaned thoroughly.

As for crabs, they are cold in nature and are not suitable for women to eat in large quantities. Note that it is a large quantity. As long as they are cleaned and not consumed in excess, they are completely edible.

I remember that she ate four crabs and two kilograms of conchs in one meal, and she felt lively and healthy after eating them.

But there is no need to refute Aunt Cuihua right now. After all, she is doing it for the good of her family.

The whole family agreed to listen. Seeing that it was still early, Mao Cuihua took off her basket and gave it to the two sisters, asking them to go around and see if they could catch another fish.

Jiang Wan was in high spirits as she tied the basket around her waist happily.

"Cousin, do you think I look like that?"

Yin Ning's mind was pulled back to its original state. When he saw his little cousin, it was as if he saw the group of children before. He couldn't help but sigh in his heart. The little cousin's ability to adapt was really good. If he didn't know that she was raised in the backyard since she was a child like him, he would have thought she was a country kid at first glance.

"Cousin, let's go a little further this time and look for it near the sea."

"Okay, I'll listen to you."

Yin Ning didn't know what to do, but he just listened to his cousin.

The two sisters ran against the sea breeze, around the reefs and to the edge of the sea that had already receded to the bottom.

There were many villagers on this beach, and from time to time, you could hear children shouting in surprise that they had found something. Jiang Wan had good eyesight, and she saw at a glance that two children were squeezing water from small objects in their hands.

That's a cat's eye snail!!

Cat's-eye snails like to lie on the sand but they are not very smart. A small bump on the beach can easily reveal something, so it is relatively easy to find it.

This kind of snail is not as big as the oyster snail but the meat is very fat. When you dig it out, the stretched-out snail meat is sometimes bigger than a human palm, but if you squeeze it hard, the water will be squeezed out and the meat will shrink back.

Image source: Internet

Jiang Wan likes cat's eye snails very much. Every time she catches one, she will squeeze the water out of it, which is very relaxing.

"My cousin's book about water splashing says it's a cat's eye snail. Let's go look for it. If you see any bumps on the beach, dig at them."

Yin Ning nodded obediently and immediately lowered his head to search on the beach.

On the long sandy beach, the two sisters moved forward little by little like little ants. Almost at the same time, the two sisters saw the small bump on the beach, and they each dug out the cat's eye snail underneath easily.

“It’s so huge!”

Yin Ning's eyes were filled with the big piece of snail meat. It was meat!

"cousin!"

She turned around to show it to her cousin, only to see her cousin wipe off all the sand on the snail meat, then hold the snail meat in her hand and suddenly squeeze it hard.

!!!

Countless tiny streams of water instantly spurted out from the snail meat, and the fat snail meat shrank into a small ball visibly to the naked eye.

Yin Ning watched without blinking, and suddenly felt that her cousin was having fun. So she also wiped off the sand like her cousin, and then squeezed it hard.

ah!

How can I describe this feeling? The moment the water was squeezed out, she felt her heavy heart relax a little, as if some shackles were opened.

She wants to squeeze in another one!

"Cousin, it's fun~"

Jiang Wan smiled and threw the cat's eye snails that had been squeezed dry into the basket.

"I see there are still quite a few on the beach. Let's pick up more before the tide comes in."

"Uh-huh!"

Yin Ning became more interested and finally stopped wandering around. The two sisters searched the beach carefully.