Chapter 31 Where Are You Going?
The group climbed the slope, and a small sweet potato field came into view.
The old lady stepped forward and rummaged through the sweet potato noodles, revealing several messy holes.
"If we leave them for a few more days, these sweet potatoes will be ruined; they'll all be destroyed by the rats!" With that, he picked up a sickle, cut the sweet potato vines, and piled them up.
Li Mengxin and Li Xiang were digging with hoes behind them, while Gu Yin and the others collected the shovels and put them in baskets.
"The sweet potatoes are really big this year! Each one is bigger than a fist and longer than a hand!" Gu Shu picked one up, broke it in half, looked at it, and smelled it. "There are no bugs. In previous years, they smelled rotten when I broke them!"
The old lady nodded: "I sprinkled wood ash and added cow dung when I planted it this year, it should help a bit!"
Gu Yin took one, peeled it with a sickle, and took a bite: "Crisp, sweet, delicious, and thirst-quenching!"
With so many people, half of a large plot of land was quickly dug up. Seeing this, Gu Shu picked up a few dry pieces of wood and some dry grass from the surrounding area.
Gu Le went up to him, her eyes shining, and asked, "Are you building a sweet potato kiln?"
Gu Shu shook his head: "The soil here isn't hard enough, it's too soft. We can't build it up, and it'll fall apart halfway through the fire. We're not going to build a sweet potato kiln today, we'll just light a fire and roast sweet potatoes!"
Gu Le was a little disappointed, but roasted sweet potatoes would be fine too!
Seeing them struggling like this, the old lady said helplessly, "The sweet potatoes are too watery now and don't taste good. They'll be much better after they've been sitting for a while. Hurry up and finish so we can go home soon!"
Gu Shu was unhappy and took out a match: "No, you don't like it, but we do! Anyway, it won't delay anything. We can just put the sweet potatoes next to the fire and roast them. We don't need to watch them!"
Seeing that others were also watching, the old lady didn't say anything more and turned back to continue cutting sweet potato vines: "They're all just greedy!"
The fire is raging. There's no wind right now, and the fire started in the ground, surrounded by freshly turned, damp soil, so it's not afraid of a fire.
After putting a few pieces of wood in and placing the sweet potatoes near the fire, Gu Shu got up and walked around on the ridge. Then he made torches out of grass, stuffed the torches into the various holes, and then placed a burlap sack at the entrance of one of the holes and sat there waiting.
Gu Yin: "...Smoke rats?"
Gu Shu nodded: "We can roast them later! They're the most fragrant! When I was a child, after the rice harvest, the empty fields were full of broken rice ears. When we went to pick them up, we often encountered field mice. They were so delicious when roasted! We haven't caught any since! I don't know if it's because there are too many people or what! So many sweet potatoes have been eaten here, there must be mouse holes around. The mice in the mountains and fields are not like house mice, which are smelly and eat everything. These wild mice are so delicious!" After saying that, he slurped a few times.
Everyone else laughed when they heard him say that, but Gu Yin couldn't laugh. She remembered eating it when she was a child, but the memory wasn't deep. In her previous life, she traveled around and saw many rats, but they were all from stinking ditches, the dirtier the place, the more rats she saw! Now, she couldn't get past the mental barrier to eating it; just thinking about it made her feel uncomfortable all over!
Gu Le, who had been waiting excitedly on the side, thinking that they were catching rabbits, quietly got up and moved away, ran behind the old lady, and started digging sweet potatoes by hand.
The old lady chuckled: "Why did you come over? Aren't you going to catch mice with your brother?"
Gu Le shook her head: "I'll stay with Grandma, I won't arrest her."
"Are you scared?" the old lady asked him with a smile.
Gu Le paused in digging, then casually took out the sweet potato and grinned, "It's not that I'm afraid, it's just that I think it's unclean. The teacher said that rats are one of the four pests, and they're unhygienic."
He had seen people bitten by rats in that place before. Afterwards, the people developed a fever and their bodies were covered in disgusting pimples. In the end, fearing that they would be infected, the people burned the person to death.
"Ah Le is so sensible! We won't eat those unclean rats. Grandma will cook you chicken legs when we get home tonight!"
Gu Le smiled and nodded: "Okay!"
Li Xiang, who was standing next to her, smiled and said, "We've eaten half of the chickens at home, Mom. Should we go and catch some more to raise? We can eat them right around the New Year. We should also buy more ducks. I saw that some people in the village made preserved duck last year. Let's make some too. It smells so good!"
It was a bit hot, so the old lady took off her coat and put it aside: "Okay! I'll go buy some to raise on market day!"
Despite all the preparations, Gu Shu failed to catch a single one in the end, and feeling discouraged, she stopped paying attention.
