Chapter 2 Chapter 1 I am from the common people

My original name is Li Fengrui, and my ancestral home is Meixian, Guangdong Province. I am a Hakka who lived in the eastern mountainous area of ​​Guangdong for generations.About 300 years ago, the ancestor Yongxing Gong fled famine and came to settle down in the mountainous area of ​​Chuancang Township, Liuyang County, Hunan Province.Liuyang County is divided into four townships: East, West, South and North according to geographical location. Chuancang Township is located about 30 kilometers northeast of Liyang County.When my ancestors fled famine and came to Liuyang, the plains had already been developed by the locals, so they had to enter the deep mountains and old forests to settle down.In this remote mountainous area, there are no tiles on the top, no space on the ground, and nothing. All with hard-working hands, they open up wasteland and build fields, cut down trees and build houses, men and women weave, and work hard to start a business.However, the mountains here are high and the water is cold, the land is barren, and people face the loess all the year round, plowing and plowing, so it is still rare to have enough food and clothing; in addition, the mountain roads here are rugged and the traffic is blocked.Therefore, year after year, generation after generation, progress has been slow for more than three hundred years, the economy and culture are still very backward, and the ancestors have lived in extreme poverty for generations.

On July 9, 1906 (the 18th day of the fifth lunar month in the 32nd year of Guangxu in the Qing Dynasty), I was born in a poor peasant family in Shuangkeng Village, Chuancang Township, in this poor mountain valley.My biological father, Li Qingwen, and my biological mother, Li Shi, were both simple and honest poor farmers. We gave birth to six brothers and sisters. The eldest brother, Li Fengyi, was a painter. Unable to take care of herself, the elder sister-in-law was forced to remarry, and her cousin Li Fengbiao (a cripple) took care of her life. She died of illness in 1931. The eldest sister Li Guihua was given as a child bride when she was nine years old, and later married a farmer in Wenjia City. Chen Changjin, who has three sons, is now over eighty years old; the second sister, Li Meixiang, married Su Cishi, who had joined the Red Army in Yandian Tieluchong, Gaoping, but there was no news of Su Cishi; Joined the party in 1930, served as the chairman of the Liuyang Fifth Township Soviet in 1930. On February 22, 1931, Tang Wenyan, an officer of the Kuomintang, led troops to Daxiyuan to copy and burn the lithography bureau of our party's underground organization (that is, the underground printing factory) ) when passing through Shuangkeng, captured Feng Ting and killed him in Yonghe City. It is said that the reactionaries dug out the heart of the second elder brother Feng Ting, and no one dared to collect the body. up.I was fifth, and there was a sixth younger sister named Chunxiang, who chanted sutras and fasted with her biological father since she was a child, and died of lung disease when she was eighteen.I was born in the last years of the Qing Dynasty. Political corruption, foreign powers invaded, natural disasters and wars continued for years, and the people were in dire straits. In addition, my family had a large population and a small harvest. He adopted me to my uncle Li Qiwen as his heir.

The adoptive father Li Qiwen is also a farmer who has been farming for generations.He is bold and upright. When he was a child, he studied in a private school for several years and knew a few words. He also practiced martial arts since he was a child. He has developed a skillful set of "iron bone pile" boxing. With some prestige, he often participates in the "sacrifice meetings" of small clans. When some civil disputes occur in the village, he is often invited to help mediate.He has two younger brothers, and his second uncle Li Fuwen is a tailor, but in the poor and backward valley, except for weddings and funerals, few families have money to make new clothes. He sews by hand, which is very slow, and the wages are very little, and he cannot support his family, so he has no money to marry a wife, and has been living with his adoptive father.The third uncle Li Xiangwen is also a loyal and honest farmer. He only knows how to bury his head in farming, go up the mountain to cut firewood, and pick some firewood to sell in the market town. Wife, live with adoptive father.In this way, the three brothers depend on each other for life, and the poverty of the family can be seen.However, because the adoptive mother, You, had no children, and the adoptive father, Li Qiwen, was over half a century old and had no children, so I was adopted to inherit the "incense" of the three brothers in his family.

