Chapter 156 Buying a Watermelon: Three Cuts and Six Holes
Having a good meal on the 14th of August does not mean that the Mid-Autumn Festival can be celebrated casually. Since 1912, all official festivals have been simply and crudely changed to the Gregorian calendar. For example, the Spring Festival was set on January 1st of the Gregorian calendar, and the Mid-Autumn Festival was set on August 15th of the Gregorian calendar. At one point, it was even forbidden to celebrate festivals according to the lunar calendar. [1]
However, there is not always a moon on the fifteenth of August in the Gregorian calendar. So even if there is an explicit prohibition, people just celebrate according to the old customs. Even the academic community, which has always admired the West, opposes this direct modification. Over the years, the goal of "people's proclamation and officials not investigating" has been achieved.
Even now, although the official calendar still uses the Gregorian calendar, people still follow the lunar calendar for festivals. Even government officials follow the old rules, so the decision to change the festivals is practically meaningless.
These kinds of big events had nothing to do with Yao Xiaoyu and the others. After the Yao family had their first good night's sleep in years without being burdened by debt, they went out to buy things early in the morning. Even Yao Xiaoyu was assigned a purchasing task. Every year after the Mid-Autumn Festival, prices would rise, and stocking up on as much as possible before inflation was the survival wisdom of ordinary people.
Although it was called stockpiling, with only a pittance left after paying off the debt, and after deducting holiday expenses, they couldn't buy much. So Zhou Chunhua simply didn't go all out and only let Yao Xiaoyu pick out a few essential survival items to buy.
"I bought the rice, I bought the flour, I bought the salt..."
Yao Xiaoyu checked the items on the list one by one, left the shopkeeper with the Yao family's address, and after confirming that there were no omissions, she was finally able to stroll around with peace of mind. Then she spotted the mud rabbit stall by the roadside at a glance.
The clay rabbit stall sells rabbit figurines, and business is best a few days before the Mid-Autumn Festival. The vendors prepare the goods early and stack them on the staircase-shaped wooden shelves, where people stop to look from time to time.
Yao Xiaoyu wandered around the stall amidst the vendor's enthusiastic greetings, but didn't find anything particularly appealing. However, Tao Xiaoxiao next to her took out her money and bought one. Yao Xiaoyu looked over in surprise, while Tao Xiaoxiao just blinked.
“In the past, when we celebrated the Mid-Autumn Festival, my family would buy one from the market and give it to each of the children in the family in turn.”
The first year it was given to the younger brother, the second year to the younger sister, the third year to the older sister... Tao Xiaoxiao waited and waited, and when everyone had gone through their turn, she thought she would finally get one, but that year the Rabbit God was given to the younger brother again.
Tao Xiaoxiao looked at the rabbit figurine in front of her. It was much more exquisite than she remembered, but she still felt it was rough. She couldn't understand why she had cried so bitterly.
"It's yours."
Tao Xiaoxiao played with the rabbit figurine for a while and then got bored. She simply stuffed it into the arms of the big-eyed girl who had been staring longingly at her, and then followed Yao Xiaoyu away in a carefree manner. The little girl who suddenly had a rabbit figurine fall from the sky didn't even pause for three seconds before she ran home—she wasn't the only one who couldn't afford a rabbit figurine, and if she didn't bring one home, someone would really steal it!
"Watermelons for sale!"
After confirming that Tao Xiaoxiao truly didn't dwell on the past, Yao Xiaoyu didn't deliberately reopen old wounds. Instead, she led Tao Xiaoxiao on a three-minute walk away from the mud rabbit stall. Before they could even catch their breath, their attention was drawn to the hawking cries.
Are there watermelons now?
Yao Xiaoyu asked the vendor curiously, "A few years ago, when the family's debts weren't paid off during the Mid-Autumn Festival, Zhou Chunhua bought some meat as a celebration. She didn't go out much during that time. So, this year is the first proper Mid-Autumn Festival that Yao Xiaoyu is going to experience since she came here."
