At the back door of the pre-processing workshop, pineapples were piled up into a small mountain in bamboo baskets.
An elderly woman in her fifties fell into a pile of pineapples, with only her legs sticking out. Her cries for help came from below the pile of pineapples.
Yu Yao, Aunt Liu, and the other elderly women around them all stopped what they were doing and rushed over to pull the old woman out of the pile of pineapples.
Aunt Liu helped the older woman up with concern: "Sister Hong, how did you fall in like that?"
Sister Hong clutched her waist and cried out in pain.
"Don't even mention it. The pineapples on top were ripe, so I was thinking of peeling them off first. But when I was getting the basket, I twisted my back, bumped into the basket next to me, and fell in."
Normally, these pineapples are moved to the pre-processing workshop by the loading and unloading workers, and they can just load them directly.
For some reason, the loaders were ten minutes late today, and Sister Hong got anxious and started moving things.
They've moved things before, even though they're all old women in the countryside, in their fifties or sixties. They've worked their way up from the fields and they're quite strong.
The ground was wet today, so it was a bit slippery, and I strained my back.
Aunt Liu asked someone to take Aunt Hong to the clinic first.
Someone asked Aunt Liu, "What should we do now? It's not good to have so many pineapples piled up at the door; it's inconvenient for people to come and go."
Aunt Liu glanced at the large pile of pineapples at the door and told everyone to each carry a little to make way for the exit.
But this means I'll probably have to work overtime to finish the 100-pound task today.
Seeing Yu Yao standing to the side, Aunt Liu said to her, "Little Yu, wait for me here for a moment."
Seeing this, Yu Yao said, "I'll move it with everyone."
Looking at her frail body, Aunt Liu said, "You're not used to carrying things, so you can't lift the bamboo basket. Use a basket or a carrying basket to hold the loose items first."
As soon as she finished speaking, she saw Yu Yao, without batting an eye, use a carrying pole to pick up two baskets full of pineapples, walk briskly to the pre-processing workshop, and pour the pineapples into the designated area.
Then he went to the door and picked up two more loads of pineapples.
You should know that the bamboo baskets used to hold pineapples are huge, and when they are full of pineapples, they weigh dozens of kilograms. Yu Yao, who doesn't look like she can do much work, actually broke out in a sweat the whole time without even panting.
Surprisingly, Yu Yao, who looked like a weakling, was just as strong as these elderly women who were used to manual labor, and even a little stronger than them.
Aunt Liu and the others were both surprised and delighted.
What surprised me was Yu Yao's strength.
The good thing is that with Yu Yao's help, it won't take too much time. I can process the pineapples faster and leave work on time.
The old lady, who had been worried about being implicated by Yu Yao, was now relieved.
With this strength, at least you won't be a burden once you get used to it.
Yu Yao never expected that simply helping to move a pineapple would eliminate the other people's initial rejection and hostility towards her because she couldn't do the work.
With Yu Yao's help, the passage was cleared at an extremely fast pace. Once the loaders arrived, the remaining pineapples were also moved into the workshop.
Aunt Liu led Yu Yao back to her seat, her face full of smiles: "Little Yu, I didn't realize you looked so delicate but are so strong. I take back what I said before. I think with your strength, you'll definitely be able to adapt to the work intensity in our pre-processing workshop in less than three days."
Yu Yao felt that three days was too long, one day would be enough.
Although the process of pre-processing fruit is complicated, it doesn't require much technical skill. You can get the hang of it after listening to the instructions once and practicing a few times.
However, she didn't say it aloud.
She prefers to prove things with facts rather than just talking.
Aunt Liu picked up a fresh pineapple and began explaining how to select it: "The pineapples we buy may have problems such as rot, bruises, or overripeness. Our first step in pre-processing is to pick out these bad fruits that will affect the quality and safety of the canned goods..."
What looks like a simple process actually involves many tricks and requires patience.
These are not problems for Yu Yao.
In her previous life, the research she conducted to recreate the ancient delicacies mentioned in the Nanxiang short video was far more difficult than any of this.
She listened attentively while drawing mind maps and flowcharts in her head.
Once Aunt Liu explained the key points once, she remembered them.
Not only did they remember it, but they were also able to apply what they learned to ask about important details that Aunt Liu hadn't mentioned.
At first, Aunt Liu spoke very slowly, but later, seeing that Yu Yao was listening attentively and could answer any questions about what she had been taught, she unconsciously started speaking faster.
Seeing that Yu Yao could keep up, Aunt Liu also started to speak more freely.
One is willing to learn, and the other is willing to teach.
Yu Yao's understanding of the pre-processing process increased rapidly.
After Aunt Liu finished explaining, she picked up an enamel mug next to her that read "Women hold up half the sky" to drink water, and stood aside to watch Yu Yao practice.
The preprocessing process consists of four steps, and Yu Yao has mastered them all very well, which shows that she has indeed remembered what she just said.
Aunt Liu also noticed that Yu Yao's eye-gouging knife and skin-removing knife were also particular about how to use them. She hadn't mentioned this, but Yu Yao had, which shows that she was a person who was good at observing and learning.
"You did a good job. You can put the dicing knife on your right hand; it will save you more time."
Yu Yao tried it out and found it much easier to use.
Seeing that she was doing a good job, Aunt Liu simply sat down beside her and watched her work while explaining, "The pineapple cans we make should be between 2.5 and 3 centimeters in size, with an error margin of no more than 0.5 centimeters."
Following Aunt Liu's instructions, Yu Yao took a ruler and measured the pineapple to get a sense of its size (2.5 cm and 3 cm). She then tried cutting a pineapple.
Aside from initially not getting the cut right and cutting it too large, the subsequent errors were all within an acceptable range.
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