Rice picking

Here is a challenging experience for people who are not afraid of having possible backaches and for people who are comfortable with snakes. Add the burning sun, your sweat that makes your clothes sticky, plus the mud that makes your moves very tricky in the paddy field and you will have an overview of what a rice picking experience looks like. I had that experience. Well, let's give more details.

Rice, rice and more rice!

I put on boots and wore my cheapest clothes on that day. A very sunny hot day of September. Just standing and looking at the sun makes you sweat and before you notice it, your nose has become a tiny version of the Niagara falls. I was given the tool to cut and pick the rice plants (稲 いね). This would mean picking rice with the old-fashioned way. Nowadays they use machines to pick rice. The tool I used is a Kama (鎌), a sickle that was a bit rotten but cut really well. The cutting part is actually very easy. Less easy is the bundling part of the plants. You have to make sure you do not bundle too much so that it can dry on some sort of wooden fence. This part is called the Inekake, or Inakake (稲掛け ). You bundle the fresh-cut rice plants with dry plants and for a guy like me, this is hard to do. It is like learning again how to attach shoelaces . . . which took me a long time when I was a kid. Anyway, in the end I was the one who put the bundles, Taba (束), on this fence which I unfortunately forgot the name.

The dreaded "mamushi"

What I cannot forget is the word Mamushi (蝮). This word means viper. It is not rare to encounter Mamushi in paddy fields. When you remember that its bite can be deadly, you see the experience differently. Well I am sure I was not going to die that day if I was bitten. Some hospital would have saved my life almost right away. Nevertheless, I did not want to get this bite and the pain that you get for the same price. That's not cool. So I cut, bundled very carefully. And I paid even more attention when I met one, crawling between my feet. Cutting in the middle of frogs, locusts (or other jumping around peaceful insects) and dragonflies is OK but when it comes to snakes that can be aggressive, the task is different. For people who did this for centuries without the healthcare available today, this might have been a survival struggle. Cut the rice to have a bite without getting the Mamushi bite . . . it kinda sounds like hip-hop . . . yeah, 米・オン! (I am not sure that this joke really works but whatever).

Last but not least : the mud. It traps you. Either you cannot move anymore either you slip. Stand forever or fall. When you do walk it is slow, hard but fun at the same time. It is like being in a swimming pool and trying to run in water. It is perfect to recreate a cinematic slow-motion effect. There was a kid who did not think the same way. After picking enough to make 5 bundles of rice plants, he decided it was more fun to plunge into it, to roll and turn mud-brown. I wish this funny boy could tell his version of that day but something tells me his title would be slightly different. It would have to be called "rice kidding."

I hope I did not scare you with my snake story. I really think this is a good experience. If you have the opportunity to do even one bit of what I did, do it. Enjoy the fresh air of nature and the BEERS you drink after work. Go with friends, mud (or not) your face, take pictures and if you are a good hunter, why not try catching a Mamushi and barbecue it ? Only joking. . . .