I realized that it was a long time ago already that had passed since I and my eldest brother went into the rice field of my grandparent's brother to collect some left-over rice stalks that we are free to gather during the harvest season. I could make a third of a sack of unmilled rice for my efforts which we dry under the sun to prepare it for milling to take the chaff off from the rice grain.
We do the picking for about a week and so me and my brother can produce a sack of rice in the process. We are just free to do that because the harvest season already has ended and what we collect really are just what are left off and will just left to waste if not taken. It is just the rice field was so vast that we are able to get productive in our efforts.
My mother was just happy for our work because the rice that we collect literally brings food on the table so she encourages it and she just makes sure that we wear long sleeves and hat plus trousers to protect our bodies from the heat of the sun and the stinging blades of some grass.
We would walk barefoot just like an ordinary farmer and my brother just thought me how to place my feet when I walk on the already cut rice plant so I won't hurt the soles off my feet. He told me to not to directly step on it but move my feet in a wiping motion and that's just how we walk there.
We would go as far as we reach the savanna where there are small ponds. Those ponds are just shallow enough for us to bail the water off from it to in order for us to get the goodies which are the catfishes and other fish that are in them. The job is done by several of us with friends because the task is quite hard if it is only done with a few persons. We would collect the fish and cook it on site.
There is hay everywhere and we just make a fire out of them because my brother brings some matches to light them up. We just throw the fishes into the burning hay plus some dry twigs. We would eat it with our packed cooked rice that we brought along and it is just an instant picnic and work time in one.
Depending on how many fishes that we caught that day, we would bring home some, usually the bigger ones that my mother would cook for dinner. We do the rice picking and that work we do in the savanna two times yearly during the harvest season only and it was a very fulfilling task as I enjoy it very much.
Now those rice fields are long gone they are now sold and converted into housing subdivisions and industrial complexes so I just miss it so much especially that feeling that I was still free and able just like an ordinary normal person. But life still has to continue for me and face it like a warrior in a battlefield for this long fight of a lifetime.
