A Young Woman's Heart

Chapter Sixty-Five: The First Day Begins

Under the blazing sun, even though many people have been wearing long sleeves and trousers lately, standing here still feels quite hot.

The cicadas, whose chirping seemed to have been absent for a long time, began to sing again, and several boys were catching grasshoppers beside piles of hay.

Some were a bright green, while others had turned brown.

Although it was only the first day since their arrival, the agricultural learning activities began in a very busy manner after the students put their luggage away.

Ye Wen was taking shelter under a mulberry tree by the field when Qiu Yi teased her, "What's going on? Isn't the homeroom teacher organizing things and is she slacking off here?"

"It's too hot! I'll get a tan!" Ye Wen nudged Qiu Yi's arm playfully. "Go ahead!"

"Hey, you're making me do all the hard work?"

"What does it matter? In the students' eyes, you're practically an assistant homeroom teacher, aren't you?"

"Huh? There's such a thing as a deputy homeroom teacher?" Qiu Yi ruffled her long hair helplessly, only to have her slap her away.

"Stop messing around, you've ruined my hair."

"Tsk, alright, alright." He glanced at the other classes, which were basically reorganizing. If he didn't step in, Class Two would become the most chaotic class at the moment.

"Everyone assemble—!" But just as he was about to step out of the shade, he heard Li Hongran's loud and energetic shout.

Standing next to him was Li Wanyan. It seemed that as the class monitor, she noticed that other classes were organizing their order, but only Class Two was not, so she spontaneously stepped forward.

"Oh, not bad."

"Hmph, don't you even know who's in charge of the shift?" Ye Wen glanced at him smugly. "Alright, you'd better hurry up and go support the team."

"Hey... look around, which homeroom teacher is slacking off here?"

"What does it matter?!" Ye Wen leaned lazily against the tree trunk. "I'm exhausted from running around just now. Can't I rest for a bit?"

"Okay, of course, whatever you want." Qiu Yi sighed and rubbed her little face before stepping out of the shade.

Actually, only the homeroom teacher needed to come for this agricultural study trip; someone like him was an exception.

The only other one was Mizuki Shi, who had a relatively good understanding of rural life.

As for Wang Qianyu, she is the homeroom teacher of Class 3, so of course she has to come.

"Line up in two lines, one for boys and one for girls. Gao Yuan! Stop laughing and joking, line up properly! Cha Li, did you get in the wrong place?" Li Hongran had absolute authority when it came to lining up, after all, she was the physical education class representative and sports committee member.

In addition, his tall and imposing appearance makes him quite intimidating when he gets serious.

The students lined up obediently. Qiu Yi walked to the front of the line and couldn't help but exclaim, "Wow, this year's class is much easier to manage than when I was in school."

"Pfft, teacher, shouldn't you say 'You are the worst class I've ever taught'?" Lu Chengyuan teased with a laugh.

"Haha, I was a real troublemaker back in school. The teachers couldn't control me at all. In fact, they always said we were the worst class ever," Qiu Yi laughed. "Your teacher Ye Wen needs a break, so I'll be filling in for her."

"Teacher Qiu is a homeroom teacher now!" Wang Jiale joked.

"Haha, is it too much for me to say I'm a deputy class teacher?" Qiu Yi put his hands in his pockets. "Don't be too nervous, everyone. Farm training is different from military training. It's just about doing some work. There's no need to be too particular. You'll definitely be a little rusty at first, but don't worry. The fields are so big, it doesn't matter if you make a few mistakes."

"Teacher Qiu, shall I go back to the line?" Li Hongran asked when she saw someone in charge of the class line.

"Okay, you can go back to your team now. Oh, you're here. Each class will have an instructor." Qiu Yi looked behind him, where the head of teaching was arranging for the simply dressed, rough-skinned farmers to be assigned to each class.

These are the instructors.

If we're talking about learning textbook knowledge, these farmers are definitely far inferior to high school students. The best among them only has a primary school diploma, and some may not even know a single character.

But this doesn't prevent them from being teachers to students in farming.

After all, everyone has their own area of ​​expertise.

"Alright, when the farmers come, you all need to be polite. Don't look down on them just because they're poorly dressed. Remember, all the food you guys eat comes from the farmers. You can't forget your roots!" Qiu Yi instructed, just as the head of the teaching department approached.

Class Two was the second to last class to be assigned an instructor; the older man among the remaining students was assigned to them.

The older woman was responsible for instructing the second-year high school class 1.

This was a short, thin old man. Judging from his rough, dark face and gray hair, he must have been over fifty years old. He was only slightly taller than Mo Xueyao, but he looked as solid as a block of iron.

He seemed to have the strength of an ox, and those prominent latissimus dorsi muscles were probably developed from farming.

It is significantly different from the muscles developed in the gym.

"Good job, dog seat!" Although the uncle tried his best to communicate with the students in Mandarin, his heavy local accent still made it almost impossible for them to understand what he was saying.

“Uncle, why don’t you stand on this haystack and talk, so they can’t see you?”

"Oh, okay!" Uncle jumped up readily, scratching his head with a simple and honest expression, "I've never been a... instructor before."

The preceding sentences were all in dialect, only the last sentence was in Mandarin, and it was spoken quite fluently, so it seems that the speaker had specifically practiced this word.

"Ahem..." Qiu Yi coughed lightly, acting as the translator below, "Uncle is saying that today is his first time being an instructor."

