My older cousin laughed and said dismissively, "It's just fruit, how much could it be worth? Take some more with you later. Although it's not valuable, you can't buy it outside. This year's harvest was good, nearly a thousand catties. I sent several hundred catties, and there's still a lot left at home."
The villagers all sold the food to supplement their household income. My eldest cousin, who was not short of money, kept it all for himself and sent it to his brothers and nephews outside the village. Although it was not a rare treat, it was something that money could not buy even if you wanted to eat it.
Moreover, this tree king also belongs to Madam Zou's family. Because it grows on the mountain belonging to Madam Zou's family, most of the torreya trees on the mountain are wild. No one knows when the birds carried the seeds, which fell on this mountain, sprouted, and grew into torreya trees.
The first person to eat Chinese torreya nuts was as brave as the first person to eat crabs. After all, Chinese torreya nuts don't look very appealing before processing. Who would have thought that such a delicious fruit would be inside a green, spiky shell?
"This tree king yielded three or four hundred catties. It's old, so the harvest is much less. I remember when I was a child, the most I ever harvested was six or seven hundred catties. We couldn't even finish eating it all, so my great-grandfather shared it with the children in the village," my older cousin said, pointing to the tree king with a nostalgic expression.
"I remember it too. There were so many fruits that year that the tree was bent over. My great-grandfather was heartbroken and specially fertilized the tree, saying he wanted to give it a good boost," Mrs. Zou said with a smile.
Although the old man was not talkative, he was actually very kind-hearted. If trees or livestock got sick, he would ask doctors for medicine and take care of them as if they were people. Moreover, he forbade the children in the family from climbing or breaking flowers and trees, saying that plants also feel pain and that they should bloom well and not suffer.
She is truly a very kind old woman.
Although no one had ever met the old man in person, they could imagine him from the descriptions of the eldest cousin and Mrs. Zou as a stern-faced but kind-hearted old man, and they couldn't help but smile knowingly.
Having such a lovely elderly person in the family must make life very interesting. No wonder Mrs. Zou and her eldest cousin have such a kind and approachable aura that makes people want to be close to them and befriend them.
After Zou Hanqiu took enough photos, everyone went down the mountain to harvest rice. The eldest cousin's wife had already started working. When Ye Qingqing and the others arrived, the eldest cousin's wife, the old man, and Lin Shufang were wielding sickles, with a large golden wave crashing down behind them.
"Grandpa Lu, Aunt Fang, are you able to handle it?" Ye Qingqing asked with concern.
Grandpa Lu was full of energy, his sickle moving non-stop, and he answered loudly: "How could I not be able to handle it? When I was a child, I harvested wheat for landlords, working from morning till night, harvesting several acres a day. This is nothing."
Lin Shufang also laughed and said, "I didn't do any of these things when I was a child, but for a period of time, the teachers in the school had to go to the countryside to provide support. They did things like transplanting rice seedlings, plowing fields, harvesting rice, and carrying manure."
She and the old man moved with great skill, shoveling rice stalks with one hand and wielding sickles with the other, easily bringing them down. The eldest cousin brought over a threshing machine and also called on some strong young men from the village, as he was too old to do this.
The middle-aged men were relatives, honest and simple young men. When they saw the celebrities and a few pretty and fashionable girls on TV, they didn't dare to look away. They kept their heads down and kept working, their faces flushed. But every now and then they would sneak a few glances and then shrink back. It was quite cute.
The young man stepped on the rice, while his older cousin delivered the rice. The two worked seamlessly together and soon stripped off a large section of the rice. Zhang Zhengrong, seeing this, was itching to try harvesting rice himself, but he almost cut his hand. His older cousin's wife was so frightened that she told him to rest.
He then took a liking to the threshing machine, his eyes gleaming with the eagerness of a child seeing a new toy. His older cousin asked him to try it out, but he couldn't get the strength or rhythm right. Once Zhang Zhengrong had his fill, he gave the machine to the younger man so as not to delay his work.
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