Composition My hometown customs Hunan

Hunan has been a land of fish and rice since ancient times. It is rich in products and the people are diligent and intensive in farming. Rice cultivation has a history of more than 10,000 years.

For a long time, the ancestors of Changsha have cultivated many rice varieties such as early, middle, late, sticky, waxy, indica, japonica, long awn, short awn and so on. According to statistics in 1949, only rice cultivated in Liuyang County There are 149 varieties. In the Changsha area, early rice is mostly grown in high-bank fields. After the early rice is harvested, sweet potatoes, corn, beans, sorghum, buckwheat and other miscellaneous grains are planted. Late-maturing varieties are planted in wet fields under low banks, such as Dongnian and Chongyang Nian. Early rice is usually sown around the Qingming Festival. It is said that "Tongzi leaves have big horseshoes, so there is no problem in making rice seedlings." The rice is planted in mud, and dummies are usually planted in the field, or fake harriers are hung to prevent rats and birds. When pulling out the rice seedlings for the first time, light incense and candles, fire cannons, and call for the gate of the rice field to be opened. Transplanting rice seedlings is commonly known as planting fields and planting crops. Some congratulate people by saying "planting rice trees". When planting crops, experts often "split the page" (open the page) - insert a pole on the opposite bank of the field, plant a few stalks first when entering the field, aim to form a line, and use this as a benchmark to plant while retreating, with four stalks in a row, from left to On the right, it is called "suishuihe". When they reach the other shore, the seedlings form straight lines, like a page of a book, which is really beautiful, hence the name Split Page. The second person is planted from the right according to the "page", which is called "cutting the page", and so on, arranged in order. If the former is surpassed by the latter, he will be dubbed as "Guan duck" or "Drilling bag". If you turn a corner on the way, you will be laughed at as "crossing Dongting Lake". In order to seize the season, relatives and friends come to help with the work, which is called "reporting work." Planting is regarded as an important competitive activity, and experts are highly respected and are called masters of planting crops. When harvesting early rice, you have to weigh the meat, make wine, and entertain them warmly. This is called "the master planting the grain pretending to be the grain guest." But avoid eating meat for breakfast to prevent the sickle from hurting your hands. To dry the grain, you usually use bamboo strips to make a drying mat, or paste the grain drying ground with diluted cow dung to make it smooth and free of sediment. After the grain is dried, it is blown by a windmill without "winding". In addition to rice, Changsha also has a long history of planting barley, wheat, buckwheat, sorghum, millet, flax (black sesame), white sesame, rape, tea, sericulture, ramie, cotton, day lily and other crops. Legume crops include broad beans, peas, soybeans, black beans, red beans, mung beans, rice beans, mud beans, Emei beans, pocket beans, etc. Among them, soybeans are divided into May yellow, June yellow, July yellow, August yellow, etc. Nidou, also known as lazy beans, is the best raw material for making Liuyang Dougu. Sweet potatoes and tobacco were introduced in the Ming Dynasty, but they developed rapidly and were planted widely. They are known as "one season of sweet potatoes and half a year's food".

Hunan Flower Drum Opera is the general name for local flower drum and lantern operas in various parts of Hunan. Among them, there are Changsha Flower Drum Opera popular in central Hunan, eastern Hunan and Dongting Lakeside, Changde Flower Drum Opera popular in Changde area, Yueyang Flower Drum Opera popular in Yueyang and Linxiang areas in northern Hunan, Hengyang Flower Drum Opera popular in Hengyang area, and Shaoyang Flower Drum Opera popular in Shaoyang area. Flower Drum Opera, Huagu Deng popular in Qiyang, Lingling, and Dong'an in southern Hunan, and Lingling Flower Drum Opera popular in Daoxian, Ningyuan, Lanshan, Xintian and other counties in southern Hunan, combined with tune troupes. They each have different stage languages ????and music styles, forming different tribes. It is March 3rd again, when the sky is full of kites. It is also a good time for peach blossoms to bloom, grass to grow and orioles to fly, and it is a good time to travel. But in Hunan we have such a custom of eating local vegetables and boiling eggs.

Based on a tradition, our family cooks boiled eggs every year. Early this morning, my father picked a lot of vegetables for us. He said that the vegetables must be picked on March 3rd and eaten with boiled eggs. The ones bought in the market were basically picked yesterday, and they would be lost. Medicinal value and significance. Regardless of whether his point of view is correct or not, we still need to preserve this custom as a traditional culture. Although my sister later bought a lot of it, we still boiled eggs with dad's local vegetables and ate them. To boil eggs with local vegetables, you can just use local vegetables and eggs and add an appropriate amount of water (depending on the number of local vegetables and your demand for local vegetable soup). Of course, the residue after the local vegetables are cooked into the soup must be thrown away. , just take out the eggs and put them into bowls, and then pour a bowl of vegetable juice into each bowl.

You can also add ginger slices, maple bulbs, red dates, black beans and other Chinese herbs to cook eggs together. In fact, I don’t really like eating boiled chicken with local vegetables, and I don’t like the taste of the local vegetable juice. But for the sake of my health and to comply with my parents’ wishes, I still ate an egg and drank a big bowl of local vegetable soup.

According to records, ground vegetables are sweet, warm and non-toxic. They harmonize the spleen, diuresis, stop bleeding and improve eyesight. It is a good herbal medicine that can cure many diseases and can also keep fit. It was later found out that the day of searching for herbs was the third day of March. To commemorate this, people designated this day as a day to eat local vegetables. It is said that if you eat it once a year, you can stay healthy.

We have a proverb here, "On the third day of the third month of the lunar calendar, don't forget to boil the eggs with local vegetables. After eating at noon, your waist will be good, and after eating in the afternoon, your legs will not feel weak." In the countryside of our hometown, in front of and behind the house, This vegetable with small white flowers and slender leaves can be found beside the pond. Friends who are interested may wish to come to Hunan to have a bowl.