When I was five years old, unfortunately, my adoptive mother You Shi died of illness, and there was no one to take care of the housework. My adoptive father had to remarry and married the widow Wu Shi as his wife.My stepmother, Wu Shi, was nearly fifty years old at the time. She was hardworking and simple, virtuous, gentle, and amiable. She loved me very much.It's a pity that her old man passed away in 1944 when my whole family died of the plague one after another in 1931, leaving her alone. I didn't expect the liberation of Hunan, the Red Army and It was a pity when I returned triumphantly.Xikeng, where the adoptive father lived, was a small village with only ten or twenty families; Shuangkeng, where the biological father lived, was a large village with hundreds of families. They were in the same ravine, only three or four miles apart.Since I was the only child in my adoptive father's family and had a lot of labor, life was slightly better than that of my biological father's family, but it was also very poor.There are only six adobe houses for the family of five, and one mu of dry land reclaimed by myself. There is a small bamboo mountain, a small tea mountain and a small vegetable garden in front of and behind the house. Some bamboo, camellia oleifera, tea, sweet potatoes, vegetables, and tobacco are planted, which can be harvested every year. Some bamboo shoots, tea oil, tea leaves, and tobacco leaves are for the whole family to eat, and vegetables are enough for the whole family to eat.The adoptive mother collects hemp and weaves hemp every day to earn some manual money. She also raises a pig and a few chickens every year. During the Chinese New Year, the pigs are slaughtered. Apart from saving some cured bacon for sacrifices and entertaining guests, most of them are sold for money. The eggs are also saved. Come down and sell for money to subsidize the family expenses.Because the family has little arable land, and it is "looking at the sky", if it does not rain, the grain will not be harvested, so every year they have to rent more than 20 acres of mountain land from the "sihui" of the non-planting clan.In a good year, more than 20 tans of millet can be harvested a year. After the summer harvest, there is not much left except for the rented grain and the borrowed grain that was paid off. The family's rations mainly depend on late rice and sweet potatoes.Except for a meal of rice on the first day of the first lunar month and when the early rice is in bloom, sweet potato rice is served all year round.In winter, the days are shorter and there is less farm work. They just dig the land, tidy up the tea hills and collect firewood, and they eat two meals instead, and they mainly eat shredded sweet potatoes.At that time, there was a nursery rhyme that said: "Three shredded potatoes and one grain of rice. You can find rice grains in the shredded sweet potatoes, but you can't find them if you look for them. If you touch your nose to the bottom of the bowl, you will find one grain."In the busy season of spring plowing, the days are long and the farm work is heavy, and only three meals can be eaten, and there are more rice grains in the shredded sweet potato rice.Even though counting the rice grains in the pot like this, our family is still short of food for several months every year, and we have to borrow three or four loads of grain from the "Sihui" and the "Yi Cang" in Malan'ao to make ends meet when the next year's crops are scarce; If there is a disaster year, it will be even more difficult.

Our Xikeng is located in a poor and remote area, and women from other places are generally reluctant to marry into the valley. Therefore, at that time, every household had the habit of raising a child bride-in-law, so that when the child bride-in-law was brought up, she could marry her son without having to spend a lot of money to marry in other places.The three brothers of my adoptive father’s family have only one “single seedling” of me. The adoptive parents and two uncles love me like their own flesh and blood.She was a year or two older than me, and until I married her when I was sixteen, I only knew that her natal family was in Fengjiawan, and her surname was Liu, but I didn't know her name.Because women had no status in the old society, many women in our valley only had nicknames, not big names.When she was young, people called her "sister" (if there were more girls, they were called "sisters"), after she got married, they called her "guest" (wife) of a certain person, and after giving birth, they called her a "baby" of a certain person. Mother; even if she is eligible to be included in the family tree and family tree, only the surname is written, such as Li, Wu, and Liu, and the name is not written. If she had a name at home, people don't know much or have forgotten it long ago.

