Fields in the autumn water town—Muxi Reservoir (middle)

Muxi Reservoir is located in the northeast corner of Yugan County, Jiangxi Province. It is a first-class water reservoir with a storage capacity of 31 million cubic meters and is used for both irrigation and drinking water. It is also the largest medium-sized reservoir in Yugan. Fish farming strictly follows the "human The principle of "let the day go and nourish it" ensures that the water quality is clean and safe.

I have continued to stay here for a few days, and I encountered a few interesting things that I would like to share with you.

One morning in late autumn, I took an umbrella and went for a walk across the dam in the light rain. After going down from the dam, we walked into the fish pond we visited yesterday and took some photos of the dead lotuses in the water, which was quite interesting.

On the surface of the water in a corner of the pond where mandarin fish are raised, I saw a long-lost waterside plant - chicken head rice (also called gorgon fruit, and the locals call it chicken eggs). This aquatic plant, like lotus root, grows in clean water. Its large thorny leaves float flat on the water. Next to the thorny Gorgon leaves, stems covered with thorns protrude from the underwater mud, each with fruits. The bag is exposed out of the water. The duck farmer nearby said that these small bags are gorgon fruits wrapped in chicken head rice. In fact, Gorgon flowers bloom and grow at the same time. They first bloom with dark blue flowers on the tips and continue to bloom until late autumn. After the flowers wither, they bear fruits, which grow bigger and bigger, and the gorgon seeds mature in autumn. Gorgon seeds are difficult to pick because they are covered in thorns.

The prickly outer skin wraps the pomegranate-like seeds inside the gorgon fruit. The hard outer shell of the seeds is wrapped in a thin film, and inside is the starchy kernel. Peel off the prickly outer skin of the pole and you can fry the vegetables and eat them, which are fresh and delicious.

I remember that in the 1960s, because there was not enough food at home, we had to pick some wild plants to satisfy our hunger. During the summer vacation, my second brother, who studied at Yugan Middle School, took my third brother and me to the ponds and lakesides of Poyang Lake to look for places where gorgon seeds grew, and then went into the water to pick the gorgon seeds that were about to mature.

Because I cared about my clothes at that time, I was reluctant to wear long pants to go into the water, so I wore shorts and fished barefoot in the water. When I came up, there were blood marks on my legs. After landing, they were cut off, the skins of the prickly stems were torn off, and the tender, pink stems were taken home and cooked for dinner. The chicken head rice fruits that were cut off were packed one by one, and they were carried home in bags. They were crushed with their feet at home, and then cut open with a knife to get out the ripe chicken head rice. The tender chicken head rice can be eaten raw. Although it is troublesome to chew, the tender nuts inside are a bit sweet, equivalent to fruit. As for some mature chicken head rice, the shell is hard and the color has turned brown. You need to chop it with a knife or bite it hard with hard teeth. There is white starch inside, which can be cooked. Eat it, but it doesn’t taste as good as the tender ones.

In that era when food and clothing were scarce, my second brother took us to search for wild food, which left an unforgettable impression on us.

I exchanged phone numbers with Mr. Ye, the duck farmer, and asked him to call to let me know if the gorgon seeds were harvested, and I would come get some gorgon seeds to try. He promised that if he went to the lake to cut and fish in a few days, he would tell me in time.

They said that now people no longer fish the gorgon seeds in the water because there are too many thorns and they sting people, which is very hard. Now they let it mature naturally. When the seeds inside are ripe, they will bloom and fall into the water. They then pump the water and silt from the Gorgon pond with a pump, float away the sediment with water, and leave the remaining Gorgon fruit. reward. After drying, the shell is peeled off using a machine. The dried kernels of the gorgon fruit are sold in the market for 25 yuan per pound.

The medicinal effects of Gorgon fruit kernels are nourishing and strengthening, nourishing the kidneys and stopping diarrhea, removing dampness and strengthening the spleen, and astringent and calming. It is very convenient to stew soup, boil water, and cook porridge. It is a good ingredient in water towns.

I stood in the fish pond and chatted with Mr. Ye, the duck farmer. He said it is very difficult to raise fish now. This year's floods destroyed the fish ponds and all the fish they raised were washed away. The losses are certain. He pointed to the fish pond opposite and said that they would not contract it next year, but Boss Ye and the others were going to take it over to contract it. He has already discussed with his friends that he will expand the scale next year. In addition to raising ducks, he plans to jointly raise fish, grow lotus roots and gorgon seeds, and also raise geese.

