Remember my parents-in-law’s homes in that remote mountain village one by one (Part 1)

Shitai County, Anhui Province, borders Huangshan Mountain and Taiping Lake to the east and Jiuhua Mountain to the north. It is a famous tea town in the mountainous area of ??southern Anhui. My parents-in-law live in a small mountain village in Liudu Township, Qidu Town, Shitai County, called Shuimoli, Qitian Village. Although it is from Shitai County, it is close to the border of Qingyang County, only two miles away. Although it is a small mountain village, the transportation is extremely convenient. Not only does it face the 530 National Highway and the 325 Provincial Highway, the G3 Beijing-Taiwan Expressway also runs from the village entrance. After turning around, the ramp is just a few hundred meters away, which is the junction of Shitai, Qingyang and Huangshan District. Here there are winding peaks, majestic greenery, clear streams, fresh air, and extremely excellent ecological environment. It is the residence of the Qitian clan of the Yimen Li family.

According to genealogical records, Li Boling, the seventh grandson of King Li Tai of Wei, the son of Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, led his family to move from the southern foot of Huashan Mountain to Tianduanli, Xiange Township, Xuanzhou in 854 AD to avoid war and practice filial piety. Yi, seven generations living together, Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty issued an edict to commend the Li Boling family as the "Li family of Yimen" and granted them 100 acres of official land and exempted them from corvee service as a sign of encouragement. Since then, the descendants of Lord Boling have been known as the "Li family of Yimen". Kui Wangong, the 32nd ancestor of the Li family, was born in Junyuan Gong. He moved from Nanguan, Shitai County to Zhaoxianli, Fangcun, and was called the "Fangcun sect". The "Fangcun Faction" was renamed the "Qitian Faction" after the Li Liutian Meeting, because there is Qitian Village in the neighboring village of Fangcun, which is the village where the parents-in-law live.

My parents-in-law have a son and two daughters. My brother-in-law is one year older than me. He joined the army after high school and graduated from a military academy. Soon after, the brother-in-law firmly requested to be transferred back to his original position so that he could take care of his elderly parents nearby. Then he was promoted from platoon commander to company commander, from company commander to battalion commander, from battalion commander to regiment commander, from regiment commander to brigade commander, and now he is one of the main leaders of the stationed Second Artillery Unit. It is the only one seen in Shitai County where he was an official and went to Zhenglu. My aunt is one year younger than me and doesn't like to study. She went to the south to work in the 1990s, and later married a Zhejiang family. She made a living in breeding and lived a moderately prosperous life. The youngest daughter, Li Meifang, graduated from the Provincial Health School and later followed her sister to Fengxian, Shanghai. We met in October 2001 and fell in love. We got married in January of the following year. We had only known each other for more than a hundred days. It could be said to be a flash marriage. After getting married for more than ten years, I opened a shop and started a business, and in recent years it has been getting better and better. A family in the mountains raised three children. This is the lifetime achievement of two old people. It is really not easy.

My mother-in-law is generous and righteous, virtuous and compassionate, diligent and thrifty in housekeeping, and good at educating her children. She is respected by her neighbors in the surrounding countryside. The father-in-law is honest and responsible, has no right or wrong, is good at farm work, and is hardworking and patient. He is also praised by the villagers. The two elders had nothing when they were young. They started from scratch and worked hard all their lives. In their old age, they had some savings and could live happily without relying on their children. The mother-in-law is the head of the family and manages the family well; the father-in-law is down-to-earth, hard-working, and closely cooperates with each other through thick and thin. The relationship between the two elders cannot but be said to be deep.

Shui Moli, Qitian Village, is a small village with only a dozen or so households. Every household has already renovated its building. Only the parents-in-law still have a brick-and-wood structure house built in the early 1980s, which has been slightly renovated in recent years. A wide stream flows from the beginning of the village to Taiping Lake. The water is so clear that people wash vegetables and clothes in the stream all year round. The sound of chickens and dogs can be heard in the village. The people are simple, filial, righteous and affectionate. The small mountain village is further up the mountain. A military unit was once stationed there, but it was withdrawn in the late 1990s. In previous years, only local villagers were allowed to go into the mountain to cut firewood, and others were not allowed to enter or leave at will. My parents-in-law have more than a dozen pieces of mountain property, all of which are within the jurisdiction of the army. Among them are several bamboo mountains, several timber mountains, two firewood mountains, and only one tea mountain. Tea Mountain is the furthest away, in a dense forest with high mountains, long roads and deep ditches, making it inconvenient to travel. It takes half an hour if you go quickly, and at least 40 minutes if you go slower.

