《胡麻的天空》：秀英奶奶的自然笔记 | Painting the tale of mother nature

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A heartwarming book "The Sky of Flax" was published in 2015.

2015年，一本温暖的小书《胡麻的天空》出版了。

It's a picture book that records everything in nature. There're both the memories of the peaceful rural life, and the feelings of the surprising urban life.

这是一本图画书，忠实地记录着自然的瓜果树木。记忆中的田间鸡犬相闻，一派祥和；面前的城市熙熙攘攘，又充满惊喜。

"The cherries remind me of the cherry tree at my first younger brother's house. We live far from each other and seldom meet. But we talk on the phone. I draw his yard as a souvenir. Their puppy is so cute. It never barks when I feed it, just stands on its hind legs and stares at me."

-An excerpt from Qin Xiuying's blog post

“一吃樱桃，就想起我大弟弟家的樱桃树来了。住得远，不经常见，只是电话里说说话，我把他家院子画下来做个留念。他们家那只小狗狗可可爱了，我给它喂吃的，它不咬我，它竖起来看着我。”

——节选自秦秀英博客

The simple illustrations and plain words touched many readers' hearts unexpectedly. "It reminds me of my grandmother." "I have new respect for my mom. And I really miss her." A netizen commented. 

稚嫩的图画和朴实的文字，意外地感动了许多读者：“这本书让我想起了我的奶奶”， “我重新认识了我的母亲。”

The author of the book, Qin Xiuying, is a 71-year-old and almost illiterate countrywoman from Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. She studied only one and a half years in primary school. Her life was basically filled with doing farm work and raising her children.

小书的作者是秦秀英，一个不识字的71岁内蒙古农村老人。幼时，她只念过一年半小学。种地持家、生儿育女占据了她生活的全部。

Her husband passed away in 2009, making her life even more enclosed and isolated. Her daughter-in-law was worried about her and brought her to Shanghai in 2011.

2009年，老伴去世。秦秀英的生活圈子更加封闭、窄小。2011年，因为担心老人，儿媳将她接到上海。

"I don't speak mandarin or Shanghai dialect." Qin was always alone like before, feeling hard to make friends with the local elderlies. "Perhaps that's how it is in the big cities.”

“但我不会讲普通话，也不会讲上海话。”到了上海的秦秀英感到难以融入当地老人的生活，只能独来独往，“可能大城市就是这样吧。"

Thus her son and daughter-in-law encouraged her to learn writing and painting from the start. They even helped her start an online blog titled "Living Beside the River".

于是，儿子和儿媳鼓励她从零开始学习写字画画，还开了一个博客，名叫《临河而居》。

"I'd never tried writing before. Now that I'm old, I may start to learn all over again."

“一辈子没写过多少字，现在老了，又重新开始学文化啦！” 

She writes about the plants she sees as if they were her best friends. She believes that they are ordinary but persistent, versatile beings.

她像记录朋友一样，记录身边的草木。在她眼中，它们都是平凡而顽强的生命，各有各的喜好。

"These are fruits of Chinese Rose and Chinese Holly. The red fruits are all over the holly tree. When it gets cold, they fall on the ground. Some leaves of the Yellow Hibiscus turn red. Some of the Chrysanthemums bloom. They like cold weather, the colder the better."

-An excerpt from Qin's blog post

“月季果实和构骨果实，一颗构骨树上挂满了鲜红鲜红的果实，天冷了，有的掉在地上。海滨木槿叶子有的变成红色的。菊花开花了，有的还没开，菊花喜欢凉爽的天气，天这么冷它才开花了。”

——节选自秦秀英博客

"The Primula poissonii are beautiful. The flowers have three colors. They are bright and beautiful. I like the nature in South China."

-An excerpt from Qin's blog post

“海仙花很好看，一棵树上开的三种颜色，又鲜艳，又好看，南方的风景很好啊。”

——节选自秦秀英博客

Sometimes, the plants recall distant memories of her late relatives.

有时，植物勾起秦秀英的回忆。故人不在，草木犹存。

"December 6th of lunar calendar, my son got married. I went to the wedding and saw red willows and Nitraria tangutorum at the gate. I missed my long gone relatives. I have little memory of childhood, but I remember that my eldest uncle had only one ear. I was curious and I asked my mom privately. She told me that in 1940s, the county government made him deliver nitraria upriver. He didn't have warm clothes. He went for over 50 km by cart. His ear got frostbite and fell off when he touched it. It was the coldest days of the year. Freezing cold. I was terrified after hearing the story. It was supposed to be a happy day, yet I was lost in memories. I missed them. After that, I draw them for the memory."