When I was a teenager, I was in a period of great social change and turmoil during the rise and failure of the Revolution of 1911.At that time, for the interests of their own groups, warlords of all sizes, with the backing support of imperialists such as Japan, Britain, the United States, France, Germany, and Russia, supported their troops to rule the roost and ruled one side separately. brought great disaster.Our Hunan Province is the sphere of influence of the warlord Wu Peifu. Years of natural disasters and military disasters have caused the people to live in dire straits. This is the root of my childhood suffering.

Like all children from poor families, I started herding cattle at the age of six. I took the cattle to the mountains to graze every day. to the bitterness of life.One day at noon in July, the weather was very hot, and there were a lot of oxflies (scientific name: oxfly). I stood under a tung tree on the mountain and watched the cows grazing. Suddenly, a large group of oxflies flew around the old cow. Flying around, biting the old cow.At the beginning, the old cow shook its head and flicked its tail desperately to drive away, but no matter how hard it tried, it couldn't get rid of it.I was in a hurry. I broke a branch and rushed over to drive the old cow away from the cowfly. Unexpectedly, the old cow was stung by the cowfly and became irritable. Below is the freshly felled bamboo forest, with sharp bamboo stubbles protruding from the fir bamboo heads.I staggered and stepped on a bamboo stubble, and my bare foot was pierced by the sharp bamboo stubble, and blood flowed out immediately, making me cry out of pain.The shepherd boy who was grazing cattle nearby rushed to my house to report the news. My father (adoptive father) immediately rushed to carry me home, washed the wound with salt water, and applied herbs to stop the bleeding completely.Because of this, my mother (adoptive mother) was so distressed that she burst into tears.After recovering from the injury, she repeatedly told me to be careful whenever I went up the mountain to graze cattle or hunt pigweed.

When I was nine years old, my father sent me to a private school to study.Originally, there were already "foreign schools" at that time, but my father was more conservative in his thinking, thinking that "foreign schools" could not get knowledge, and only private schools could "know books and rituals" and learn real skills.On the first day of school, my father sent me there himself.According to the old rules, my father asked me to kowtow to the spirit tablet of the "Holy Master" Confucius before the incense table, and after bowing down to the teacher, he asked the teacher to say: "I will give you this child, please be strict with me." Discipline, if he doesn't study hard, you can beat him anyway, I won't feel bad."

The teacher replied politely: "Yes, yes. 'If jade is not polished, it will not be a tool; if a person does not learn, he will not know righteousness.' Don't worry, don't worry!" Then he gave me a scientific name of "Ming Jie". My first teacher, Li Huipan, was in his fifties, well-educated, and very strict in his requirements, but he did not easily beat or scold students.He started his lectures from "at the beginning of human beings, nature is good, nature is similar, habits are far away", mainly literacy.I am very interested in reading. I can recite books quickly and remember words firmly. The teacher is very kind to me.A year later, teacher Li Huipan left the "resignation hall", and a new teacher named Li Riwang came in. He was also a private school teacher in his fifties.He was rather strict, hitting the calves with bamboo boards for those who couldn't memorize the books, and the students were afraid of him.But I didn't get beaten by him for studying.One day, a naughty classmate played a prank and tied a caught toad to the leg of the teacher's desk before Teacher Li Riwang came to class. The teacher didn't pay attention at first, but after a while, he found a toad under the desk. While jumping around, he wanted to kick it away with his feet, only to find out that someone tied it under his desk with a rope on purpose, and immediately lost his temper, trying to find out who did it?No one dared to admit it, and I and other students did not dare to report it for fear of being retaliated against. As a result, each of the dozen or so students in the class received three boards, but usually the naughty students received the hard board, and I received the light board.I have always remembered this "wronged" case for decades.I think: Doing anything requires investigation and verification to clarify the situation, especially when dealing with people, and you must be more cautious. You must not "three poles for unreasonable things and three poles for reason", indiscriminately and wrongly wronging good people.

