Pin:
My mind was in a swirling vortex of confusion. I wasn’t sure what I was doing - All I had were
some fancy skills that supposedly worked like a charm against the heated weathers. Looking up, I
wondered if my ancestors were clucking down upon me with disappointed and angry expressions.
Were they angry at the fact that I had ditched the traditional farming style and moved on to
use ‘Useless modern gizmos?’ Were they furious that I had come back penniless with skills given
from a shady teenager? Were they ashamed to have me apart of the heritage, the long, perpetual
journey to beat the desert?
I certainly hope not.
However, when the sun had slept and the day had darkened, it became apparent that my
hope was distinguishing like a candle. I had only planted one seedling, a value so small and
insignificant compared to old hand Yang.
For a few months, it was like this. Get up, labor, fail, and sleep; get up, labor, fail, and sleep.
The first seed I planted was now shyly growing up, leafing out its tiny yet detailed patterns. Its
branches touched others, forming a strong army against the frequent desert rages. Unfortunately,
they seemed to just, wither under the glare of the heat. Yang’s trees were a few meters away,
recruiting new members every hour or so. But the trees he planted had the fragility of an
old grandma - its strength was weak and defective against the sand monster in front of me.
Nevertheless, they stood upright, even when temperature was hot enough to cook rice. Surely, as
the stories follow, shouldn’t mine triumph against the odds and win?
Yang:
Last night, a great yelling began. The winds shifted and awoke, sending dozens of sand at all
directions. It called out loose branches, and creatures of the wild. Wherever it went, it wrecked.
No animal, human or thing was left safe, especially not plants.
Once again, my plants are thrown miles away, dead in the deep desert. I must’ve planted it
too lightly.
Yang’s trees, on the other hand, and firmly planted, if not a little withered.
We can’t keep going on like this. I thought. We’re living in the same house, eating the same
food, and yet not talking. I’m like a dog that sits on its bone; willing to not eat the bone if that
means others couldn’t eat it.
And that was not abnegation thing to do - What if the future was ruined because I was
too stubborn?
So when the day clears and the light returns, my brother and I have a serious talk. He
talked about his techniques in farming, and I talked about my ‘magical seeds’. He talked about
the terrifying city life; I compared it to my lonely and tiring farm life. In the next few hours, I
learned more about my brother than I had learned it the last ten years.
In the end, we had it all worked out. We wanted to let in the new, and yet keep the old. We
decided to use papa’s magical seeds, but at the same time use new, city techniques to plant in the
seeds. After all, two brains were better than one.
Maybe our plan wouldn’t work - Maybe there was another mysterious hidden factor that we
had yet not discovered. But we could only hope.
This is the story of 2 brothers, 1 desert, and a bucket of hope.