"Yes, yes!" The uncle could understand Mandarin, but he couldn't speak it very well. He nodded happily.

"It's alright, Uncle, take your time, there's no rush."

“Okay, students.” This time, it was in relatively standard Mandarin again. “Don’t be afraid of getting tired. We farm workers work very hard, but we usually won’t make you work too hard. It’s just an experience.”

My uncle's Mandarin gradually became more fluent, although it still had a heavy accent, but it was finally understandable.

Under the sunlight, the uncle led everyone for a walk along the edge of the field.

First, I showed them some basic crops.

"Look ahead... everyone, look ahead, this is the rice field, it's ready to be harvested now," Uncle said with a radiant face. "This year's harvest is excellent!"

For farmers, this is probably the happiest thing of the year.

"Over there, there's wheat! And over there, there are vegetable fields, where they grow all sorts of vegetables—peas, radishes, potatoes…"

Many of the students were city kids who had hardly ever been to the countryside. At that moment, they felt that there seemed to be food everywhere in the countryside, and that resources were so abundant.

After the introductions were finished, the uncle led everyone into a rice paddy.

They started teaching me directly, step by step.

“There’s a technique to harvesting wheat. You have to bend over slightly so you can exert force, and you have to be quick. Shoot at the root, ‘snap!’ and you’re done.” Uncle even vividly added onomatopoeia as he cut several clumps before handing out a basket of sickles and gloves. “You must wear gloves. Your hands are delicate, and you’ll cut yourself if you don’t.”

Everyone was very curious, so they put on gloves and then scattered around the field to try to harvest the rice.

Although her uncle harvested the rice with ease, Mo Xueyao found it to be exceptionally tough when she tried it herself. She couldn't cut it all at once and had to grind it down little by little.

It's time-consuming and laborious.

"Are you still harvesting manually? Don't we have combine harvesters now?" Gao Yuan asked, puzzled.

Uncle laughed twice: "A harvester, a harvester, that's expensive! And if the machine breaks down or something, you still have to harvest manually. Once you learn this, it's yours. As long as it can move, you can work. It's reliable to have people do it!"

To be frank, the problem is that harvesters are not yet widespread in rural areas and their prices are not low enough. If they were cheap to buy and maintain, then the need for manual labor would be inevitable.

"Wow, Yang Yankai is amazing!" Just as Mo Xueyao was trying to figure out the technique, another commotion broke out on the other side. Boys and girls alike gathered around Yang Yankai to watch.

He wielded the sickle with ease, harvesting at a speed that rivaled even his uncle's. In no time, he had cleared a small patch of land, covered with the remaining stubble of rice stalks.

"This student is really impressive!" the uncle praised, giving a thumbs up.

"Uh, you flatter me, sir." Yang Yankai smiled a little embarrassedly. "I'm from the countryside, and I often help with farm work, so I know a little bit about these things."

"What do you mean, 'old man'? I'm only thirty-nine this year, how am I an old man?"

Thirty-nine—?

Many people spoke in unison.

People would believe this uncle is sixty years old, but no one expected him to be so young.

Perhaps it was the hard work in the countryside that made him look so old.

The rough skin on my face is a result of being exposed to the wind and sun.

"Yes, there really is an old man here. You can't understand his dialect at all. I at least studied Mandarin." The old man said this in his thick rural accent, which made people want to laugh.

Lunch was not eaten in a special canteen, but rather enjoyed by the fields.

Actually, lunch arrived at 12:30.

Many people were starving.

Mo Xueyao wiped her sweat and sat down on a large rock by the field. This kind of physical work was not suitable for her. At this moment, not only her arms, but her whole body was a little sore, especially her waist.

Because I'm almost always bent over, I've never been able to straighten up properly.

No wonder many farmers suffer from back problems when they get old.

"Lunch is here!" Li Hongran, who was in charge of carrying the food, placed a large basket on the ground, and An Ruosu followed closely behind, carrying another one.

……

Chapter Sixty-Six: Remembering the bitter past and appreciating the sweet present?

Lunch was not the fast food Mo Xueyao had imagined, but a basket of steamed buns in plastic bags.

These steamed buns are different from those sold in the city.

The cornbread sold in the city is basically just dyed steamed buns; you're lucky if you can taste even a hint of corn flavor.

The steamed buns here are different; they are very firm and almost not fluffy at all. If you squeeze them slightly, large crumbs will fall off.

This is clearly made from cornmeal, and not finely ground cornmeal, but rather the coarser kind.

There were two steamed buns, each about the size of a baseball, in a plastic bag; the amount was exceptionally generous.

The side dish consisted of a cup of beet soup packaged in a plastic cup like milk tea, and a serving of pickled bamboo shoots.

"Where's the meat? Why isn't there any meat?" Gao Yuan was the first to shout. He was a meat lover and couldn't eat without meat.

"This is a meal to remember the bitter past and appreciate the sweet present, where did the meat come from?" Qiu Yi laughed loudly. "Ha, eat it all up, don't throw it away, otherwise there won't be anything else for you to eat later. Farmers in the past didn't even eat this well! You should be content!"

“Back in our day, all we had to eat were cornbread made from mixed grains, which contained corn flour, sweet potato flour, and a little bit of wheat flour. It was very dry, and there weren’t even any vegetables. We’d just eat it with soup at most,” the uncle recalled. “These cornbreads were so good back then, everyone would fight over them.”

"Only by enduring hardship can you understand others," Qiu Yi lectured from the side. "It will also make you cherish food more."