Harvest of fortune

"I take a noon break and then get back to the field late in the afternoon for another two to four hours," Tan says.

He has reaped about 900 kilograms of paddy rice out of 667 square meters of land this year.

He also keeps another 1,333 square meters of field of corns, beans, pumpkins and a few other vegetables.

"It is tiring, all the work, but the good harvest is cheering, making every pain worth it."

He is pretty much done with the harvest by middle September and is working on sun drying the unhusked rice before putting them in storage.

Tan says the folk music performance helped him to recover his strength and zest.

It was part of the celebrations for harvest in the village since 2018.

"We play chess and make gluttonous rice cake together in the harvest season," Tan says.

The festival is to enrich local villagers' life and increase cohesion, says Lin Houbin, a senior official in Tangbaqiu.

"We want the villagers to feel like the world is celebrating their harvest," Lin says.

The celebration also helps to highlight the virtue of traditions in the village.

Villagers are encouraged to help one another in finishing the last stage of their farming work.