Nanxijiang

Rambling about these timeworn villages is like tumbling into history. It does not take an attentive tourist to discover many farming and living utensils have been here and still works well since dynasty of Ming or even Song dynasty.

The ancient oil extractor is only in use during off - harvest season when the farm cattle is not doing other heaving work in the field.

It is certainly not the most productive way of extracting oil, but somehow the farmers are slightly superstitious about the handmade product. They believe the oil extracted here simply tastes better. We also normally believe in the magic of human touch than mechanics of engine power, so sure, We are totally convinced by the theory too.

Only tourists need time to process so many "the picturistique countryside", the "idyllic farming living" visual images; understandablely for people living in it, beauty is often not something to see, but something to be put into the stomach...

The mild climate and easy access to irrigation make this area a place of abundance. A so called "hometown of rice and fish", they are truly 2 major ingredients in every family dinner table. Rice noodle, rice cake, rice ball, even smash rice, you have all the variations to choose from as long as it is rice-based. The sumian, one of local specialty is a kind of rice noodle that is actually made of fermented rice dough.

Again, as a true believer of home cooking and the magic of the handmade, even allergic to instant noodle overdose from college time, we would never say no to a bowl of handmade sumian.

We were quite disappointed later to find out: these rice cakes were not supposed be eaten, at least not before they were steamed and smoked, here, by the incense burning in the ancestral hall. These rice cakes were one of the tributes from all families in the village for a yearly festival for celebrating harvest and sacrificing ancestors.