He used to work in Fujian, but when he came back this year, it seems he can develop in his hometown. He said that despite his age, he was willing to work hard, so others were willing to partner with him. He raised a lot of ducks in the canal. He spent several hundred yuan to build a new bamboo bridge so that pedestrians could cross the canal. He said that if the contracting was stabilized, he would build a cement bridge so that cars and feed could be transported across it.

At noon on the third day, I received a call from Boss Ye, who contracted the fish pond, saying that the gorgon seeds in his fish pond had been harvested and asked me to come over and take some back to taste. He also said that he would bring a bucket to fill it because the plants There are thorns, so you can't hold it directly with your hands.

When I passed by, they had already rowed a small boat and harvested a batch of Gorgon seeds from the fish pond water. Thorny poles and gorgon fruits covered with thorns were piled on the fields. They were sorting and separating them with sickles and tongs, cutting off the excess long poles, leaving behind large packages of gorgon fruits.

Boss Ye filled me with a bucket full of freshly harvested Gorgon seeds, and stuffed some thorny poles into it, saying that the thorny skin of the poles could be peeled off for cooking. The fruit is pressed with a wooden board and squeezed to press out the mature and hard fruit, and then the tender film on the surface is peeled off, which is the Gorgon fruit. There were dozens of gorgon seeds growing in one fruit bag, and they were basically all mature. We tried opening one. The shell inside was so hard that it could only be bitten open with teeth. It was full of white starch. I thanked them and returned to the reservoir carrying a bucket of fresh gorgon seeds.

Several larger villages around Muxi Reservoir still retain the ancient custom of going to the market. The surrounding farmers staggered the dates according to the lunar calendar, and several villages took turns to determine the days to go to the market.

After going down from the Muxi Reservoir and walking a short distance, we arrived at a village called Maolongkou. It was the market day on the 369th day of the lunar calendar. Today was the third day of the lunar month, so the streets were crowded with people coming and going on the market day.

I took Master Bai's tricycle to Maolongkou and asked him to park the car far away, get off the car and walk on the street.

Not far away, I met someone calling me. I saw it was my second brother’s friend Yu Pingyun. The couple came here today to sell vegetables. Under a tent, there were various varieties of vegetables for the farmers who went to the market to choose from. Buy. I stopped and chatted with them for a few words, fearing that it would affect their vegetable selling business, so I quickly said goodbye to them.

I saw something in town that I thought was rare:

First, there are a lot of fish, and there are quite a lot of varieties. There are catfish, probably farmed, all black, priced at 8 yuan per catty; live white fish, weighing two jins, priced at 20 yuan per catty. They say they have been bought by others and have not been taken away yet. This kind of fish is delicious and is in high demand; small wild crucian carp is 7 yuan per catty; wild eel is 35 yuan per catty; sea bass is 15 yuan per catty; there are also grass carp, loach, etc.

There are slaughtered ducks and tofu for sale.

Second, there is a store that sells local ginger. These fresh and tender yellow gingers are freshly dug from the shore of the reservoir. They cost 8 yuan a pound. There are also many sellers of lentils and shrimp lentils. There was one selling sweet potatoes, and there were also sword beans that I hadn’t seen in a long time.

Of course, there are other vegetables that are grown by farmers themselves. There are sellers of persimmons, wild rice, edamame, green vegetables, taro, lotus root, ducklings, bamboo brooms, and fork brooms. It seems that this bamboo pot-washing tool is still used in rural areas.

Third, there are still people sitting on the street shaving their heads and faces. This ancient way of shaving can still be seen in rural markets, and I am also curious.

There are small shops on the street selling all kinds of breakfasts, as well as general merchandise. I watched curiously along the street and took photos of anything I thought was strange.

Xiaoyao and his wife, who work in a reservoir, are proud that their three children, two daughters and one son, have all gone to college. It is not easy.

Xiao Yao told me that their three children all had very good academic performance, so the couple discussed that no matter how poor they were, they would still support their education. Their sons and daughters all went to college and were praised by Xiao Yao’s primary school teacher!