-An excerpt from Qin's blog post

“腊月初六给儿子娶媳妇，我去了，看见门前长的红柳和hǎměr (注：学名白刺)让我想起离我而去的亲人。我回忆起，我很小的时候，什么都没记住，就记住一件事，我大爹(大伯)长的一只耳朵，我悄悄的问我母亲，我大爹怎么长的一只耳朵。我母亲说，民国三十几年，县政府派他往河头上送hǎměr，没有好穿戴，赶的牛车，一百多里路，把耳朵冻了，他拿手一摸碰掉了。阵（正）是署（数）九寒天，那时候天气很冷，滴水成冰的天气。我听了好害怕。那天本来是个大喜的日子，让我不知（不）觉走进回忆之中。我很想死去的亲人，回来想了想把红柳和hǎměr，做成自然笔记，以怀念死去的亲人。”

——节选自秦秀英博客

As there's no heating in Shanghai, Qin went back to Inner Mongolia in the winter and wrote notes about her farm works and social activities, like how to till the land, or how to cook the grains...... Humans and nature never get as close like in her book. She revives things that have been lost long time ago.

上海的冬天没有暖气，秦秀英便回到内蒙老家开始写起农事笔记、社会笔记。地怎么种，粮食怎么吃……人与自然的相近相亲，一切逝去的事物，在她的笔下都重现了。

"The flaxseeds are rich with oil. The flax oil used to be a daily necessity. People used it as lamp oil, lube oil, and rust remover. When the ceramic ware was broken, we pieced it together, wrapped it with sliced flax barks, and covered the cracks with the mixture of ground flax bark and red mud sifted from the water channel. When the mud was dry, we rubbed fax oil on the surface a couple of times so that it could last long. The mud wouldn't break even in water. You can always put on another layer of flax oil and it can be more solid than a new one."

-An excerpt from "The Sky of Flax"

“胡麻籽籽的油大，过去人们吃的、用的全是胡油。点灯用胡油，润车轴用胡油，铁器锈了也是拿胡油抹擦。以前家里的盆、碗、瓮打碎了，经常是糊住继续用，把水渠里澄下的红泥和麻皮末子搅在一起，把打烂的盆、碗、瓮砌在一块，拿整条麻皮缠上两圈，再把和好的泥抹在裂缝上，等泥干了，最后抹上几遍胡油，油一干，真是耐用了，放在水里洗也烂不了。用的时间长了，再抹点胡油漆一漆，这样的碗简直比新碗还牢靠。”

——秦秀英《胡麻的天空》

Chinese writer Liu Zhenyun says in the foreword of "The Sky of Flax" that, the illustrations "are stories between an individual life and the nature around it." Because of the hidden wisdom, "The history of the individual life can contain the histories of the community, the nation and all the human beings."

作家刘震云在《胡麻的天空》序言中说，这些小画“就是一个个体生命，跟身边的植物和动物，打过的交道……”而因为其中包含的智慧，“个体生命的历史之中，已经包含着族群的历史、民族的历史、人类的历史。”

That being said, Qin doesn't really care about these grand concepts: "I don't paint for fame or money. I just want to tell the young people how life was like in the past, and how we got here in the first place."

但秦秀英不懂得这些宏大的概念： “我画画不图名利，就是想告诉现在的年轻人，过去的日子是咋样，我们又是如何一步步走到今天的。”

In the countryside and in the city, Qin continues to draw from her heart what she sees around her. As flowers bloom and wither, the seasons go round, all are recorded in her notes of nature. Thanks to the company of the animals and the plants, she doesn't feel lonely anymore.

在乡村中，在城市里，秦秀英继续一笔一划地，亲切地记录着自己的所见。花开花落，春去秋来，这些都被收录在她的笔记之中。 因为有了动植物的陪伴，她也不再觉得寂寞了。

Cameraman: Yang Wenchao

Film editor: Wang Ying, Lu Gengrui

Story written by: Zhu Siqi

English editor: Melissa Chua

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