Chapter 169 – Little Root Vegetables
By the end of February, the weather gradually became warmer, and the outside had already started to thaw.
However, it was still quite cold, so Lu Xia didn’t dare to take off her thick cotton coat. On the other hand, Jiang Junmo no longer needed to wear his heavy military coat. After a winter of recuperation, his health had almost recovered and was now similar to that of a normal person. In fact, due to the good food he had been eating, his physical condition was even better than average, and he wasn’t as sensitive to the cold anymore. Occasionally, when he met people from the village, they were all surprised to see such a significant change in him.
After all, the impression he left before, of being unable to walk a few steps without gasping for breath, as if a gust of wind could knock him down, had been deeply etched in everyone’s minds.
However, witnessing his transformation, everyone attributed it to his marriage with Lu Xia, believing that she had taken good care of him. Consequently, without even realizing it, Lu Xia had created an image of a good wife in everyone’s eyes.
As the weather gradually warmed up, Su Man and Gu Xiangnan were also preparing to build their new house. Besides preparing wood and other materials, they also needed to buy roof tiles from the brick factory. Under normal circumstances, one had to queue up in advance, but fortunately, Gu Xiangnan had connections and managed to buy them quickly. They even brought back roof tiles for Su Man’s house as well.
When Cheng Yujiao learned about it, her face twisted with anger. However, everyone pretended not to notice.
Her leg was now healed enough for her to walk with crutches and not remain confined to the kang. However, the impression the educated youths had of her wasn’t favorable, so they seldom interacted with her.
In this environment, her temper became worse, and she could only vent her frustrations on the only person who paid her any attention, Yu Fang. Yet, Yu Fang didn’t bother to engage with her. After receiving payment, she would just do her job and pretend not to hear Cheng Yujiao’s words. This made Cheng Yujiao even more frustrated.
So, she thought about doing something quickly, preferably to show Su Man a thing or two, lest that little vixen steals her Brother Xiangnan away…
Lu Xia was unaware of the hidden currents among the educated youths. With the warmer weather, she often went out for walks and was frequently dragged by Sun Shengnan and her friends to dig for “little root vegetables.”
“Little root vegetables?” Lu Xia was puzzled. She had never heard of them before. “Are they wild vegetables? There’s still snow on the ground, how could any wild vegetables grow so early?” she asked.
“You can say that. Once you go and see for yourself, you’ll understand. We’ll go to a place where the snow has melted, and the taste is quite good. We can gather some to improve our meals,” Sun Shengnan explained.
Intrigued, Lu Xia agreed, “Alright, let me get some things, and then I’ll go with you.”
She went back to fetch a basket and also pulled Jiang Junmo along, who seemed to have nothing else to do.
Seeing Lu Xia bringing Jiang Junmo with her, the female educated youths chuckled, “When we left earlier, we asked the male educated youths, but they felt embarrassed to join us. If we had known that Educated Youth Jiang would come, we would have called them.”
Lu Xia also laughed after hearing that, “Well, he doesn’t have much to do, so let’s take him along to help.”
Jiang Junmo had no objections and didn’t feel embarrassed to follow the female educated youths.
The group hadn’t walked far when they arrived at a sunny spot. The snow had already melted here, revealing the ground with a layer of yellowish weeds on top.
“Are the little root vegetables here?” Lu Xia looked at the ground with puzzlement. She didn’t see anything green.
“Yes!” Sun Shengnan walked over and lifted the weeds, revealing small, fine weeds underneath. “You see, these are the little root vegetables. We don’t eat the part above the ground; we eat the roots. Just dig them out, and it’ll be good. We don’t have hoes, so using wooden sticks to dig will do.”
*
Chapter 170 – Digging Corn Stalks
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Sun Shengnan spoke and immediately got to work, using a wooden stick to quickly dig out the little root vegetables.
Then, Lu Xia looked at the little root vegetables that Sun Shengnan pointed out with surprise, “Are these the little root vegetables?”
The stems and leaves above the ground were as thin as needles, just like weeds. However, she didn’t expect the roots to be so round and white, as big as a fingernail.
“Why not call them big root vegetables or round root vegetables?” she asked.
Sun Shengnan laughed at her question, “You’re just like Qingqing. She asked the same thing when she first arrived.”
Hearing this, Shen Qingqing next to them felt embarrassed, “The villagers have always called them that way.”
Lu Xia also chuckled, “Alright.” There was no need to delve into it. It was similar to why cucumbers weren’t called green melons.
Then, she turned to Jiang Junmo and asked, “Have you seen what they look like?”
Jiang Junmo nodded, “They look like onions, but a hundred times smaller.”
“…,” Lu Xia was rendered speechless by his comparison.
Sun Shengnan laughed, “Educated Youth Jiang knows how to describe them accurately. They not only look like onions, but they also taste like them. Whether it’s eaten raw or stir-fried, it goes well with the dishes.”
“Is that so?” Lu Xia became interested upon hearing this.
She directly took Jiang Junmo with her to dig around the area. There were indeed quite a few of these little root vegetables underground. Some roots were large, while others were small. After digging for a while, they figured out the pattern and chose the larger ones.
When they had dug enough, Jiang Junmo washed and chopped them. Luckily, a few days ago, Lu Xia had exchanged some eggs in the village, so they used them to make a stir-fry with the little root vegetables.
It turned out to be quite tasty.
After taking a bite, Lu Xia remarked, “Isn’t this the taste of scallions?”
“Indeed,” Jiang Junmo nodded.
“Not bad. I’ve had enough of eating sauerkraut recently. Let’s go dig some more tomorrow,” Lu Xia suggested.
“Sure.”
The next day, when they went to the location, they found that they weren’t the only ones. The male educated youths had also come. They probably saw the good harvest the female educated youths had yesterday, and quite a few villagers were also there, though most of them were children.
While digging, Lu Xia and the others chatted and learned that after the thaw, wild vegetables would also start to grow, and they had already made plans to go up the mountain together to collect them.
Lu Xia also decided to join in and experience the excitement.
However, Su Man and Gu Xiangnan didn’t participate because they were busy preparing materials for building their house. They aimed to start construction right after the thaw.
But it seemed that this plan wouldn’t come to fruition.
By the time the third month of the lunar calendar arrived, the ground had completely thawed, and the wild vegetables on the mountain had sprouted. However, before Lu Xia and the others could go pick them, they received a notice from the village that they needed to start working normally.
It was still early for spring plowing, but there were already plenty of tasks that needed to be done in the village.
They had to dig corn stalks, apply manure, turn over the soil, and more. So, they were quite busy during this period.
On her first day of work, Lu Xia was assigned to dig corn stalks.
She didn’t know what it was, but seeing the serious expressions on the faces of the other female educated youths made her curious.
After arriving at the site, she learned that digging corn stalks meant removing the leftover corn roots in the field after harvesting.
It sounded simple, but it was physically demanding work.
The village had planted a lot of corn, so most people were assigned to dig corn stalks that day.
Lu Xia followed the others’ lead and swung her hoe with force at the corn roots.
But it went askew.
She didn’t mind and continued trying. The second attempt finally hit the target, but because her strength was insufficient, the hoe didn’t go in deep.
On the third try, she succeeded in getting the hoe into the corn roots and then tried to pry them out.
The corn roots… didn’t come out.
Thank you for the chapter (=ﾟДﾟ=)