Xiao Yao told me that his eldest daughter took the lead and led her younger sister and younger brother to college. He remembered that his eldest daughter wanted to go to Linchuan Middle School in Fuzhou (which may be one of the best middle schools in Jiangxi) with her classmates and had already registered. However, Xiao Yao considered that his daughter was still young at the time. When she was only 15 years old, the couple did not want her to leave home to go to school so far away, so they sent her to nearby Wannian County to study, and later she was admitted to university. Now he has settled in Nanchang. The second daughter graduated from college and worked with her sister in Nanchang. When my son entered junior high school, he actually got a high score of 112 on the 150-point math paper. After graduating from Yugan Middle School (which is the best middle school in Yugan), I went to Hunan University of Science and Technology. I have graduated with a bachelor's degree and am preparing for the postgraduate entrance examination. A family of three college students is really worthy of their pride and honor. This is something that has never happened in Yaojia Village of Taihe Village Committee. They are really not a simple couple.

At noon that day, I drove to Xiao Yao's house to have a look. The small mountain village where their home is located is at the east end of the reservoir, across the lake from the Reservoir Engineering Management Bureau. It can be reached in five minutes by boat, and it takes only 5 minutes by car. The detour is several kilometers long. It was a real small mountain village with very little external interference. It was also close to the lake and had abundant negative oxygen ions. Outside the village was the village of Wannian County.

At the door of Xiao Yao's house, I met his parents. They were a simple and elderly couple who spoke little and were well-educated and sensible.

Their small villa is beautifully built, with very good lighting and nice interior decoration. It is fully equipped with furniture and appliances and is kept clean. The young couple really knows how to get along, and they are indeed a happy family.

I had just finished breakfast when Master Bai, a worker here, told me that his uncle was a poet in the army. He gave me the poetry award certificate of his uncle, Mr. Bai Chuhuai, who had won the first prize of the "China Socialist Literature and Art Society". look.

His uncle, Mr. Yang, originally followed the army from Yugan to the south, and lived in Guizhou for a long time after his retirement. He also showed me his uncle’s collection of poems, award certificates and character introductions. The information is precious, so I took photos of the information one by one, added Master Bai on WeChat, and sent the six photos to him, asking him to save them for future reference.

Later, Master Bai specially used three of his cars to take me to his home.

I got on Master Bai's tricycle, sat on the right side of his driver's seat, and went down the road on the reservoir. We passed through the market and continued to drive forward, and unexpectedly passed through Chaijialiao, which is where my second brother was sent down. Along the road beside the canal behind Chaijialiao, we continued forward and arrived at Gangbian Village. Turn left and you will arrive at Baijia Village in Baima Township not far away.

Master Bai's name is Bai Xinkui, and his home is on the mountainside to the west of the village. There are several dragon boats hidden there, and they are rowed out for competition every year during the Dragon Boat Festival.

There are large trees and bamboo forests in front of and behind the house. There are two old houses and two new houses, covering a large area.

There are bamboo groves and fruit trees in front of the house and behind the house. A smelly orange tree is so full of fruits that its branches are bent, which shows that Master Bai is a hard-working and capable man.

At the door of his house, I saw Master Bai's father, who was in his eighties and very healthy, and said hello to him.

Master Bai is very good at driving boats. Every time he goes to patrol the lake, he controls the propeller. He is a simple farmer of the older generation.

One day, a guest who came to fish brought a dog to the reservoir. It was a cross between a Labrador and other dogs. It was huge and black, and its name was "Lala". As soon as it arrived, it started fighting with Duoduo, the dog raised in the reservoir. "Lala" is big and "Duoduo" is afraid of it, so when "Lala" comes, the beautiful "Duoduo" usually hides in the kitchen and barks once or twice at most. The two dogs usually start to bite each other when they meet and gesture, but "Duoduo" is often quickly stopped by his owner, so the two dogs never have a chance to decide the winner.

On this day, "Lala" suddenly came, and "Duoduo" couldn't avoid it. Today, "Duoduo" thought this was his territory, and with his owner and his wife nearby, "Duoduo" got into a fight with "Lala" fiercely. In order to prevent the big "Lala" from biting or killing the smaller "Duoduo", the owner of "Duoduo" tried his best to fight and drive "Duoduo" away. During the fight, the owner was bitten by Duoduo. His skin was broken in several places, white flesh appeared, and there were several teeth marks and bleeding. After driving "Duoduo" away, he quickly rinsed it with water and soap for half an hour before he felt better.

After ringing the bell, someone hurriedly sent someone to drive the owner of "Duoduo" to the county town for rabies vaccination. When he came back in the afternoon, he showed a medical receipt worth 2,890 yuan. It was said that the doctor not only injected him with rabies vaccine, but also gave him anti-tetanus shots. The treatment process took a week.

