Wild vegetables from my hometown

(GLO) - Each season has its own produce, each region has its own vegetables; not only were meals eaten in the fields and on the farm, but it seems that every meal of our childhood was never without a bunch of wild vegetables.

My mother grumbled, "We have everything we need at home, there's no need to bring all this stuff back, it's so tiring." As she spoke, she reached out and picked up her grandson.

She busied herself unloading the bags from the car. There were fresh vegetables, pork, tuna, green beans, cauliflower… She said she was buying some vegetables and fish from the market so her parents could eat them gradually, saving them the trouble of going to buy them little by little.

My mother said that we lacked nothing at home; we had plenty of vegetables in the garden, so why buy them and waste money? Besides, the vegetables and fruits in the market were contaminated with pesticides. My mother was right. In the countryside, we might lack many things, but we were very generous with wild vegetables.

Illustration: HUYEN TRANG

I remember the days of planting beans and potatoes on the alluvial land along the river. The land was far away, requiring us to wade across the river two or three times and climb several slopes to reach the work. Every evening, my mother would pack up all the things we needed to take with us, like rice, fish sauce, salt, pots, and pans... And my father would carry a small fishing net on his back.

Around midday, when the scorching sun of Central Vietnam blazed down on everything, people left the fields and gathered towards the riverbank. Along the river, tall, massive trees, too large for several people to encircle, cast their shade over the rocky banks and spread out to provide shade for the river.

My father chose a calm stretch of river to cast his net. He spread a small net across the river, waded along the bank, and then swept it across to remove the fish. Small whitefish, scad, minnows, and other fish caught in the net thrashed about, their scales gleaming. After a few casts, he pulled in the net. The small plastic bag held about half a sack of fresh fish.

My mother placed three stones on the stove to start the fire. By the riverbank, a small, makeshift well had been dug long ago. The water was about two handspans deep and crystal clear. After the rice pot had run out of water, my mother moved the fire to the side of the stove, covered it, and didn't forget to place another stone on top to seal it. She placed a small, dented pot on top of the water. My father sat gutting the small fish by the river.

Then Mother put on her hat and walked upstream. The ferns stretched out their shy, curled-up tendrils like elephant trunks. A couple of shoots had already raised their tiny, tender leaves, waving in the sun. Mother reached out and snapped a stem, hearing a crisp crunch. A couple of wild betel plants grew along the sandy bank. The fertile alluvial soil made the betel leaves larger than a person's hand, even larger than Grandma's betel leaves. Mother reached out and picked the thick, tender, smooth leaves. A couple of wild purslane plants hid shyly beneath the fence along the riverbank. Each plant was lush and overgrown. Then there were water spinach, morning glory, and other greens… Mother tilted her straw hat back and strolled along the riverbank, filling it to the brim with vegetables.

When Mom returned, Dad had already hung his hammock among the crape myrtle trees, and the uncles and aunts were rocking the creaky hammocks while chatting animatedly amidst the murmuring sound of the river.

The water boiled, the mother tilted the lid back, scooped out the boiled vegetables onto the surface, then added the fish, and finally the other vegetables for the soup. Lunch in the fields was served on the rocks, consisting of a few sweet potatoes, some river fish stewed with turmeric, and the main course being a pot of wild vegetable soup along with some boiled wild vegetables.

My mother talked about the time when "hunger meant eating vegetables, pain meant taking medicine," but sometimes, even when in pain, there wasn't enough money to buy medicine, so we could only treat ourselves with traditional Vietnamese remedies passed down through word of mouth, mostly from wild vegetables. For my mother, every vegetable was a medicine. Boiled passionflower and cassia shoots cured insomnia; betel leaves and plantain were diuretics; perilla relieved colds and coughs; centella and fern cooled the liver and treated kidney problems…

My mother and I, from the countryside, were all doctors, mind you. I don't know the details, but back then we grew up eating rice with sweet potatoes, freshwater fish, and wild vegetables, enduring the scorching midday sun in the fields and splashing in the cool, stormy afternoon rain, and none of us ever got a runny nose, a headache, or anything like that…

Working on the alluvial plains, my mother would stroll along the river; working in the fields, she would wander along the stream banks, the slopes of the fields, into the forest… It was always wild greens like pennywort, wild banana blossoms, wild spinach, wild morning glory, and wild guava leaves… Each season had its own produce, each region its own vegetables. Not only were meals in the fields and rice paddies present, but it seemed that every meal of our childhood was never without wild greens. And so, we grew up in the countryside, surrounded by hardworking hands and the love bestowed upon us by our homeland.

My sister said Mom was always worried, thinking that if eating the vegetables and roots sold by vendors were poisonous and killed, then everyone in the city would be dead by now. Mom laughed. I knew Mom wasn't entirely wrong. Every time my sister went back to the city, Mom would pack up a bunch of chicken eggs, water spinach, and several bunches of unripe bananas, pumpkins, gourds, and squashes… and mutter, "At least it saves me a few trips to the market."

Everything was carefully packed by my mother in layers of plastic, and she didn't forget to tell my sister to take it all out when she got home so the vegetables wouldn't wilt. When my sister's car started, my mother would stand wistfully at the door, watching down the alley as my sister and granddaughter disappeared into the distance.

Source: https://baogialai.com.vn/rau-dai-que-nha-post324228.html