I studied in a private school for two and a half years, started to read, and then learned "Jiyun Zengguang", "Liyan Zengguang", "Children's Learning Qionglin", and so on.It was already the summer of 1917, six years after the victory of the Revolution of 1911 and the establishment of the Republic of China, before the district government issued a ban and closed down all the private schools.My father had no choice but to send me to Malan'ao Public Ping'an No. 1 National Junior Primary School, starting from the second grade.But Malan'ao is five or six miles away from my home, and there is still a mountain ridge to climb. The mountain road is rugged, and it is dark and rainy.Shuangkeng is only three or four miles away from Xikeng. There is no need to climb mountains, and the path is relatively flat, and it is close to the biological father's house, so there is a caretaker.I studied here for three years until I graduated from elementary school.

I started elementary school at the age of eleven, and gradually became sensible.My home is several miles away from the school, and I have to bring my own lunch when I go to school. Although it is still sweet potato rice, my mother always tries to cook some delicious dishes for me, such as eggs, pickles, and sometimes a few slices of homemade bacon. .My parents loved me so much, they saved me food and money for my schooling, and prepared delicious lunch for me. I felt sorry for them, and secretly made up my mind to study hard so that I could repay my parents’ kindness when I grow up.Therefore, I never arrive late for school and leave early. I always listen to the teacher's words well, study hard, and thus get the teacher's love.At that time, because I had two and a half years of experience in a private school, my language skills were relatively good, and I could write properly with a calligraphy brush. Hu Wancheng, my Chinese teacher, liked me very much.Once, when I was in the third and fourth grades of junior high school, I had an exam composition in the school, and the topic was "Peach Blossom". I handed in the paper.Teacher Hu Wancheng shook his head when he saw it, thinking that I didn't write carefully, so he called me back angrily, patted my test paper and reproached me: "Look for yourself, what do you write? Rewrite an article carefully, write You are not allowed to go to lunch!" I had never been scolded so severely by the teacher in front of my classmates, my face was flushed all of a sudden, and my tears almost fell down. After I returned to my seat, my mind was in a mess and I couldn't figure it out.After a while, I suddenly remembered the couplets posted by ordinary people during the New Year. There were "three friends of pine, bamboo, plum and winter, a family of peach, plum, apricot and spring breeze". I thought: Isn't it spring when the peach blossoms are blooming?After surviving the cold winter, the peach blossoms herald the spring, and all things recover; the year's plan is spring, and the farmers will be busy with spring plowing. Once the questions are broken, the ideas are opened, and the composition is written, and the papers are handed in just before lunch.After seeing it, Teacher Hu nodded and smiled and said, "Okay, let's eat!" But I still didn't eat this lunch in a fit of anger.This incident had a huge impact on the school.At that time, all the national schools in our Gaoping area were divided into one school district, called Liuyang County Sixth School District; the school district had a school affairs committee in charge of the education work of the whole district.The school affairs committee member was Li Shilin, a native of Shuangkeng Village. He was only in his twenties. He had just graduated from Changsha No. 1 Normal School. ".One day when he came to our school and listened to Mr. Hu Wancheng tell the story of my composition test, he praised me for "being aggressive in learning can make me a talent." When I was a child, my family was poor and could not afford lamp oil.When it was dark, only a small oil lamp was lit in the kitchen, and the whole family gathered around it to do some chores of repairing farm tools and baskets; mothers and child brides also had to pick ramie, weave linen or mend clothes under such dim lights.Sometimes when there is no lamp oil, bamboo chips are used instead.In this way, I can't read and write at night, so I like to go out and listen to the old man's stories about ghosts and gods.I love to listen to stories but I am timid. After listening to the stories, I have to go with my companions and dare not go home alone.Sometimes I go out alone at night, when I walk under a big tree and hear the wind blowing the leaves, I always feel the rustling sound of footsteps behind me, as if some ghost is always following behind, the faster I walk, the more closely I follow, the more I think about it, the more afraid I become, He didn't dare to turn his head back, and was covered in cold sweat.It wasn't until after