Ringing the bell said that the dogs should decide the winner and loser, and people should not care about them. After they fight once, the losing dog will naturally obey and will not fight again. In the future, it will take a detour when seeing the winning dog, or Hiding and not coming out. It’s not worth it to artificially create a fight for them, only to get bitten instead! The ringing of the bell makes sense.

One morning, I walked straight along the reservoir dam, turned left downhill at the end, and walked into a small village in the mountains. This is part of Zhangjiawan Village, and several families live here.

I saw someone at the door of a house, so I went up and chatted with them for a few words. The owner's surname is Zhang, a local farmer. Their family is impoverished due to illness, and it is said that there are people who provide one-on-one help in poverty alleviation. He asked me if I could help ask the county civil affairs bureau if they had no son, could they be classified as a "five-guarantee household"? At this time, his 83-year-old mother came over and asked me if I could help her ask the relevant departments in the county. His husband had participated in the "Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea" and had always received government subsidies when he was alive. Now that he has passed away, As a survivor, can the old lady enjoy the "benefits of the survivors of the U.S. aid to Korea"?

I told them that my classmate worked in the county civil affairs bureau and I could help them consult and give them an answer.

At noon that day, I made a phone call with my classmates who had worked in the Civil Affairs Bureau about the Zhang family in Zhangjiawan, and consulted them in detail about applying for the "Five Guarantees Households" and the "Benefits for the Survivors of the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea." My classmates patiently told me that households with five guarantees must meet at least three conditions: first, they must be over sixty years old, second, they must have lost the ability to work, and third, they must have no children. As for the "benefits for survivors of the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea," the state has clearly stated that when the person concerned dies, the subsidy ends and relatives cannot enjoy state subsidies. But if you are a martyr, you can continue to provide subsidies to your survivors.

I went to Zhang's house in Zhangjiawan again and patiently told him and his mother these answers and explained them to them. Because the Zhang family has two problems: although he is sixty-one years old, he still works outside and has some income; he also has a married daughter.

After declining the lunch from the Zhang family, I warned the couple to be kinder to their elderly mother. Yesterday, after they parted ways with me, they went to the ancient port to pay the electricity bill. I continued chatting with his mother for a while. After discovering that the couple had left, his wife locked the kitchen door and the hall door, and even put the small bench under the eaves into the house. His elderly mother stood blankly under the eaves. There was no place to sit. Even if the old man wanted to enter the house to rest or find a drink of water, he could not enter the house. I was very heartbroken when I saw this scene.

Once I followed the main road on the reservoir from the fish pond back to the reservoir management building.

I was walking on the uphill slope of the reservoir dam when I heard a crash behind me. I didn't know what happened. I just heard the fish farmer say that the motorcycle fell into the ditch. I looked around and saw nothing. There were two people standing on the road.

Walking further, I saw two people on the side of the road, one of whom was only wearing shorts. Only then did I realize that someone was riding a motorcycle and fell into the ditch on the side of the road. I couldn't see clearly, so I took a photo with my mobile phone and then enlarged it. I could see a motorcycle falling into the water. Bian, luckily, he didn't fall into the water. People also climbed up, and their clothes were probably soaked. I shouted to them, was anyone injured? Do you need help? They said nothing happened.

Later, I ran out after dinner and saw the man who climbed up from the ditch, sitting at the door of the hydropower station, seeming to be bandaging his wounds. From the photos taken, you can see that his feet and hands were injured and bleeding.

Four people were already helping to salvage the motorcycle by the ditch. Three people stood on the road and pulled it with ropes. One person went down to the water's edge to tie the rope. They worked together to pull the motorcycle out of the water.

It seems that local young people drive too hard. If such an accident occurs at night, it will be very dangerous. Traffic safety is a major issue.

Back to the reservoir, I saw a few people fishing. In their fish baskets, I saw seven or eight large grass carp, each weighing more than five kilograms, jumping around in the water.

Autumn at Muxi Reservoir is really the harvest season, especially the harvest of Gorgon seeds, which makes me feel like I haven't seen for a long time. I haven’t seen or eaten this aquatic plant in decades. It reminded me of the days when I was short of food and clothing, when I followed my second and third brothers down to Poyang Lake to pick gorgon seeds to satisfy my hunger.