Although I have been living in Hubei for about half a century, because I was born and lived in Chengdu for nearly thirty years, I have a deep affection for Chengdu. I often regret that I have not been able to return to my hometown, but its local style paintings are always active in my dreams
Gracious and gorgeous. It is said that today's Chengdu has undergone earth-shaking changes, but I am not a little "emotional". This has become a "good thing" because these pictures have not been "disturbed" at all, is not it the "original soup" of the old Chengdu folk customs! Rambling memories, handwritten letters, Shippo Tower, not a piece, let's call it "Rongcheng Reminiscences"!
Moving "back"
In the old society, Chengdu moved to ask for a "back". What is a "back"? It is also a person who helps carry furniture. People want to move, they have to find a "back" to come to the house, and have seen each piece of furniture, such as the big cabinet, the second cabinet, the shrine frame... Wait a minute. Big back, small pieces, altar jars and cans to pick, the price is good, he uses thick rope to bundle each heavy object on his back, holding a wooden stick commonly known as "beating the pestle", the wooden stick is nailed to a square magic board, tired to sit on the wooden stick board to rest. Just like this, there is really a momentum of foolishness to move mountains.
What is particularly difficult is that the "furniture mountain" composed of large and small, tall and low cage cabinets on his back is so well tied that from a distance, there is almost no one to see, only the furniture is walking. People who have this kung fu are afraid that they are rare today.
The porters on the Tea Horse Trail, their mode of transportation is similar to that of "backs"
Fire sellers
In the cold of old Chengdu, a kind of business that appeared on the streets for the poor. The poor do not have enough to eat, do not wear warm clothes, and do not feel cold during the day for manual labor. By the end of the night, there was no cotton clothes to wear, and it was too cold to endure. At this time, there were fire sellers who opened businesses on the street. A large iron pot with a flaming charcoal or wood slag at the bottom, covered with sawdust, and a pot of hot grass ash next to it. When a buyer carries a baking basket to buy fire, the seller first scoops up mahogany charcoal, then scoops hot grass ash, presses the baking basket tightly, and she knows how much money per scoop. This kind of trading is called "picking fire" among the Chengdu population. On the ninth cold day, poor people carried baking cages to pick up fires, and business was booming. Because of the low cost of extraction, the poor people carry hot baking cages and go to bed hot to sleep until tomorrow.
Heating artifact, unique to Sichuan
boarding house
In the old days, the apartments were very closed, and the apartments were few and all the rich and powerful people, and the poor people absolutely could not afford to live. Therefore, some people have ingenious ideas and set up dormitories to facilitate the working people. The dormitory is very simple, but the owner's own house, vacate one or two rooms, put on a few small beds, hang a paper lantern at the door, and write "Zhang Ji" and "Wang Ji" to send the dormitory, so that someone will come to stay. At that time, there were many such dormitories in The area of Junping Street, Xiaonan Street and Baojia Lane in Chengdu. This kind of boarding dormitory is not only convenient for shopkeepers, but also convenient for travelers, especially college and middle school students who come to Chengdu to study and are not willing to be constrained by the school, and they have become the main tenants of the boarding dormitory in groups.
Tooth and tooth rice
Tooth and tooth rice is rice cooked in a large iron pot, less water and more rice, after the water dries, put on the stove with a slight fire to smoulder, and then cut into a tooth and tooth to sell, so it is called tooth and tooth rice. This meal was as hard as a grain of iron, and it was very well eaten, so many working people went to eat it. In order to adapt to the tastes and economic capabilities of these customers, the dishes of tooth and tooth rice are mostly cheap and good popular home-cooked flavors, such as various kimchi, tofu milk, bean blossoms, bean sprouts, bean soup and seasonal vegetables and other vegetarian dishes, meat dishes are not much, but pig offal, fat pieces of boiling pot meat and the like.
Hat head
This is a kind of rice similar to tooth and tooth rice, but the cooking method of this rice is different, the water is mixed more, the rice is also more smoky, when it is scooped into the bowl, the seller adds the rice loosely, only on the upper base, piled up like a hat, so the name "hat a few heads". This kind of rice can coax the eyes, the buyer likes it, looks more, in fact, not hungry. But it is not hard, and it best meets the needs of ordinary "two-bump" grain households and medium-sized public servants.
Anti-sputum melting cake
In the Shaocheng area of Chengdu, every night there is an old man who hunches over, carrying a basket containing many cartons containing various kinds of medicines. Hang a blue oil jug on the basket. The old man shouted as he walked: "Cold cough, fire cough, salt cough, cold wind cough, phlegm elimination cake!" Every night. When I was a child, I also bought his anti-sputum cake, and I thought it was delicious and sweet. It is said that this old man is a Manchu who only sells night markets and sells them every night until he has tomorrow's "hat head" money and goes home.
Scratch the catcher
This is the old slang term for pharmacists in Chinese medicine stores. Most of the "graspers" were apprentices from childhood, because they had been dealing with Chinese medicine for many years as adults, and he could remember the drugs well, and over time, which medicine to treat which disease was also a little bit rough. Some of them are smart, old enough to be listed as doctors. Some people have become "positive results", but there are also many people who have misled people. My father was left in the hands of a grabber. My father loves wine, and there is heat in his stomach, so he asked the "Song Dead Man" who was born to catch the catcher to treat the disease, and he prescribed hot and dry medicines such as chai hu and so on, and when he ate a dose of medicine, he accepted my father's life. It is said that because his surname was Song and he had misdiagnosed and harmed people more than once, people called him "sending people to the dead", which means sending people to Yinsi.
"Fortuna"
In the old days of Chengdu, every first day of the first lunar month, there were constantly "gods of wealth" at the door. The so-called "god of wealth," that is, beggars and people without occupations, dressed up as the god of wealth, dressed in colorful paper, wearing a top hat on their heads, and holding a paper paste "golden whip" in their hands went door to door to ask for money, and sang in their mouths: "God of wealth, god of wealth, send gold and silver." "The god of wealth does not open his mouth, and buys places every year." "The god of wealth opened the cavity, and the gold and silver piled up in the jar." "Money comes to money, and fortune comes from this year." Such auspicious words made the owner rejoice in his heart and immediately gave the reward money.