I joined the revolution that I realized that it was all caused by superstition. After training, I became more and more courageous. I was no longer afraid of anything when I walked and fought at night. There is a folk song in my hometown: "Adults have no money, and children look forward to the New Year." It was the same when I was a child. I didn't understand how difficult it is for adults to worry about having no money to buy rice and sacrifices to pay homage to ancestors during the New Year, so I looked forward to the New Year.Because of the New Year's Eve, the adults will give the boy a bunch of lucky money, also called longevity money. Twelve or twenty-four copper coins are strung with a red rope, which means that there are twelve months in a year or twenty-four solar terms. Disasters; During the New Year, you can also wear new clothes or neat, clean and less patched clothes, and visit the elders' homes to pay New Year's greetings. The elders will also give lucky money and delicious food.I took a few strings of New Year's money to throw copper coins with my friends, and I could also buy firecrackers to set off. I was very happy. When I was a child, apart from looking forward to the New Year, I also looked forward to the annual spring festival to worship ancestors.We "Hakkas" scattered in the mountainous areas of Gaoping have passed down dozens of generations of descendants from Guangdong to Liuyang for more than 300 years, forming many clan branches, large and small.Due to economic backwardness, some customs of clan society are still preserved.Our Xikeng and Shuangkeng are a small family. The cultivated land reclaimed by our ancestors has been kept as public land according to the clan rules and regulations. It was not distributed to descendants for cultivation, but was rented to people from other families to cultivate, and the land rent was accumulated. It is called "" "Yi Valley" is managed by a "sacrificial meeting" composed of prestigious elders selected from the clan.If the children and grandchildren want to farm, they have to open up wasteland by themselves or rent the public land of other families, so our two small villages are relatively poor, and there are no landlords or rich farmers. The grain rent from the "Sacrifice Association" has three purposes: one is to help the descendants to overcome the famine in the spring. Every year when the season is green and yellow, according to the size of the population of each family and the harvest of the previous year, the grain is lent to the descendants of the family to overcome the famine, and a stone is borrowed in the spring. In the summer, when the early rice is harvested, one stone and one bucket are used, so that after two or three hundred years of accumulation, more and more grains will be accumulated.Every year my family has to borrow three or four loads of millet to survive the spring famine, otherwise they will go hungry.The second is to set up education. In the Qing Dynasty, it was a private school. After 1920, a private Lishi Yuxing Junior Primary School was established.The third is the spring sacrifice. Every year from the spring equinox to the Qingming Festival, the "sacrifice meeting" will hold a three-day spring sacrifice: on the first day, clean, arrange the ancestral hall, set up incense tables, and prepare for the sacrifice.The descendants of the family must have one or two men from each household (women have no status and cannot participate), and the descendants who have moved to other villages must also send men back to their jobs to worship their ancestors.You can have a meal of dry rice that night, and the dishes are also rich.On the second day, the tombs of the ancestors are visited, and the descendants who participate in the spring festival must go.When you arrive at the ancestral tomb, you must first clean the cemetery, pull out the weeds around the tomb, and draw the inscription on the tombstone with a red pen. kowtow.Because the ancestral graves are scattered on several hilltops, from Gaoping, Chuancang to Malan'ao, and Shuangkeng, they go out at dawn and can't return to the village until the afternoon.After returning to the ancestral hall, the memorial ceremony officially began. The memorial ceremony is very grand and cumbersome.In the shrine in the middle of the ancestral hall, there are neatly arranged the tablets of the ancestors; in front of the shrine, there is a wooden fence more than one meter high, and there is an incense table in front of it. On the incense table, there are incense burners, candlesticks and fruit offerings; people, an accompanist and a praiser.There is usually a patio in front of the main hall of the ancestral hall, which has been paved with wooden planks at this time, leaving a passage in the middle. On the left side is a big pig's head, and on the right side is a whole sheep that has been slaughtered and removed its wool and internal organs as a sacrifice.The children and grandchildren