Chapter 174: Rice Flower Fish
As the commotion caused by Liang Gong’s background subsided, Class Eight Grade One’s group also returned to its usual calm.
Just then, the Staple Food Department Manager appeared before everyone alongside the Grade Director.
The Department Manager was a man who looked very scholarly, wearing a white coat and a pair of decorative glasses on his face (Xiang Chuan: It’s 32022 already, nearsightedness has long been extinct), the only thing that surprised Xiang Chuan a bit was that he was actually wearing a straw hat on his head.
The Fourth Escort Ship is in autumn, it’s not like it’s hot enough to need a hat… right? Xiang Chuan slightly looked up at the sky, the sun was quite glaring, but there were plenty of clouds too, so it couldn’t really be called sun exposure.
“Good morning, First Year High School students. I am Staple Food Department Manager Wu Hongchang. Next, I will lead everyone to the rice paddy to visit the entire process of the upcoming rice harvest.”
As soon as the Department Manager said this, it instantly sparked cheers from students of all classes. Everyone gazed hotly at the rice paddy behind them, each one eager to try, like five- or six-year-old kids staring at a brand new Ultraman toy.
Is that necessary! Xiang Chuan, standing at the back of the crowd biting the straw of her water bottle, complained in her heart, completely forgetting her own foolish appearance when she had just gotten off the transport ship and was held back by two club members on either side to prevent her from rushing into the rice paddy.
“Manager Wu! If I may ask boldly, what about our luggage!”
A student from the neighboring class who seemed like a Class Cadre asked.
Manager Wu didn’t mind the student’s abrupt question and smiled as he answered: “The transport ship will arrange to transport your luggage to the dormitories in the residential area. Each student’s room number will be sent to the homeroom teachers of each class before lunch, so just confirm with your homeroom teachers then.”
After confirming the whereabouts of their luggage, everyone had no more worries and all looked at Manager Wu with sparkling eyes.
Fortunately, Manager Wu wasn’t the type to keep people in suspense. He led everyone onto the floating platform.
This was Xiang Chuan’s first time riding such a high-tech product. She looked at the about one-square-meter platform that flew to her feet, feeling a bit uneasy, but Ouyang Yating and Ainuo clearly didn’t want their club president to cause any more trouble, so they resorted to the old trick, grabbing Xiang Chuan’s arms one on each side and directly lifting her onto it.
Even as Xiang Chuan made a big fuss trying to reclaim her nearly dissipated club president dignity, she was sunk by Liang Gong’s “haha” while standing still in place.
Xiang Chuan felt like she had put all her strength into a final desperate blow before complete exhaustion, only for it to hit cotton, leaving her utterly burned out.
Based on 21st century bus knowledge, one square meter can hold about eight to nine people, so a one-square-meter floating platform with four people on it was more than ample.
After standing steady, Xiang Chuan realized that this platform wasn’t shaky like she imagined. On the contrary, it was extremely stable; her earlier fuss hadn’t affected the floating platform’s movement or ascent at all.
The floating platform had an invisible barrier about one meter high around it to prevent people on the platform from accidentally falling off. Xiang Chuan curiously touched it, feeling like the stress-relief toy crystal slime that had been popular shortly after she became a corporate slave; her colleague had bought one back then, and she had the chance to touch it a few times.
After everyone was on the platform, Manager Wu switched to teaching mode and led the crowd’s platform to the field edge.
Manager Wu had everyone board the floating platform for good reason.
Mature rice averages over one meter in height, not to mention the rice varieties bred through multiple improvements later on, which can reach up to two meters during harvest.
If the students went down into the field like that, they wouldn’t just trample the land; they’d probably have to stand on tiptoes to even reach the rice ears above their heads.
Xiang Chuan gently stroked the plump rice ears in front of her. The mature rice grains were tightly wrapped in husks. If Manager Wu hadn’t warned beforehand that there was surveillance around and students were strictly forbidden from picking mature rice ears on their own, she really wanted to pull a few rice plants to personally demonstrate threshing, drying, and husking, then cook herself some fragrant white rice.
If there were braised pork or shiitake chicken thigh meat, that would be perfect. Xiang Chuan lovingly stroked the golden rice ears before her, her mind filled with the irresistible image of fragrant firewood rice with crispy rice, making her swallow hard several times.
To keep herself from getting hungry too early, Xiang Chuan forced her gaze down to the field below.
Modern rice paddies weren’t murky like in the 21st century; on the contrary, they were very clear, clear enough to see the rice stalks underwater.
All Production Escort Ships had top-notch control over harmful organisms and bacteria, so there were no signs of leeches or snails, and of course, no rice flower fish either.
Looking at the naturally fallen rice ears floating on the water surface, Xiang Chuan said heartbrokenly: “What a pity for these rice ears. If they raised fish, the rice flower fish would eat them and get nice and fat; they must be so delicious this season.”
Thinking of the rice flower fish she had caught in her hometown fields as a child, which her mother turned into fragrant pan-fried rice flower fish, Xiang Chuan’s tears were about to flow from her mouth.
At this moment, someone nearby asked: “Rice flower fish? What’s that?”
Xiang Chuan answered without thinking:
“It’s a not-too-big fish raised in rice paddies, with few bones and lots of meat, perfect for pan-frying, deep-frying, or braising; it’s very appetizing, ah, talking about it is making my stomach hungry… huh?”
She abruptly turned her head and saw that Manager Wu, who had been at the front of the group, had somehow ridden his platform over to the one with the A Bite of China Club’s four members. Manager Wu was staring at her with sparkling eyes.
Xiang Chuan was familiar with this look—it was just like the one from the Production Escort Ship Seafood Department Manager in charge, who often came to their house for meals, slurping the fish belly of steamed fish and then looking at her exactly the same way.
Are all you Agriculture Department people like this! Xiang Chuan looked pleadingly at her own club members.
Ouyang Yating and Ainuo shook their heads: Nothing we can do, club president, you’re on your own.
As for Liang Gong, sandwiched in the middle, he directly turned his back, pretending not to see Xiang Chuan’s look. No choice—his mother was counting on getting some new animal husbandry ideas from Xiang Chuan’s side, and since the Production Escort Ship’s departments shared prosperity and decline, if he spoke up now to stop Manager Wu, then at dinner that evening reuniting with his mother, he would taste the delicacy that ancient kids most often got in the same year—stir-fried bamboo shoots with pork.
“This classmate, you’re the rumored Classmate Xiang Chuan, right?” Manager Wu looked at her with sparkling eyes, his original scholarly demeanor gone; now he looked a bit like a mad scientist. “Could you talk about that fish you mentioned raising in the rice paddy? What breed is it? What precautions are there? What does it usually eat? How long is the growth period…”
Facing Manager Wu’s machine-gun-like barrage of questions, Xiang Chuan felt suffocated.
She really wanted to shout: Every time my parents just casually tossed in some fry and left it alone! How would I know how to raise them! I only know how to eat them!
