Rice season

One afternoon, I went back to my hometown, walking on the national highway running through the fields that were starting to enter the harvest season. Before my eyes, I was overwhelmed by the image of the countryside fields with the golden color of the plump rice flowers, about to bend. The gentle breeze blew, bringing the fragrant scent of lotus flowers.

On the dike slopes hummed the sound of kite flutes, a familiar sound that has entered the childhood of many generations. A melodious country music that has become a source of inspiration for many poets.

My childhood memories are of afternoons with my friends catching crabs and clams along the edge of the fields after the harvest. The fragrant scent of rice wafted in the air, mixed with the smell of mud and the pungent smell of the land. One day, wandering into the harvested fields, a group of friends about ten years old and I held baskets and ran behind the wheeled tractor to catch fish. That was when the tractor passed by, cutting the water to the sides, leaving only the stubble and some struggling crucian carp, perch, and silver carp. We just picked up the fish and put them in the baskets, and in no time the baskets were full.

Afternoon fell, our group returned with laughter echoing through the fields. Holding baskets in hand, we walked happily on the familiar village path, happy that the basket of fish was enough for my mother to cook a delicious pot of sour soup. In the evening, by the oil lamp, my family sat around the dinner table, I chattered to my mother about the fishing trip with my friends. The pot of rice smelled of new rice, the bowl of sour fish mixed together to make the atmosphere warmer.

At that time, we were too young to fully understand the hardships and toil of our parents when doing farming. That was when my mother harvested rice with a sickle curved like a crescent moon at night, and my father carried rice with his bare feet on the bumpy dirt roads mixed with bricks and stones. Then on bright moonlit nights, my father pulled the rice threshing axe back and forth to let the rice grains fall off the ears. I remember sweating when grinding and pounding rice...

Nowadays, farming has more modern and automatic machines. Harvesters run across the fields. In just a moment, the rice is lying on the sun-drenched yard. The golden rice carpet on the field is left with only stubble. The time of farming by manual methods has become a "legend". However, even though time has changed and agricultural machines have become modern, the old memories and the hard-working scenes of my grandparents, parents and villagers are still unforgettable for those of the 6X, 7X, and 8X generations.

From the sweet memories of those days, the white and fragrant rice grains have nourished me to grow up and mature.

Today, standing in front of the fields entering the new harvest, I suddenly remember the old countryside flavor, remember the folk song imbued with the hardships of farmers in the past: "Oh, hold a full bowl of rice/Each grain is fragrant and soft, but a thousand times more bitter!".