Educated Youth in the Countryside: She is the Village's Embroidery Queen!-Chapter 325: Surviving Rabbits

But that’s not the main point.

The main point is that many military spouses accept this very calmly, even believing from the bottom of their hearts that men should be like this.

Even those with jobs think that men should work outside while women take care of the home, which is normal.

Conversely, a woman like Yi Chichi, who doesn’t cook, doesn’t do laundry, and relies on her man to do housework, eating at the mess hall when he’s not home, is not considered a good woman.

She personally heard military spouses complain that she’s not a good woman and even said that Wen Shi was being wasted on her.

This is also why she only hangs out with Ji Jian and her group, staying away from other military spouses.

There’s no point in forcing interactions if the conversations don’t align, and their thoughts don’t match—if people who are not on the same wavelength try to hang out, it only leads to conflict and no friendship can develop.

Therefore, it’s unnecessary to engage in such ineffective social interactions.

She doesn’t know what kind of person Zhang Xinsheng is, whether he’s chauvinistic or not, but she doesn’t want Wen Shi to make her seem like one.

Fortunately, Wen Shi is very reliable when it matters. He said, "This is all based on my experience. You see, I used to be unpopular with the ladies, and my superiors worried about my lifelong issues. But once I understood what it meant to be a good man, I got myself a wife."

He spoke with a straight face, talking nonsense.

Zhang Xinsheng responded with silence, thinking how foolish he was to wish for a serious discussion with this guy.

"Why aren’t you saying anything? Do you disagree with what I said?"

He wanted to remain silent like a chicken, but Wen Shi wouldn’t let him go.

Zhang Xinsheng felt helpless, "I know, I will follow your lead, okay?"

"Xiao Ming..."

"Don’t worry, I’ll also raise them well."

He couldn’t let his son be a bachelor forever. Although Wen Shi had a bit of a dog-like personality and a sharp tongue, he did say one true thing: raising children requires early effort.

If you try to teach them when they’re older, it’s too late; their personalities are already set.

As the saying goes, it’s easier to change mountains and rivers than change someone’s nature, so it’s better to be safe and start early.

The Zhang Brothers never thought that, by simply wanting some coconut and getting their dad to bring it back, their dad would come back ready to stop being human.

Under the guise of raising them to be upstanding men, he turned them into his little helpers.

They washed the dishes, did the laundry, swept the floor, and even had to scrub their dad’s smelly socks and shoes.

They even had to learn how to cook, plus...

In short, their dad returned from the beach with coconuts and seafood, ready to abdicate human responsibilities.

During this time, Yi Chichi and her husband, each holding a coconut and enjoying it, had no idea that Zhang Xinsheng was going to pass the housework he should have done himself onto his kids.

Wen Shi wasn’t particularly interested in coconut water, taking a few sips before turning to Yi Chichi, "Is it good?"

"It’s pretty good."

Yi Chichi smiled, "You don’t like it?"

"It’s okay."

Meaning he could take it or leave it.

"Let’s buy a chicken tomorrow."

"You want to eat chicken?"

"I want to eat chicken stewed in coconut water."

Wen Shi looked puzzled, glancing at the coconut in his hand, then at Yi Chichi, and after a two-second pause, asked, "These two things can be cooked together?"

Forgive his ignorance, but he couldn’t imagine what those two together would taste like.

"They can, just like how in the Northeast, you can stew anything together."

Is there anything wrong with coconut stewed chicken?

No.

Wen Shi made a sound of acknowledgment. Whatever his wife said goes, but, "Chicken might be hard to buy."

Yi Chichi, "..."

Alright, she’d been focused on eating and forgot about how much chickens are valued in the current environment.

The chicken backside bank is the family’s means to trade for essentials like oil and salt; they’re not easily sold.

As for roosters...

Most chicken-raising families have at most one, in preparation for hens to hatch the next year.

But she was still hopeful, "Can we go to nearby production teams and trade with farmers?"

She said exchange, but it’s essentially buying.

However, in this environment, private transactions are safer called exchanges; Yi Chichi has already learned to adapt to local customs.

Wen Shi expressed that hopes were slim, "After the typhoon disaster, many villagers’ chickens are either missing or dead. The mess hall is raising rabbits, though; do you eat rabbits?"

The implication being that eating rabbits would be easier than eating chickens.

Yi Chichi thought about it and thought it was doable.

Stir-fried spicy rabbit pieces, spicy cold rabbit head, and more – all have decent flavors.

However, "Why is the mess hall raising rabbits?"

These fluffy rabbits are quite mysterious.

They look nice, and if you pair a male and a female together, you’ll have litter after litter; they’re extremely fertile.

With a pair of rabbits, in less than a year, you’d have a lot more rabbits.

But if you try to expand on this, they’ll start dying one after another.

"We have a high training intensity and physical exhaustion demands adequate meat supplements; otherwise, we can’t keep up. Raising pigs takes too long to sell, buying large quantities increases military expenses, slaughterhouses can’t meet our needs, and beef or mutton is out of the question—it’s a rare treat to have. Only rabbits have a high meat yield and short growth cycle, meeting our needs."

Yi Chichi became interested, "How many rabbits are you raising now?"

Wen Shi took a sip of coconut water and calmly said, "Last year there were over five hundred. This year there are only about twenty big rabbits left."

"Eating them all up?"

"Dead!"

He looked frustrated, "These things are really outrageous. Being fed well, they just die batch after batch. When neglected, they thrive instead."

Last year, the rabbits were all doing well. They planned to slaughter two hundred by the end of the year to give the soldiers a plentiful feast. But in December, one rabbit died.

Then it all fell apart, one died after another, with a peak of more than fifty dying in a day.

Yi Chichi’s lips twitched, "Are those twenty-something big rabbits the survivors?"

"Yes."

Wen Shi nodded, "But they can reproduce, and with the young ones, there are seventy or so. Once the little ones grow, the rabbit numbers will increase again."

He was quite optimistic about the future of their rabbit farming, "We can at least have a rabbit feast for this year’s Spring Festival."

Yi Chichi thought he was celebrating too soon, "Better prepare for a repeat of last year."

"We’re preparing."

"How are you preparing?"

Wen Shi smiled happily, "Free-range."

Yi Chichi, ...well then, they’re really not worried about the rabbits causing trouble.

"Where are they free-ranging?"

"There’s an empty area behind the training grounds, lots of wild grass. The rabbits moved there and settled in to fend for themselves."

Yi Chichi felt this was hard to describe, "Watch out, the place will be crawling with rabbits by then."

Wen Shi didn’t think this was a problem; he even welcomed it.

"Great, we can just catch and eat them as we find them."

He spoke with a near-sacred reverence, "Meat’s meat, no one will complain about having too much rabbit meat, only too little."

That’s true. While just eating rabbit meat might starve you, as they say, Wen Shi and the others don’t have the luxury of just eating rabbit meat, and it’s better than having nothing at all.

"Then you also mentioned catching a rabbit tomorrow. If they’re free-ranging, you won’t be able to catch one, right?"

"That’s not much of a problem."

Catching rabbits might be difficult for most people, but it’s easy for them.