As for modern times... with abundant resources and work pressure, the flavor of many traditional festivals has become very faint. For example, when Yao Xiaoyu's family celebrates the Mid-Autumn Festival, they just have a meal with their grandparents and eat mooncakes while watching the moon at night.
Yao Xiaoyu usually takes a small piece of classic lotus seed paste or fruit cantaloupe mooncake to taste—it's too greasy, and she really can't eat a whole one. However, in the past two years, a topic has emerged in videos that says "anything that looks like a mooncake is a mooncake." Before coming here, she bought a mooncake mold and pressed out a spicy chicken leg burger mooncake.
Then it turned out that the shape of the mooncake was enough to make her feel comfortable.
"Look at what you're saying, what Mid-Autumn Festival doesn't have watermelons?"
The vendor initially thought Yao Xiaoyu was joking, but after seeing her clear eyes, he realized that the girl might genuinely not know. Since no customers had arrived yet, he said a few more words.
"In Shanghai, people buy watermelons, apples, and pomegranates when they worship the moon, as it symbolizes a bountiful harvest. I specially stored these watermelons; once they're sold out, I'll have to wait until next year..."
Yao Xiaoyu didn't hear anything after that; once she was sure the watermelon was edible, her eyes were glued to it.
"How much?"
Yao Xiaoyu asked excitedly, the vendor was exaggerating, but there were only a small pile of watermelons, and they weren't even the large type of modern rock-crack watermelons. Yao Xiaoyu felt that she could easily finish them off without any pressure.
"...Worshiping the moon...ga?"
The vendor, who was always being educated by others, was interrupted as he was telling others about Mid-Autumn Festival customs for the first time. He subconsciously let out a duck-like quack.
"How much are these watermelons? My family needs quite a few watermelons for the Mid-Autumn Festival. If the price is right, I'll take them all."
Yao Xiaoyu controlled herself and didn't utter the words "eating alone." Her eyes were filled with deep affection as she looked at the watermelon. The vendor was overjoyed and, fearing that Yao Xiaoyu would change her mind, took the money and ran off without even leaving the basket or carrying pole. Yao Xiaoyu called out a few times but couldn't stop him. She could only ask a bystander to take the watermelon to Yao's house.
Why is this person running so fast? She was originally going to ask if there were any other fruits she wanted to buy.
"He offered a high price and waited for you to bargain, but you agreed immediately. The basket and carrying pole together weren't worth much."
The idle man carrying the load hit the nail on the head. Yao Xiaoyu was a little upset that she had been taken advantage of, but looking at the watermelons in the basket, she quickly cheered herself up—she didn't need the money, she could just consider it a special holiday product with a markup.
For some reason, she was able to eat watermelon several times this year even with her money. If she didn't know this was a scientific world, Yao Xiaoyu would have suspected that some kind of mystical factor was at play. Fortunately, heaven was on her side and gave her a chance to satisfy her craving at the last minute.
The idler carried his load to the Yao family's house, while Yao Xiaoyu continued shopping. Soon she spotted apples and pomegranates and bought them. When she looked at the golden pears and was about to pay, Tao Xiaoxiao stopped her.
"The word for pear sounds like the word for separation, so sharing pears during the Mid-Autumn Festival has a bad connotation."
Yao Xiaoyu: ...
There's really no need to divide it; she can eat at least three of these small pears in one go.
"Then let's buy it tomorrow."
Yao Xiaoyu stopped in her tracks, her attention drawn to the lotus root, mainly because the man buying it was making a rather amusing conversation.
"If a pound of lotus root contains half a pound of holes, and I buy two pounds of lotus root, then there's nothing wrong with me paying for one pound of lotus root!"
It's no exaggeration to say that when Yao Xiaoyu heard those words, she felt as if all the wrinkles in her mind had been smoothed out. There were obviously many people who felt the same way, and some kind-hearted people even explained the strange things this man had done in the past.
