On the occasion of the Spring Festival of 2008 in China, the expression of "Chinese New Year" once again awakened the heartstrings of the happy event of "Killing Year Pig" in rural areas.
My hometown is located in a remote and backward mountain village in northwest Gansu Province. In my childhood memory, I will always be so poor, backward and closed. But the thick yellow land and kind villagers are always so simple, selfless and simple. At the same time, the vast world selflessly breeds simple rural customs and heavy soil and water customs.
On the occasion of the Spring Festival every year, every farmer in my hometown will slaughter a Chinese New Year pig to reward the whole family for their hard work and share the joy of harvest once they enter the twelfth lunar month. Entering the twelfth lunar month is not only a major event for this family, but also a major event for the whole village, and it is also the children's greatest hope! My carefree childhood is looking forward to killing pigs and eating pork every year and having a happy time growing up!
As far as I can remember, in the poor times of 1980s and 1990s, for every farmer in my hometown, killing a Chinese New Year pig every year before the Chinese New Year is a sign to measure whether their life is red or not. If that family didn't kill a Chinese New Year pig, it means that life is not so good. In the twelfth lunar month, your family, my family, his family and every household will kill a New Year pig, which has become the hottest topic for villagers to get together and discuss after dinner.
In the hometown of yellow land in northwest China, kind, uncontested and simple villagers regard an acre of yellow land at home as their lifeblood, and have experienced several heavy labor procedures such as busy and orderly spring ploughing, summer harvest, autumn harvest and winter storage. Finally, in the twelfth lunar month at the end of the year and the beginning of the year, we ushered in a most enjoyable time. Everyone has time to drop in, get together and have a "canned tea" and talk about this year's harvest. Compare whose woodpile is tall; Whose crops grow best; Who has enough food every year; Whose shopkeeper (shopkeeper: dialect refers to the male owner of this family) is the most capable; Whose wife will be the best; What people talk about most is who eats the biggest and fattest pig in the New Year. ...
Perhaps, day after day, year after year, those kind folks who face the loess every day, those fields and those neighbors are their narrow living space. They are almost isolated from the rest of the world. Only in the rare leisure time of the twelfth lunar month, we sit together and exchange experience in farming techniques and planting crops, so as to strive for a bumper harvest in the coming year. It is also the time to kill pigs and eat meat in the twelfth lunar month to connect feelings and increase friendship; It is to celebrate the safety and smoothness of the past year. They are simple, honest and sincere people. They have nurtured strong rural customs and are writing a happy, festive, harmonious and beautiful rural picture!
For the kind and simple folks in their hometown, they have been far away from the troubles of power struggle and money addiction. At the end of each year, your family, my family and his family will kill a New Year pig. They helped each other to slaughter the New Year pigs, and invited all the men, women and children in the village to sit together and eat some fresh meat and vegetables to share the joy of this year's harvest. If there are hospitalized patients or college students in that family who go to school and sell new year's pigs, and there is no pork to eat during the New Year, there is a family in the village who kills the new year's pigs and the owner has a piece of meat. The whole village is United, friendly and happy, always higher than meat. ...
Up to now, my hometown in northwest China has experienced many ups and downs. Once the villagers live and live in the village, the custom of killing pigs and inviting their neighbors to eat pork in the New Year has not been changed by the dirty flow of "everything is money-oriented" brought by the times. When you walk into the village in the twelfth lunar month, you can smell the thick smell of pork floating in the wind; Seeing that house, the door is like a city; The children danced happily; People go in and out, busy and nervous; You can also see clouds of smoke rising from the roof; It is this farmer who is killing Chinese New Year pigs today. If you step into this farmhouse, hospitable and kind-hearted villagers will definitely invite you to the table and eat green, pure natural and fresh cooked pork raised without any additives. Will not let you, a distinguished guest from afar, leave hungry; But don't worry, although their life is not so rich, they will never charge you a penny for eating. Because the village put "not poor food and clothing, not poor life." As a fellow villager in the village, treat guests warmly and educate this generation forever. You must be generous, kind and equal to others.
In my childhood memory, in the eighties and nineties in the northwest, I was eager to solve the problem of food and clothing, and I entered the twelfth lunar month. Killing pigs and eating pork in the village is not only the best hope of every child! It is also what adults want most! It is the best hope of the whole village!
However, in the changes of the times brought about by the harmonious and prosperous reform and opening up today. Great changes have taken place in my hometown in the northwest. Kind and simple villagers have long been out of poverty and become rich, and every household has lived in spacious and bright brick houses; Have meat to eat every day; Everyone lives a good life with plenty of food and clothing. Entering the twelfth lunar month, killing pigs for the New Year, and inviting neighbors to get together to eat pork, folk customs have never been overwhelmed by the dust of the years! Forever fixed in my memory.
Especially near the end of the year and the beginning of the year, the strong hometown flavor has become a wanderer who makes a living in a foreign country today, with a lingering homesickness! The most familiar smell of pork in memory will enter the wandering dream every night!