Chapter 38 Five Poison Moons
It rained all day, and in the middle of the night, the light rain turned into a heavy rain, with lightning and thunder, which scared Chun Niang so much that she couldn't sleep much the whole night.
It wasn't until the rain stopped the next day that she breathed a sigh of relief.
After a night of heavy rain, the river was overflowing, barely overflowing its banks.
Jiang Sanlang stood by the flowing river and watched for a long time, feeling almost certain.
It seems that my daughter's dream may come true.
But one night of heavy rain can cause the river to overflow like this. What if it happens another night?
He dared not think about how he and his family would cope if a flood struck.
In the past, rivers would overflow, even reaching low-lying farmland, and occasionally flooding into villagers' homes, but it receded quickly, so the villagers didn't care.
Ever since his daughter said she was going to have a flood, alarm bells suddenly sounded in Jiang Sanlang and his wife's hearts.
Now when I look at the river after the rain, the more I look at it, the more dangerous it becomes.
No, we still have to move to Xiaonanshan as soon as possible.
Looking back, Xiaonanshan is not far from the village, but only two or three miles away. Standing on the hillside, you can see the smoke from the village.
It doesn't seem impossible if a few more families move to Nanshan.
Jiang Sanlang made up his mind and turned around to find Uncle Muramasa Chen.
After the rain, the weather cleared up, the sun was shining brightly, and the weather gradually became hotter.
Today is the first day of the Five Poisons Month. Yingbao is wearing a five-color wristband embroidered by her mother-in-law. Her ankles are tied with colorful silk threads. She is wearing a colorful shirt and five-poison embroidered shoes. She is wearing the same clothes as Dani and Ernihu. Let's go to the river ditch to catch shrimps together, break off some reed leaves and go back to make rice dumplings.
The deer followed closely behind them, nibbling at the new grass on the roadside from time to time, wagging its short tail happily.
The reeds grew luxuriantly and the leaves were very wide. Dani asked her two younger sisters and her little cousin to stay on the bank while she went down to the river beach to collect leaves.
A bamboo basket was soon filled, and she walked ashore carrying the deep one and the shallow one.
At this time, a pheasant flew by, making the tiger scream in surprise. "Pheasant! Pheasant! Big sister caught it!"
Dani took a look and said, "The pheasant has flown far away and we can't catch it."
She placed the basket at Erni's feet and went back to the river beach. "I'm going to see if there are any wild eggs in the reeds."
Usually, pheasants and wild birds will make their nests in the grass or reeds. There may be pheasant eggs where the pheasants flew just now.
Sure enough, Dani's surprised cry came from the reeds: "Ah! There are really wild eggs!"
Yingbao and Ernihuzi immediately stretched their necks, trying to see where the pheasant was nesting.
After a while, Dani walked out with one foot deep and one foot shallow, one foot deep and one foot shallow, laughing, and showed the wild eggs in the hem of her clothes to her younger brothers and sisters. "Look, eight."
Huzi squeezed over and reached out to take it, but Erni slapped it away, "Don't move, it will break."
The four-year-old child screamed angrily and jumped up and down, insisting on grabbing it.
Suddenly, his little hand was grabbed by Ying Bao.
Huzi paused immediately, became as quiet as a chicken for a moment, turned around and said to Yingbao with a smile: "I want to play with Yingbao."
"I don't want to play, we have to go fishing for shrimps." Two-year-old Yingbao coaxed him like a little sister: "Hey, be good, go back and cook wild eggs for you to eat."
Huzi nodded wildly, sniffed, and suddenly transformed into an obedient baby.
Dani and her younger brothers and sisters found a large puddle with aquatic plants and started fishing for shrimps with their own dip net.
At this time, the shrimps are fat and big, and a plate can be cooked with twenty or thirty of them.
Yingbao was young and couldn't carry the net, so she wandered around carrying the basket.
