07:57, 11/05/2023
In the past, my house was on the edge of a field. When the harvest was over, the smoke from burning the fields surrounded me, making me feel suffocated. I was afraid of the suffocating smell of thick smoke that blew into my nose and ears.
However, after a long time, I suddenly miss the distant, strong smell of smoke. Not only the smoke from burning fields, but the restless smoke in my heart also rises from the small kitchen, every morning, every noon, every evening when the wood stove, the straw stove… have receded far away.
I remember the winter mornings, my mother always woke up the earliest in the house, before gently going to the kitchen, she would shake me to get ready because the road to school was far away. But I had to wait until the warm, lingering smell of smoke followed the taste of the food my mother cooked, then I had the courage to crawl out of the warm blanket with nostalgia. And the most memorable, sweet smell of smoke was the smell of smoke when my mother cooked sticky rice in the morning. Oh, the fragrant aroma of just-cooked sticky rice mixed with the mist of the winter mornings, so alluring and strangely warm! There was also the fatty, rich taste of sesame salt melting in the wind, rhythmically following the rhythm of my mother's pounding hands. I stood by the door, eyes half-closed and half-open, seeing the silhouette of a person swaying, swaying on the wall, the fire flickering and red. And the wisps of smoke peeking out, stealthily rising, dispelling the cold, empty space. I wanted to inhale that fragrant, warm smoke and didn't want to leave.
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| Illustration: Tra My |
I also remember the scorching summer afternoons. After returning from the fields, my father would go into the kitchen. The straw fire would flare up as if racing the scorching sun in the yard. The smoke would flutter, gently. The pot of crab soup would boil, thick with layers of bricks, Malabar spinach, and green slices of squash. I could smell the sweet, refreshing taste. At mealtime, pouring the soup into a bowl, I could feel the refreshing taste of the fields, the salty taste of sweat, and the immense wind. But when cooking, you had to pay attention, light the fire neatly, airy, and quickly, don't let the smoke get stuck in the pot and lose all its flavor. My father told me that because many times when cooking lunch, it was too hot, my brothers and I would just throw straw in, stir the ashes with a stick to finish quickly, the smoke from the kitchen didn't have time to escape, and it was so pitiful. Dad said, the more you rush, the longer it takes and the hotter it gets. Just calmly push the straw, the fire will be enough for the rice and soup to cook, the smoke will not swirl and will gently rise up and stick to the pile of things hanging above or add a new layer of clothing to cover and protect the walls and not get into the eyes or ears.
It turns out that we were in a hurry, busy playing and flustered, so sometimes we hated and feared smoke, not knowing that many delicious dishes still relied on smoke. It was the pot of braised perch with star fruit that my mother covered with rice husks before going to bed; the rice husk charcoal slowly smoldered and then gradually died down so that the next morning there would be a pot of dried, well-cooked fish. The rich, fatty taste of the fish mixed with the sour taste of the star fruit mixed with the aroma of the rice husk smoke created a delicious harmony that was beyond words. Or on cool days, the uncles in the neighborhood would pile up sticky rice straw to grill some snacks, the fragrant smoke wafting from one end to the other of the long alley. The children inhaled the rich aroma, stirring up in their nostrils both familiarity and vague distance…
But I still remember most the evening smoke rising from the old, dark brown kitchen roofs. Back then, all around were still tiled houses, the kitchens also had tiled roofs, sometimes thatched roofs. When the sunset quietly set in, the storks were flying back to their nests, the buffaloes and cows leisurely counted their steps on the bumpy road back to the village, shimmering in the last sunlight of the day, the wind began to draw vague, fluttering streaks in the air. Each fragile cluster released warm, peaceful scents into the sky. It was the scent of peace, abundance; the taste of reunion, family. Looking at the evening smoke, people seemed to forget all the fatigue and hardships of the day. The smoke soothed, spread out lovingly and gently. Whether it was smoke in the middle of a windy, rainy afternoon or faint, quiet... I felt sorry for someone who was still bewildered in a strange land, suddenly catching sight of the kitchen smoke at the end of the day slowly rising.
And suddenly I feel nostalgic when the modern kitchens now no longer have the scent of smoke. Where can I find the serenity and passion of the secret love between firewood and sunlight? The smoke has flown, drifting forever into the distant days, mixed in the clouds of nostalgia. Fragile and endless. Only a little bit of sadness remains when turning over the past!
One Last Fragrance
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