There is my father's burial, there is my father's grave, there is the land soaked by his father's sweat, there are simple and hardworking villagers, there is my fiery youth, and there is the laughter of young playmates.
My hometown, Dawei Village, Gao Zhe Town, Chaohu City, is just one of countless villages dotted in the central plains of Anhui Province.
My hometown is located between Hefei-Miaogang-Gao Zhe and Hefei-Yang Yang-Chaohu, at the junction of Hanzhong, Yang Yang and Gao Zhe, six miles away from Hengdian and Fenghuang in Yang Yang Town, and fifteen miles away from Gao Zhe, a thousand-year-old town. Besides Dawei Village, there are two small villages: Dadaoshan and Xiao Wei Village.
Three years of natural disasters, the most difficult period of the country, my mother became an orphan. She came to Xiao Wei Village and was adopted by a family. I also have grandparents, uncles and aunts. They are very simple and hardworking people. When our three brothers and sisters were worried about tuition fees, they helped our family a lot.
The village is very large, with 100 households and nearly 1000 people. Divide into team one, team two and team six. My family lives in Raul team, located in the northwest corner of the village, next to farmland, vegetable garden and pond. The names of my childhood playmates and neighbors, Erzai, Fengqiu, Erbaodan, Yuanhe, Changhua and Sanmei, still appear in my dreams.
My hometown is beautiful.
Green Woods surround the village and green hills are located outside the city.
Two or three peach blossoms outside the bamboo forest and ducks in the water first noticed the warm spring.
Don't laugh at the farmhouse music brewed in the muddled month. In the harvest month, the dishes for guests are very rich.
The mountains and plains are all green, and the sound of Zigui is raining like smoke.
The child ran quickly to catch the yellow butterfly, but the butterfly suddenly flew into the vegetable garden and could not be found again.
The artistic conception and atmosphere of many ancient poems can be found and experienced here.
In spring, Yuan Ye is dressed in green, and bees are flying around in the mud house. The spring is bright and the years are long. We picked wild vegetables on the hillside, went to the forest farm four or five miles away from home, and picked bamboo shoots in the bamboo forest.
In summer, we dig earthworms, hang them on hooks and catch shrimps by the pond. Or pick hard little fruit from the tree, put it in a homemade pump, use it as a pistol, imitate the war scenes seen on TV, and shoot at each other with friends.
In autumn, we climb trees to pick dates, or pick dates that have been blown off by the wind.
In winter, after a heavy snow, a world of ice sculptures and jade carvings is presented. We make snowmen, have snowball fights, or chase rabbits in the wilderness. When the sun came out and the snow gradually melted, the villagers gathered in an open space, basking in the sun, scraping eggs, talking about this year's harvest, telling the legendary story of Chairman Mao and gossiping about their neighbors.
Birds go to the mountains, and people sing and cry.
The villagers grew up in this land, married, multiplied, raised their offspring, worked hard and finally passed away. Tombstones were erected in the fields. They are like dead leaves, in another form, integrated with the land that once raised them.
My father died in Hefei in April the year before last. A month later, we held a funeral for him in our hometown. In the sad suona sound, we sent our father up the hill. With a dignified and sad mood, I put my father's urn in the grave built by craftsmen. After the funeral, I took my daughter by the hand, walked over the high and low hurdles and crossed the dry river. I lost one of the closest people in my life. I no longer have a father to shelter me from the wind and rain. I want to face the hardships and challenges of life alone. My closest relatives left us. Tears blurred my eyes when I thought of his kindness to me.
There is a big pond between Dawei Village and Dadaoshan. One summer night, my friends and I were swimming in the pond. I am a landlubber. I can't swim. I just walked around in the water on the solid clods at the bottom of the pool. I accidentally swam into a deep pit and swallowed a few mouthfuls. Just then, another playmate who was a few meters away from me swam over immediately and dragged me out of the pit. To this day, I am very grateful to him.
Next to the bungalow of Wei Ruiping, the former neighbor of my old house, there is a cesspit with cow dung and chicken manure, which can be used as fertilizer instead of chemical fertilizer. When it is hot in summer, bubbles keep popping up in the cesspit and cracking again.
This cesspit is open and uncovered. When I was about seven years old, my friends and I played games next to this cesspit. I closed my eyes, stepped back and plunged into the pit. Fortunately, the adults next to me arrived in time and dragged me up. As for what I felt in it and how I was rescued, I was still young at that time, and I can't remember it clearly for a long time, only I can probably know it. If fate were a little more cruel and harsh to me, in any crisis, my life might come to an abrupt end and there was no possibility of continuing writing.
Compared with the metropolis Hefei, my hometown is relatively poor and lacks industries and factories. In order to make a living, people abandon their wives and children to work in big cities, and exchange hard work and sweat for meager income. Some of them are business-minded. They are contractors themselves, contracting construction projects.
During the Chinese New Year, these people who worked as contractors and worked hard abroad returned to their hometowns. They are satisfied, their shoes are polished, they distribute high-grade cigarettes to everyone, and they speak loudly about their brilliant experiences of wandering outside and going through five customs and beheading six generals. Those onlookers or villagers cast envious and hateful eyes on them, and they can only blame themselves or their incompetence and can't get along.
The village is small, but there are many talents. In recent decades, a total of three people from Chaohu No.1 Middle School have been admitted to this prestigious school.
When I was in primary school and junior high school, my teacher often mentioned Wei Dongping. He is much older than me. The senior high school entrance examination was admitted to Chaohu No.1 Middle School and was admitted to China University of Science and Technology. Now he lives in Beijing.
Wei Ruixing, my head teacher and English teacher in junior high school, is also a famous family in the village. The eldest son graduated from Tongji University and now works in Shanghai. The second son graduated from Anhui University, and the youngest son graduated from Chaohu College. "A family of three college students", Mr. Wei's family is very admired by the villagers.
Wei's eldest son, Wei, was admitted to Shandong University, and his other son, Wei, was one year older than me. The senior high school entrance examination was admitted to Chaohu No.2 Middle School, and the college entrance examination was admitted to Southeast University.
There are also some people who struggle to buy a house and get married in big cities like Hefei, Shanghai and Suzhou Changshu. They got rid of their status as farmers and lived a decent life.
The countryside is not the paradise and pure land described by Tao Yuanming, and fights occur from time to time. Sometimes, villagers will make a big fuss about the demarcation between the water in the field and their houses. Farming in the countryside, without a strong wrist, is difficult to get along with, and it is difficult to get along with dignity. Once, I saw the villagers fighting for a little thing. One family picked up a drawing fork and stuck it on the head of another owner.
My hometown has a large area of farmland and no factories. The villagers worked hard to earn their children's tuition fees and maintain the living expenses and operation of a large family.
Compared with the bustling metropolis, my hometown is beautiful and poor. Hometown is just a stop for travelers to take a nap. After several years, I don't want to go back to my hometown as a loser. Now, I will work hard in the city and live up to my great youth and youth.