Seeing that Da Ni Er Ni and Hu Zi were all staring at the puddle, she squatted down and quietly took out a large bush of water chestnut grass from the cave and placed it on the edge of the ditch, deliberately making it look like it had just been pulled out of the ditch.
Then she shouted: "Sister Dani, come quickly, I found the big water chestnut."
Dani heard the sound and came over. She was a little surprised when she saw what was in her little cousin's hand, "Is this really water chestnuts?"
This is too big. She has never seen water chestnuts as big as eggs.
Regardless of how shocked Dani was, Yingbao picked up a water chestnut and rinsed it in the water. She pointed at several water chestnuts hanging below and said, "This should be edible."
As he spoke, he picked one, washed it, took a bite, and kept mumbling: "It's so sweet and delicious."
Huzi had long forgotten that he had eaten water chestnuts last year, so he picked up a water chestnut and rinsed it. He happily tore off a large water chestnut and stuffed it into his mouth, making a crunching sound.
Seeing this, Erni squatted down, picked off the water chestnuts one by one, and put them into the basket.
Dani didn't hesitate for long and came to help.
This time, Yingbao released a bunch of freshly pulled sage grass and a small basket of water chestnuts.
The four siblings stopped fishing for shrimps and returned home with a basket of water chestnuts and a basket of reed leaves.
"This is a water chestnut, right?" Ms. Jiang Liu and Mrs. Jiang's wife Zhou were surprised when they saw such a big water chestnut for the first time, "Where did it come from?"
"Ying Bao found it." Dani and Erni said in unison.
"Where did you find it?" Jiang Liu asked.
"Over there in the ditch."
Dani was still a little confused and asked Jiang Liu: "Grandma, is this really edible?"
Ms. Jiang Liu picked up a water chestnut and rubbed it on the palm of her hand, took a bite and chewed it, "It's not numb, it's sweet and sweet, you should be able to eat it."
He handed another one to the eldest daughter-in-law and said, "You should try it too."
Mrs. Zhou took it and went to the kitchen to scoop out water and wash it before taking a sip. "It tastes like water chestnuts, but sweeter than water chestnuts."
Mrs. Jiang Liu asked her granddaughter with a smile, "Are there any more over the ditch?"
Dani was confused and turned to look at her little cousin.
Ying Bao said quickly: "There should be one. Let's go look for it tomorrow."
She wants to get all the water chestnuts in the cave, and maybe she can mobilize her family and her eldest and second uncle's family to grow some, and they should be able to sell them for money.
If it can't be sold, it's better to eat it at home than to let it rot in the cave.
Mrs. Jiang Liu touched Ying Bao's head and said with a smile, "Then you will go look for it tomorrow. If you find it, come back and tell Grandma, and Grandma will ask your second brother to help dig it out."
"Yeah." Ying Bao nodded. She will be able to find lots and lots of water chestnuts.
Yingbao returned home and showed half a basket of big water chestnuts to her mother-in-law.
"This is the water chestnut that Sister Dani and Sister Erni found."
"Such a big water chestnut?" Chun Niang picked up one and looked at it. "It's really rare."
The two milk babies on the kang also crawled over to catch them.
It was the time when they were teething, and they put everything they caught into their mouths.
Ying Bao moved the basket away and said, "I'll give it to you to eat after it's cooked."
Children of seven or eight months old have weak spleens and stomachs and cannot eat raw food. Moreover, these things grow in water, so there is no guarantee that there will be bugs in them.
Chun Niang took the water chestnuts, washed them, cooked them all, and put them in a yellow basin.
The two babies were drooling as they watched their sister peel the water chestnuts for them, and screamed with excitement.
Ying Bao handed the peeled ripe water chestnuts to her younger brothers. Seeing how sweet they tasted, she took one and bit it herself.
The two little guys ate it with gusto, drooling all over their clothes.
Chun Niang had no choice but to keep wiping her sons' saliva and hands, but the little baby boy pushed them away and made babbling protests.