The Farm Life Of a "Fool"

Chapter 12

Two days later, all of the bamboo required for the new house had been cut down, and all that remained was to transport them down the mountain.

In addition, Xu Ran led a group of children up the mountain to help in the work. He moved one after another because he was still not strong enough.

The children were often paired together to bear one bamboo at a time and rest as they became exhausted.

Dahu and Gouzi were both eight years old at the time, so they worked together while the other kids were separated into two groups.

The children were still young, but there were more people, and thus more power! They went back and forth in this manner, effectively pushing a large amount of bamboo. The adults were overjoyed and continually praised the children. The kids didn't seem exhausted at all because they were so encouraged.

Carrying all of the bamboo down the mountain took them all of one day. After that, they had to divide each bamboo into two parts. This was indeed a major task. Now that they didn't have money, they couldn't pay for other people to do it. They could only do it slowly. Fortunately, it was not the busy farming season.

Every day, there were a huge number of people to feed, and they all stayed at Wu Mei's home. Xu Ran was concerned and embarrassed by the situation. As a result, he always took the kids out in search of wild vegetables. He would have been able to find a lot of food if he was lucky. However, the amount of food provided was insufficient.

Xu Ran had never seen potatoes yet in this life. He believed that this location should be used to grow potatoes. He reasoned that they had not yet been discovered, so he went up the mountain to look for them.

He couldn't take any children with him because the mountain was dangerous. He went alone, not asking Liu Tong or anybody else. He knew Liu Tong wouldn't agree with him, so he decided to do it on his own first.

Xu Ran carried a basket on his back, stuffed it with a small hoe, and held a sickle in his hand. He just intended to go for half a day, so he didn't even have food or water with him.

People living on mountains or near water have often been said to be able to feed on nature since ancient times. As a result, Xu Ran was confident that there should be plenty of food to sustain human life on this mountain.

The mushroom harvesting season had come to an end, but there were still some wood ears. When Xu Ran saw the thick wood ears growing on the tree trunks, he realized that no one here dared to eat them, so he picked them up and put them in his basket.

However, he went up the mountain today mostly to look for potatoes. He wasn't sure whether he'd be able to find them.

Xu Ran spent a lot of effort in order to find potatoes. He knelt down and looked vigorously for it at first, but none was found. Later, he simply lay down on the ground and checked each space with a sickle, resulting in mud stains on all of his clothing.

At last he found one plant of potato! He was almost weeping with joy.

After a potato plant was found, there was a second and a third one... The climate here was humid. It was a good place to grow potatoes.

Xu Ran emptied the basket of wood ears and set them aside. He then started digging potatoes out of the ground and throwing them into the basket. It was becoming exceedingly hot, and Xu Ran discovered that his basket was already filled with potatoes. He simply stopped in his digging. He knew Liu Tong would be worried if he returned late.

Liu Tong and the others had not returned until Xu Ran returned with his crop. They were probably already dealing with bamboo in the village's back yard.