Chapter 52: Chapter 52 Girl Fight
Daya carried the clothes to the riverside to wash, a large basin full of clothes she carried to the river, where some older women and girls about her age were washing clothes.
Daya used a washboard and the soap pods they collected from the mountains once a year; every family would make some to wash their own clothes.
This was something they, as farmers, made themselves, while those slightly wealthier would go to the stores to buy better soaps with a pleasant scent.
Just like the tea they used for washing hair, which they also gathered from the mountains and processed, it could clean the hair thoroughly and make it black and glossy; some even made tea oil from these leaves for cooking.
“Daya, your mom has gone to the county to enjoy herself, why didn’t you follow her? Look at you, so young, doing so much work; why hasn’t your mom come back this month?” an inquisitive aunt in her thirties asked, her voice engaging the curiosity of others, who were just as intrigued by this family.
Many others were envious, after all, not everyone could earn two taels of silver.
For farmers like them, with not a small amount of expenses, it might be impossible to earn two taels of silver in a whole year.
How could they not be jealous? It’s a pity that they weren’t lucky enough to work for a wealthy family.
In their minds, working for a rich family would be better than farming at home.
Wealthy families had better food, better products, and could even offer reward money for good work.
“Yeah, why haven’t the two of you come back? Your mom wouldn’t have abandoned you, would she?” another old woman asked.
“Daya, you’ve got a dad but no mom,” said a girl about Daya’s age.
“My mom will be back in just over ten or twenty days; please don’t talk nonsense. With so much work waiting at home, how could I go with her?”
Daya, observed by so many pairs of eyes, was shy but replied with firmness.
“Daya, why don’t your second aunt and third aunt come out to help you with the laundry? Why do you get up so early? I see your second aunt and third aunt only come to the riverside to wash clothes after 7 a.m. to 9 a.m,” an old woman said, her words tinged with a hint of provocation.
“Right, your second aunt and third aunt are so lazy, why do you have to be so diligent? And your family too, letting Er Ya and Sanya, who are so young, go out and work the fields with you,” another auntie commented.
“Stop talking, my second aunt and third aunt have their own work to do. We divide the tasks among our family; those who don’t know shouldn’t spread rumors,” Daya responded.
Upon hearing Daya’s response, the crowd continued their chatter.
Daya chose not to reply to the subsequent comments, feeling it was better to say less, as talking more could lead to mistakes. These people were too idle, already past the busy farming season, with many having nothing else to do besides watering the garden.
Her family was different; Dad and Grandpa were carpenters, and the two men being away meant losing two laborers.
After washing the clothes, Daya returned home. While hanging the clothes to dry, she only then saw her second and third aunts and grandmother just getting up.
They didn’t start working upon waking; instead, they went to the kitchen to look for food.
Er Ya and Sanya had already prepared porridge and served it out into bowls on the table to cool.
On the table, besides the porridge, there was pickled vegetables. Unlike in the North, where they have steamed buns with their porridge, they just had porridge with pickled vegetables.
If someone had sweet potatoes at home, they would also steam them in the pot to eat together.
Daya, after finishing with the clothes, carried two bowls of porridge into the room and woke up Wuwa, who was still asleep.
Ye Shiqi was awoken by her elder sister. Usually, she would sit up energetically, but today she lazily crawled out of bed, rubbed her still groggy eyes, and gestured to her elder sister, saying, “Hold on, hold on.”
“Wuwa, you care too much about cleanliness,” Daya said as she put down the bowl of thin porridge on the table, took a wooden basin from under the bed, grabbed an old handkerchief, and went to the kitchen. From the pot used to cook the porridge, she poured some hot water into the basin for Wuwa to wash her face.
“What a waste of resources, that water in the pot is for drinking, do the kids really need to wash their faces? I, your grandmother, haven’t even washed my face, and you’ve seen your second and third aunts haven’t washed theirs either, wasteful creature.”
Mrs. Lai was eating her porridge when she lifted her head and saw Daya’s actions, bits of her meal spilling out while she spoke.
“Grandma, none of us have washed yet, it’s a good chance to clean up. Wuwa likes being clean, she just said she wanted to wash her face.”
Daya was suddenly scolded by her grandmother. Previously, she always did these things in secret, and now that she had been discovered by her grandmother, she felt a bit timid but was determined to persist.
“That troublemaker, so young and already obsessed with cleanliness, who do you think you’re fooling, acting like some sort of witch, just a few years old and already preoccupied with cleanliness, you think you’re Miss High and Mighty? Isn’t this wasting water? Wasting firewood?”
Mrs. Lai continued to scold relentlessly, causing the people eating across from her and next door to set their bowls aside and stand up.
In the midst of her grandmother’s scolding, Daya quickly carried the basin out of the kitchen and hurried a few steps back into the room, “Ah,” closing the door behind her.
“Mom, what are you scolding about so early in the morning? Isn’t it good that the children like to be clean?” Hongji felt stifled upon hearing his mother scolding the kids again.
“Just go on causing trouble, even with food, you can’t shut your mouth,” Hongji’s father said after hearing his wife’s remarks, glanced at her, and seeing the sleep in her eyes, looked at his wife with disgust.
“Mom, don’t talk like that anymore. If others heard it, it would ruin our reputation,” Ye Shuzhi was lazy but didn’t want to be talked about by others.
Ye Shuzhen also nodded and said, “Mom, do you want me to be unable to marry? Tarnishing my reputation so that no one will come to propose.”
Mrs. Lai was used to scolding the kids, her first reaction was to berate them without thinking too much.
Upon hearing one complaint after another, Mrs. Lai felt an air of frustration but had no choice but to hold back her words.
“Elder sister, I want to wash my face too.”
The kids in the room, seeing Daya washing Wuwa’s face, also lined up in front of the wooden basin.
“Okay, let’s all wash together.” Daya, unfazed by her sisters’ requests, patiently helped each of them wash their face, leaving herself for last.
Ye Shiqi watched her elder sister with just one wooden basin and so little water, using one towel to wash several people’s faces, wondering if sharing a basin, towel, and water was somewhat unsanitary?
She had heard the scolding in the kitchen just before – sharing things was unsanitary, but wasn’t not washing your face even more unsanitary?
Ye Shiqi decided to sneak into the space and use the Spiritual Spring to wash her face secretly.
Hongji quickly finished his porridge, deliberately avoiding the salty pickles. He didn’t want to consume too much salt, which would make him thirsty and send him to the outhouse frequently, wasting a lot of time.
“Son, remember to carve the immortal portraits today,” Mrs. Lai reminded her son as they were about to leave the kitchen, repeating her focus on the immortal portraits from the night before.
“Mom, I know! I sketched the portraits overnight. Today I’ll do the carving, and none of you should fight over them. I’m thinking of selling these carvings to make some money for the New Year,” Hongji said as he turned back to look at his family members, who stopped eating to listen.
“Brother, you said you would carve them for my dowry,”
Ye Shuzhi thought not just of displaying them but also of selling them in the shop at her husband’s house, seeing it as business without any investment.