The five plots were all harvested by the afternoon. Everyone gathered around the fire and ate all the sweet potatoes. Even though they hadn't been soaked in water, the sweet potatoes were still very fragrant and sweet. Gu Le ate until his belly was round and full. In the end, fearing that they wouldn't eat dinner, the old lady put away the rest.
Except for Gu Le, everyone else made several trips back and forth, finally managing to carry the sweet potatoes and vines back to the yard together.
Before the sun sets, we put the sweet potato vines on the wall to dry. Once they're dry, we'll cook them with green vegetables and rice bran to feed the cows or pigs.
The Gu family doesn't raise cattle, but they do raise a few pigs, which they will sell before the New Year.
During dinner that evening, the old lady looked at Gu Shu and said, "On Monday, your mother and I will go to the city to deliver winter clothes and blankets to your grandpa and the others. Only your aunt and Ale will be home then, so don't come back at night. It's not safe to leave the door open too late."
Gu Shu nodded: "Okay, then I'll stay at school for two nights. By the way, when are Grandpa and the other two coming back?"
Gu Yin continued, "I received a call from them yesterday, saying that they have a lot of work to do in preparation for the New Year, and they will probably work until around the 27th of the lunar year before returning." Gu Jianguo and his two sons work on a construction site in the city. At this time, many bosses are looking for workers because everyone wants to move into their new homes by the New Year, so they are rushing to finish their work.
"There are still two months left. How are we going to slaughter the pig this year without Grandpa?" Gu Shu looked at the old lady. Usually, it's time to slaughter the pig and make sausages after a while, and it's usually the three men who handle it. But this time, no one is home. What are we going to do? He wanted to try, but he didn't know how.
The old lady waved her hand: "You don't need to tell me that. I've already talked to the old village chief. He and Li Sen will come over to help. We'll treat them to a meal and take some back with us."
"That's good!"
On Tuesday morning, after sending the old lady and her sister-in-law to the car, Li Mengxin returned to the village entrance and saw a crowd gathered together, not knowing what they were doing. She didn't want to join in the fun, but someone called her away.
"Mengxin, wait a minute!"
Li Mengxin stopped the car and looked at the person who had come.
The old village chief's wife came over quickly, carrying a basket: "Don't you have pea shoots? The boss said he's buying them this morning in the old town. He told everyone in our village who has pea shoots to pick them today and deliver them tomorrow morning. They used to be 50 cents a pound, but it's been raining yesterday and today, so the price has gone up to 2 yuan a pound! I see you have a lot. Take advantage of the price increase and hurry up and pick them, otherwise they'll get too old in a few days!"
"Two yuan?! I'll go home and change into my rubber boots right now! I'll go right away!" Li Mengxin originally thought that even if it was only 50 cents, she could pick all the fruit and sell it all at once once the old lady and the others came back. She didn't expect the price to go up these past two days! It's a pity that she's the only one at home today. She can only manage about 200 jin (100 kg) by herself in a day. She'll call them tonight and ask them to come back earlier tomorrow!
When the children returned home at noon, the stove was cold, but the pot was clean.
Gu Yin went to the guest room and saw the note her mother had left.
"My mom went to pick pea shoots. There will be buyers on the street tomorrow morning. There's no time to cook, so let's just cook some noodles. I'll take some over to her later!"
Gu Shu turned and went into the kitchen upon hearing this: "Okay, you guys go and rest for a bit, I'll cook!"
Gu Yin went inside and lay down. Her spiritual body then went to the library to study. She went in whenever she had free time recently. If it weren't for the time limit inside, she could stay there for a year!
She went to the library to write her manuscript for the Youth Magazine. The Youth Magazine is published quarterly, with only four issues a year, each divided into two parts. Gu Yin was in the autumn issue, and now she was going to write the winter issue. This time, she didn't plan to write about national development, since she was only a junior high school student and it wouldn't be good to write too much. It would be more acceptable for people to write about it when she was in high school. So this time, the manuscript would return to the topic of school and learning.
After spending ten hours writing her manuscript in the library, Gu Yin saw Gu Hua washing her family's clothes when she came out, so she went over to wash them with her.
After the two finished washing their clothes, Gu Shu also cooked the noodles.
After finishing her noodles, Gu Yin took the bowl and chopsticks, packed the noodles, and rode her bicycle to deliver them to Li Mengxin in the fields.
After evening self-study, Gu Yin got up and walked out, not staying to read as usual. Song Pengfei looked up and was stunned when he saw her leaving. Was she going to get a late-night snack? He decided to take advantage of her absence to read more!
Zhao Xiaomin assumed Gu Yin had gone to the restroom, since she hadn't gone all night and it was normal for her to go now, so she didn't ask.
Seeing that Gu Yin was heading towards the school gate, 001 paused for a moment, puzzled: "What are you doing at the main gate?"
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