Walking less than 200 meters from the village is the original army gate. The brick gate has long been mottled and covered with moss. Only the slogans on both sides are still vaguely visible: "Be vigilant and defend the motherland." . At this time, you can immediately hear the huge sound of "wow-wow-wow-wow". On the left, there are tall mountains and thick bamboo trees. On the right, there is a wide and deep stream with mixed trees on the banks. The water is fast and green, but the water is green. At the bottom, sand and gravel appear one by one. Continuing forward, there is a low bunker beside the stream. The concrete is one meter thick. There is only one small hole, which can only allow one person to enter and exit. There are three shooting holes facing the river bank. There used to be a dam here, but now only a few remains remain. Not far ahead, there is an open area on the left. It used to be the army barracks and the second and third rows of bungalows. Now only the foundations are left.

After passing a large stone bridge, there is a large tunnel at the foot of the mountain on the left, hidden under lush trees. It was originally used by the Second Artillery Corps and has been abandoned. The door is four to five meters wide and more than three meters high. Inside The darkness is so deep and daunting. The gate is made of concrete and reinforced steel, nearly one meter thick, and extremely strong. It is said that the tunnel can accommodate as many cars as possible, and there are many small rooms on both sides. It's a mess inside and there are overgrown weeds at the door, so you have to be careful when entering or exiting. I have never been in, so I don’t know how deep the tunnel is, and others can’t tell. There are several abandoned tunnels like this. On the mountain outside the cave door, trees cover the sky and the sun. From above, you can't tell that there are tunnels in the mountain. Due to military implications, logging in the mountains here is prohibited, and violators will be severely punished. This is still the case today.

Going further in, the road gradually narrows, and the mountains seem to be connected. Huge rocks and dead trees in the stream lie across the large and small cobblestones at the bottom of the stream. There is a large slope at the foot of the mountain on the right. Not far up there is Chaihe Mountain, Yuezhang's place. At the end of the twelfth lunar month one year, my father-in-law and I went up the mountain to cut firewood. My father-in-law chopped it, and I was responsible for dragging it down the mountain. In fact, I pushed the huge firewood down one by one from this large slope. In three days, I chopped more than 8,000 kilograms of firewood. It was so hard that my clothes were soaked with sweat. Although the father-in-law is short in stature, he is thin and lean. He can cut such a big piece of firewood with just a few axes. On the fourth day, I felt sick in my stomach and felt so weak that I had no choice but to stop and weigh myself.

We walked another section of the mountain road and then went down again. There was a very deep ravine here with a slope of nearly 80 degrees. When we reached the bottom of the ravine, we had to climb up again. For me, who grew up in the plains and is not used to mountain roads, it is really difficult! This ditch impressed me so much! Once, my father-in-law lassoed a wild boar. It was not big, only seventy or eighty pounds. When he went to make a bow, the wild boar was not dead yet. It was bounced off the firewood tree and hung upside down in the air. It was howling and still struggling to death. The father-in-law took a very thick wooden stick and hit it on the head several times. The wild boar's blood flowed out and it was still moving. The father-in-law was worried and added a few more sticks. Then he untied it from the tree, tied it up with a rope, and asked me to carry it down the mountain with him. I am a scholar who has never worked or walked on mountain roads. Now I am carrying a wild boar and walking on the bumpy mountain roads. It is really hard work. When I got to this big ditch, I wanted to go down. Because the ditch was so steep, I couldn't stand at all. I slipped and slid, including people and pigs, all the way to the bottom of the ditch. Not to mention how miserable I was.

After passing this big ravine and walking through a mountain road, we soon arrived at the tea mountain of my parents-in-law. It was originally a tea garden owned by my family. Later, because the mountains were high and the roads were far away, my parents-in-law were old and frail, so they stopped taking care of it and left it to fend for themselves, eventually becoming a field of wild tea. I saw thousands of tea trees growing sparsely among miscellaneous trees on an open slope with a radius of five or six acres, overgrown with weeds and no one left. Some of the weeds are even taller than a person's head, and some vines have grown directly onto the tea trees. There are also unknown wild flowers blooming everywhere, mixed in among the tea trees. Only the word desolate can describe this scene.

In the tea garden under the sun, the fragrance of flowers and tea drifts in the wind, butterflies dance gracefully, shuttle back and forth; mountain bees also buzz, as if in response, being in it, it seems like another world. feeling. Here, far away from the hustle and bustle of the world, wild tea lives in secluded solitude, like a secluded virgin. It is quiet and peaceful. It is nourished by the sun, rain and dew, and absorbs the essence of the sun and the moon, giving it a unique fragrance. Forgetting and loss have actually contributed to the quality and fragrance of my parents-in-law’s mountain wild tea!