Go back to the valley to farm

Chapter 10
Chapter 10 Uncle

The three sat down to drink tea and chatted about homework.

Uncle Li Sicheng is 65 this year, and this is his last village head.

The eldest son, Li Junwei, just turned 14 this year, opened a small restaurant with his wife in the county town, and hadn’t come back for more than half a year because of the inconvenient transportation. His son is [-] years old, and he is in the third year of middle school in the county town.

The second child, Li Junan, has been working outside for many years and has found a wife from out of town. She will not be able to return home until this year's Spring Festival. Her daughter also attends elementary school in the county with her eldest brother Li Junwei.

The third child, Li Junhua, still stayed in the village, but he also separated from the family. Just now, the aunt also called him and asked him to come over for dinner with his wife and meet Li Junge by the way.

Li Junge picked up the previous topic and asked: "Uncle, the transportation is inconvenient this year. What the fourth grandfather said just now is really a matter. Not only Lijiagou, but the whole Pan'ao Township will be affected, right?"

Litchi, longan and green olives are the special products of Jiachuan County, and they are also important economic crops. Because of the higher latitude, the maturity period is two to three months later than those in Guangzhou and Fujian, so the price is relatively good. Many people in Lijiagou rely on Litchi earn enough for a year's household.

The uncle said: "Oh, the hair of the township chiefs and village chiefs has turned gray because of this matter. In previous years, as long as we pulled the lychees to the wharf, many of the lychees came to collect, and we didn't have to worry about selling them at all."

"It's troublesome this year. In previous years, all the tree-packing bosses didn't come. If you charter a boat in the village, you'll have to pay for it for a month, and the cost is too much. Besides, how to sell and divide the bills is also troublesome."

In the lychee business, the boss in the city will come to see the tree and see the flowers in the past. As long as you agree on the price after seeing it, and pay a part of the deposit to the farmer, the tree will be owned by you.

The fruit that will be produced in the future will be yours, and you can take it away when you settle the balance when it is ripe, which is a kind of primitive futures trading.

Once the waterway was cut off this year, the tree-wrapping guests stopped coming, and the lychees in a village couldn't go out.

The three talked for a while, but there was nothing good to do.

Talking until almost noon, the little cousin and sister-in-law also came over.My little cousin is 35 this year. He is not tall but very energetic. His wife is a rural woman. His son Li Yusong is just eight years old this year. He lives in Shangxiang Elementary School in Pan'ao Township. He has lunch at school at noon, so he didn't come.

They were very enthusiastic when they saw Li Junge.

The family sat down to prepare dinner, and the little sister-in-law went to the kitchen to help. After a while, she put out a plate of cured pig's trotters, a plate of cured meat, a plate of salted edamame and peanuts, and a few cold dishes, calling the men to serve first. She and The mother-in-law will make a few more hot dishes.

The uncle asked the fourth grandpa to sit at the top, and he himself sat on the left. He was about to call his son to sit next to him, when Li Junge pulled his little cousin over and said with a smile: "Young cousin, please sit next to me. I'm his follower, let's have a good chat."

The little cousin smiled and said: "Oh, I dare not call you a follower. You are a college student and work in a big city. Your little cousin and I are still muddleheaded."

Li Junge smiled and said, "It's not like a follower. At that time, when the summer vacation came, I followed you up the mountain to catch birds and down the river to fish for shrimps. You taught me my swimming skills."

The aunt came in with a plate of fried bacon with garlic sprouts and put it down, and said with a smile: "It's not a big deal, Erpi was really a puppet when he was a child, and the two of them stole my bacon and went to the river to roast it, lest I find out that they would use the stove to eat it." Hui smeared the cut edge of the bacon. The two children never thought that the cut edge was so neat, and the adults could tell it at a glance."

Erpi was Li Junge's nickname, and everyone at the table laughed.

Li Junge said with a smile: "I learned another trick. When I have a baby, I will definitely tell him to cut bacon at an angle."

Seeing the uncle picking wine, Li Junge said: "I just drank plum wine at home yesterday. Uncle, I think the orange wine is pretty good. Why don't we drink this at noon."

The uncle took out the orange wine and poured it into a large bowl, and then poured it into everyone's bowls.

The aunt and sister-in-law acted swiftly, and quickly prepared some vegetarian dishes, a pot of sauerkraut and bitter bamboo shoot soup, and the two women sat down, and everything was ready, and everyone started to move their chopsticks.

The uncle picked up the wine bowl and said: "Come, come, come, Erpi finally came back, let's all walk together, it's considered a welcome."

Everyone drank a few rounds, and the uncle said: "Erpi, uncle, I am too old, and I can't be the village chief after this term. We are old people in this generation. How to get money."

"These years are not bad, supported by lychees and longan, and the younger generation go out to work, every family can get by. Alas, it is the last year that the waterway was cut off, which is a bit annoying. Forget it, no matter what you say, It’s up to you next generation.”

Li Junge said: "Uncle was right to organize everyone to plant fruit trees. At that time, the Li family in Xiahe laughed at our village. Later, they rushed to plant with us. Life in the village has been better these years, uncle. You deserve it."

The uncle waved his hand and said: "Your uncle is now a dog meat bun - you can't get on the table. Now several villages are headed by college student village officials, and some of them are doing well. They have ideas, drive, knowledge, and a lot of talk in their heads. Very much."