who participated in the sacrifice stood in the lower hall in front of the courtyard, lined up in several rows according to their seniority, and a bamboo mat more than one foot long and two feet wide was laid in front of each row as a bedding for kneeling.At the beginning of the ceremony, the drummer played ritual music. Following the command of the praiser, the chief priest held candles, burned incense, burned paper money, and recited the sacrificial oration, such as "there is a pig's head on the left and a lamb on the right, to be sacrificed to the ancestor's spirit", and then It means that all the descendants follow the praiser to read some words to pray for the ancestors to bless their safety and auspiciousness, and kneel and kowtow while saying; Loud noise.Finally announced the ceremony.In the evening, there will be a big banquet and a full meal. This is also the most important program I look forward to in the annual Spring Festival.At that time, because my father could read a few words, he began to be a celebrant, and later served as an accompanying priest and officiant. Therefore, since I was in a private school, my father took me to participate in the spring festival; As a celebrant, I officially participated in the spring festival.At that time, it was not easy to be a salutator. You had to memorize dozens or hundreds of etiquette commands. You were not allowed to laugh or make mistakes when singing the salute. . On the third day of the spring festival, the "sacrifice meeting" will be discussed, and all the members participating in the sacrifice will attend. The elders in charge of the "sacrifice meeting" will announce the income and expenditure accounts for the year, propose the income and expenditure plan for the coming year, and agree to hire the principal of the primary school, The selection of teachers and the amount of stipends for students above primary school; sometimes they also negotiate the protection of forests and water conservancy regulations, organize labor for bridge repairs and paving roads, and adjudicate and punish unworthy descendants who violate ethnic rules.I remember one year, I saw the "Sacrifice Society" punish a lame man who was lazy and petty theft, and was caught outside the ancestral hall and spanked 30 times.Looking back now, although the three-day spring festival was a feudal superstition, and it cost a lot of money and food (these money and food are called "Sacrifice" and are actually the accumulation of everyone's hard work), but the hungry For me and the poor folks, it is indeed rare to have enough food for three days.Furthermore, this "sacrifice meeting" form of discussion can also be said to be a form of "democracy" in the countryside at that time. Although very primitive, it still played some good roles in the backward mountainous areas. In the old society, there was such a folk song in my hometown: "Manchu Manjiaojiao, lead the big manchu to chop firewood; cut a load a day, cut a reef (pile) in ten days, and sell it and burn it again. "It's only natural that the farmer's children should go to the mountains to cut firewood when they grow up.Of course I am no exception. After school, weekdays, and especially during winter and summer vacations, I have to work in the fields, go up the mountain to cut firewood, and sometimes I have to pick firewood with Uncle Xiangwen to sell in Yonghe City.He can pick more than one hundred catties, but I only pick forty catties.It is hard enough to walk more than ten Huali mountain roads each time to pick firewood.After the firewood was sold, my uncle would always go to the restaurant to buy me a bowl of rice, but he himself only ate the rice with shredded sweet potatoes that he brought; he refused to share it with him. Yonghe City is an important market town in Dongxiang, Liuyang County, with convenient water and land transportation. Most of the local products from nearby villages are distributed here, and the market is very prosperous.At that time, the troops of the warlord Wu Peifu were stationed in the Shuifu Temple three or four miles away from the downtown streets.Like bandits, this army often went to the streets to drink and make troubles, extort money, and even blatantly blocked roads and robbed merchants. The masses hated and feared them.One day, Uncle Xiangwen and I went to Yonghe City to sell firewood. Unexpectedly, we met a purchasing sergeant from Wu Peifu's army who wanted to buy firewood.I thought to myself: Not good, 80% of the money is for nothing.In a hurry, he lied and said: "Boss, this firewood has been sold to others. The customer is going to buy meat. Come back immediately and take us to pick him up!" The purchasing sergeant glared at him and shouted viciously: "Damn it, I can't buy it if I buy it? Stop talking nonsense, pick it up and go with me!" . Uncle Xiangwen was timid at first, so when he frightened him, he shivered with fright, pulled me up and said, "My son, let's go with him." The