Spring Views from Wuhu and Tongcheng

July 29, 2025, 7:54 p.m. Essays

This is the time of the Begonia Bloom, when all things awaken. The orchids on the balcony have all opened, the sun shining on the flowers, making the whole room warm and fragrant. Outside, 'chattering and squawking' is the sound of the restless birds, and the neighbors' vegetable gardens are full of peony flowers. Occasionally, butterflies fly in and out. The lazy cat lying in the yard basking in the sun cannot even disturb it. The lawns along the roadside greening, the gentle wind caressing the fruit buds on the camphor trees.

Dragon Nest Lake is brimming with purpleleaf lilacs, Dragon Nest Lake's willows are drooping, the purpleleaf lilacs along the footbridge are in full bloom, and other trees that have shed the pomp of autumn are re-emerging. The reeds in the reed marshes of the lake still seem like winter, but a closer look reveals new shoots emerging. Children throwing stones into the reed marshes will start several pairs of ducks. Sitting on the grass beside the delicate yellow common poppy, the blue-purple Arabian mothers are circling around you, dotted like stars. Looking up at the lake, the same warm yellow canola flowers in the fields across the lake, making the distant mountains look brighter.

Meanwhile, the spring hasn't yet arrived in my hometown of Tongcheng Mountain, it's probably still the season for azaleas. The lavender in the mountains hasn't yet bloomed, and it will take until the spring equinox for them to bloom together with peach blossoms and wild lilacs, painting the cliff walls red and welcoming the returning swallows.

The swallows bring fresh mud from the freshly ploughed terraces. In this barren land, it's a difficult task to grow a harvest-worthy rice crop. The villagers need to work hard throughout the spring. First, they enrich the soil of the terraces. Early on, there was no fertilizer, so they cut the weeds on the ridges and along the streams and rivers, piling them up in the fields, mixed with animal manure and soil, and then burned them. Or, they take out the cow dung from the cowpen and dry it, wrapping it in straw and tying it with grass ropes, then spreading it out in the rice fields, lighting it on fire, and covering it with earth to let it burn slowly, turning these 'little volcanoes' into real smoke.

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Rice fields are all about water. The streams in the mountains flow continuously, but getting water to the terraces is not easy. Using stones and soil to build dams to raise the water level, cleaning the channels dug along the roadside, and using bamboo tubes to pass water where there is no way through. To ensure that the water reaches the terraces, people have to guard the water channels, ensuring the smooth flow of water and allocating water resources. Because each family's progress is different, water distribution is often accompanied by disputes.

Nursery seedlings are a technical art, often completed by the most experienced people in the production team. What season, how much temperature water, the timing of sealing and sowing all have their own rules.

While distributing water and nursery seedlings, prepare the rice fields. On the first day of the new year, hold a feast for the carters who plowed the fields, agreeing on the time to plow the fields, and two ploughs, then use a spade to repair the terraces, planting yellow beans on the prepared ridges.

Once ready, we can start transplanting rice. The most beautiful labor scene is here, under the blue sky and mountains, inside the terraced fields, people 'face the yellow earth and face the sky', using their hardworking hands to 'plant hope' into the rice fields.

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After clearing the fields, people began another busy task around the Qingming Festival. The hometown's elevation is about 400 meters, with clouds growing tea, so this tea is naturally a fine tea. The tea plants grew vigorously in the warm spring wind, and the tea makers had to race against time. Every morning, before the sun had fully dispelled the morning mist in the mountains, the dew on the mountain roads and fields had already moistened the tea makers' shoes. Picking tea is just a simple action, but it needs to be repeated thousands of times, so it is endlessly torturous. One by one, the tea pickers put the tea into the tea baskets like sand slowly accumulating in a funnel. The tea field is uneven, torturing the waist, and the tea tree is always short, torturing the waist. Time passes quickly, and the spring sun is obviously too hot, so it's finally torturous.

At noon, people would go home for a short rest, and on the way back, they would bring a few strings of roadside wild fruits. While washing their faces in the stream, they would pick a basket of wild celery. Or, they would bring back a few bunches of ( –), and then make a dish of ( -). Or, they would pick a few blooming orchid flowers. Then, they would transform these into hometown nostalgia and put it into the hearts of the children.

After eating a salt-rich lunch, people set off again. After another two hours, when the daily harvest was brought to one place, the busy night just began. Carefully removing the impurities from the tea, then sending them to the processing factory for queuing, killing, and chopping. Shaping, drying, every process is a game between people and time, and people can win through experience. As the night deepened, the fragrance of the new tea drifted into people's dreams, and tomorrow is another cycle...