"Well, even my Lijiagou is too remote, and people don't want to come here. If you don't want to hang around outside, it's fine to come back and be the village head."

Li Junge shook his head hastily: "Don't, don't, I'm just lazy, I'm not that kind of material. But I'm duty-bound to do things with the folks. Isn't Liang girl in Pan'ao Township as the deputy head, she's coming this weekend For dinner at my house, by the way, there is also Wang Congjun, the old lady who used to come to my house, he is now the deputy director of the county government office, and I will inquire about the waterway when the time comes."

The uncle laughed when he heard this: "How did you get this nickname? It's worse than your second skin."

This brings back the family's shortcoming from the major events in the village.

Li Junge said to his uncle again: "By the way, there is one more thing. The fourth grandpa wants to write a family history for our Li family, writing about the ancestors from Duke De Mao to the present."

The uncle was both happy and surprised when he heard it: "Oh, this is a big event in our family." After speaking, he looked at the fourth grandfather: "Old uncle, can your body take it?"

Li Junge said: "This matter is a lot of work, so I thought that the fourth grandpa would be in charge, first draw out a clue, and then slowly collect information. The children are going to be on summer vacation. Let them do the work of copying books, and they can produce something in one summer vacation."

The uncle was very happy to hear that: "This is a good idea. During the summer vacation, the village is full of children. Without adults to control Tianguang, he knows how to be mischievous. This year, I will drive them all to the ancestral hall. The fourth grandpa will arrest them. Who dares to blow their hair, Huang The thorn stick greeted vigorously!"

Uncle is an older generation, and he believes in the saying that "good people come from yellow thorn sticks".

The fourth grandpa smiled and said: "Your education method is not good. I think so. Three rooms are vacated in the ancestral hall. They are divided into three sections according to age. In the morning, do homework for two hours first, and then read books to help you." I check the information, and I can also give counseling to the children by the way."

"I don't care about it after noon, and go home separately. This way, I can learn and play at the same time, and the kids won't be herding sheep when they come back from summer vacation."

The uncle said with a smile: "I don't know much about these things. Anyway, it's a good thing. What do you say about me?"

After eating at the uncle's house, the fourth grandfather was left to chat with the uncle, while Li Junge and Li Junhua wandered around on the chai mountain in the uncle's house.

Every household in Shudu Mountain Township not only has its own paddy fields and slopes, but also has a large area of ​​firewood mountains. Hardworking people plant bamboo trees and fruit trees on the mountains, and the lazy ones are native miscellaneous trees. source.

Li Junge and Li Junhua walked side by side. Li Junge saw a lychee grove. There were about six or seven lychees. They were all old trees with luxuriant branches and leaves. With a small bump, he said to Li Junhua: "Hey, this year's fruit is pretty good."

Li Junhua sighed and said: "In previous years, the spring of the fruit-packed trees has been decided. Every year, these trees also have an income of [-] to [-]. This year, there will be a famine."

Li Junge comforted: "There are still two or three months left, and I will always find a way."

The two then walked up the mountain, passing a small piece of bamboo forest.

Li Junhua smiled and pointed at the bamboo forest and said: "Pi Wa, you planted this one, look, how good it grows."

Li bamboo is also called tea stem bamboo, wild bitter bamboo, just bamboo, with a diameter of three to five centimeters and a pole height of more than ten meters. The pole shape is straight, the material is tough, the thickness is uniform, the node length is moderate, and the resilience is strong moth-eaten.Li bamboo is most famous for its production in Huaiji County, Guangdong Province. It was once exported in large quantities to make ski poles. Because of its lightness, Americans once plasticized Li bamboo to make aircraft parts. Now it is widely used to make fishing rods, ski poles, and desks. , chairs, bookshelves, screens, birdcages and other advanced handicrafts, known as the "King of Bamboo".

Lizhu is a species of bitter bamboo, which can also be used as medicine.It has the effects of clearing away heat, detoxification, cooling blood and clearing phlegm.

Bamboo shoots are a treasure in the series of bitter bamboo shoots. People in Shudu usually make dishes with sauerkraut. Bitter bamboo shoots and sauerkraut sliced ​​meat are classics in the bitter dishes of Shudu.

Li bamboo is relatively rare in Sichuan. This piece of Li bamboo was discovered when Li Junge was searching for materials for making fishing rods in Bifeng Mountain. At that time, to be on the safe side, he transplanted some in the back mountain of his home, and relocated it in the back mountain of his uncle. After planting a part, the Li bamboos of the two families survived and grew well.

Li Junge looked at the bamboo forest, and found that many bamboos were over six years old and ready to be harvested. He said happily, "These are all good things. I don't know if Uncle Bamboo Carpenter has done my things well."

Li Junhua smiled and said: "It should be done, he has shown me several times, saying that you are satisfied with the things this time."

When Li Junge heard this, he couldn't stay any longer, so he hurried down the mountain, saying as he ran, "Then I have to go and have a look quickly, tell Fourth Grandpa and Uncle and Aunt, and I'll come to see them another day."

Li Junhua wanted to say something else, but seeing that Li Junge had run away, he couldn't help laughing: "This kid is still as virtuous as before!"

(End of this chapter)