purchasing sergeant took us to the Shuifu Temple by the Daxi River and asked us to pick firewood into the kitchen without weighing or paying.The uncle came forward and begged, "Boss, these two loads of firewood weigh 170 to 80 catties. Our family is poor, and we are waiting for the money to sell the firewood to buy rice for cooking. I beg the boss to do me a favor and give me some money." Before the uncle could say anything more, the guy swung his arm, slapped the uncle hard twice, and cursed, "Give me the money? You don't even open your eyes to see what this place is. Get out!" I wanted to go up to reason with that guy, but he pushed me and staggered to the ground.Uncle quickly helped me up, pulled me, and walked away swallowing his anger.After returning home, my young heart was filled with anger and humiliation. For several days, I was always depressed, and gradually I developed a thought that I would take revenge when I grew up.My father is a boxer in the village, and his "iron bone pile" boxing is well-known in the villages far and near. Some teenagers in the village are vying to worship him as a teacher and practice boxing and martial arts with him.When I was five or six years old, my father taught me to practice martial arts. In the morning and evening, and during vacations, I also practiced boxing, gun and stick, and lion dance with my father's apprentices.But when I was young, I just thought martial arts was fun and didn't care much. The incident of being robbed and beaten for selling firewood in Yonghe City inspired me to practice boxing and martial arts consciously.I think, if you want to not be bullied, you must have a hard fist.From then on, I actively followed my father to learn martial arts, and gradually developed a relatively strong "iron bone pile" boxing, and learned to use sticks, broadswords, shields and "meteor hammers".Later, when my father got older, he often asked me to demonstrate to my apprentices and lead them to practice. During the Chinese New Year (Spring Festival) in rural areas, there is very little farm work. From the first day of the first lunar month to the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the Lantern Festival is held, and folk cultural and entertainment activities are relatively active.My father took advantage of this opportunity to take ten or twenty apprentices to nearby villages to perform lion dances and martial arts. First, he could concentrate on practicing martial arts, which would make the neighboring village lively and lively; Some martial arts equipment.When we toured the villages to perform, we performed a lion dance first and then performed martial arts.Martial arts include unarmed singles and sparring with "iron bone pile" boxing, as well as singles and sparring with knives, spears, and sticks. When the performance is brilliant, the master and the crowd will set off firecrackers vigorously. The louder the firecrackers are, it shows our kung fu. Get over it.When I was very young, I performed "Qin Bone Pile" boxing, and when I was a little older, I performed single-handed swords, holding a shield in one hand and a knife in the other, slashing, blocking, jumping, and rolling.I am better at "Meteor Hammer".It is also a weapon, a long rope with two round or square iron mounds tied on both ends, wrapped with red silk outside, grasp the middle of the rope with your hands, and shake it vigorously, the two iron mounds will move up and down, left and right Swinging quickly, pointing at where to hit, can injure or even kill people.Because it flickers like a meteor, it is named "Meteor Hammer".During the performance, a few small benches were placed on the stage, and candles were lit on the benches. At the same time, gongs and drums were played, and orchestral instruments such as shengdi, erhu, and suona played together, creating a tense and joyful atmosphere.I went to the middle of the arena and used the "meteor hammer" to hit the tip of the candle's flame. I saw the flame flickering and couldn't be extinguished, because the owner thought it was bad luck and unhappy if the candle was extinguished, so I had to be very careful and beat it again and again. Fast and accurate, changing patterns up and down, left and right, as if playing acrobatics, such a dozen or twenty rounds to the sound of drum music, often won bursts of applause from the crowd.My father usually plays the finale and comes out last.The audience saw that he was over sixty years old, his temples were pale, he was still so vigorous and fast in punching, he followed like a tiger, moved like a monkey, punched and kicked, jumped and rolled, and he was as powerful as a man in his prime. Set up the stage and make the performance reach its climax.I learned this martial art from my father when I was a teenager. Until I was seventy years old, I could sometimes do one or two sets of boxing. This is very good for my strong body, health and longevity, and decades of military career. .