Yao Xiaoyu missed the initial introduction and didn't know the man's name. She only knew that he was a stubborn person, nicknamed "the simpleton," and that he had once ordered soup noodles but changed them to fried noodles and left without paying.
The famous saying, "If you exchange soup noodles for fried noodles, you don't have to pay; if you don't eat the fried noodles, you don't have to pay," also came from his mouth. After being forced to pay, he would come over every day to argue with the stall owner. In the end, the stall owner was too tired to deal with him and quietly returned the money to him, which finally put an end to the argument. [2]
"You always return them secretly, how did you know?"
When someone voiced Yao Xiaoyu's doubts, the well-meaning science communicator didn't hide anything from her.
“My second uncle’s third aunt’s fifth aunt’s cousin’s godson’s lover lived next door to the noodle stall owner. Once, the stall owner got drunk and cried in his arms, which he heard with his own ears.”
The people around her exclaimed in realization, and Yao Xiaoyu felt a little flustered—was she the only one who didn't understand what kind of relatives these were?
Unwilling to admit she was stupid, Yao Xiaoyu tried to calculate the kinship relationships. Thirty seconds later, she sadly realized that her comprehension in this area might indeed be a bit low, and she really couldn't figure it out!
While they were explaining the science, things had reached a climax between Er Lengzi and the stall owner. The stall owner told Er Lengzi to get lost and that she wouldn't sell him lotus roots anymore. But Er Lengzi, true to his name, couldn't understand human language and kept saying he wanted to eat lotus roots today. Yao Xiaoyu was getting breast pains from watching him like this.
"Is this person really not deliberately being a scoundrel?"
He acts like a simpleton, seemingly clueless about social interactions, but he's really just trying to take advantage. He did it with the fried noodles before, and he's doing it again now. Yao Xiaoyu tries to convince herself that she didn't choose the wrong nickname, but the man's behavior...
Seeing the man's ferocious yet forcedly gentle expression, Yao Xiaoyu silently moved closer to Tao Xiaoxiao. Seeing the man who seemed to want to walk this way, Tao Xiaoxiao prepared to kick him, but the stall owner exploded first.
"So you came here to take advantage!"
The stall owner stood up with a cold smile. She was a fisherwoman with long arms and legs and dressed neatly. She was inconspicuous when she was squatting, but when she stood up, everyone realized that she was taller than the men. But now no one cared about the height difference. All eyes were on the gleaming knife in her hand.
"If you're tough enough, come over and take three cuts, and I'll give you my whole business. If you're too scared, get lost."
The "three cuts and six holes" method was a way for people to leave the gang or atone for their sins in this era. There were two modes: stabbing the torso and limbs. The requirement was that each cut had to penetrate. One cut would leave two holes, and three cuts would leave six. There was also a more ruthless method called "nine cuts and eighteen holes," which had even higher requirements.
But the "three cuts and six holes" mentioned by the fisherwoman is not the kind of thing that involves physical violence. Rather, it is a trick devised by local thugs to eat and drink for free, a kind of ruthless method. These ruthless people would go to a restaurant or similar place for a big meal, and they would bluntly say that they had no money. Then they would poke holes in themselves. It would be two holes with one cut. After three cuts, they would go out. If they could come back alive, the restaurant would have to provide them with a year's worth of free meals.
This is a gamble with one's life for food. When the fisherwoman said this, she was betting that the man wasn't truly single-minded.
As for if that man really dared to stab me with those three knives... if he can be so ruthless to himself, what harm is there in giving him all these lotus roots?
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The author's note: [1] The data on directly changing traditional festival dates to Gregorian calendar dates comes from -- {Mooncakes in the Republic of China, Wen Zhai Bao (September 20, 2018, page 8)} --
[2] From the skit Sea Cucumber Fried Noodles
[3] I don't remember which book I read the saying "three knives and six holes, a local thug who eats for free," I only remember that such a thing happened.
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