Vegetable Plots

Jack

Sept. 25, 2025

When I was a child, every family in my village had a small vegetable plot. They couldn’t afford to buy vegetables, so they grew their own.

My village was square-shaped and surrounded by a small moat. Outside the moat on the west side lay our vegetable plots—together, these plots were also square and divided into separate sections for each family in the village.

Unlike field crops, vegetables require more care. So the plots must be carefully prepared based on the different types of vegetables to be grown. At the very least, irrigation ditches are indispensable.

Since vegetables need watering almost every day, each plot had a well. I consider these wells a symbol of people’s wisdom, thanks to the simple mechanical device each was equipped with.

The device typically consisted of three wooden sticks of different diameters. A thick stick stood beside the well, and its top was connected to the middle of a slightly thinner stick. One end of this horizontal stick was attached to a counterweight, while the other end was linked to a thin wooden stick. A hook was fixed to the bottom of this thin stick; when people needed to fetch water, they would use it to hang a bucket. This simple yet clever device made drawing water from the well much easier.

People grew a variety of vegetables, such as green onions, potatoes, chili peppers, radishes, carrots, Chinese cabbages, tomatoes, and melons.

They never used chemical fertilizers or pesticides when growing vegetables (I’m not even sure if such things existed back then). Instead, they only used organic fertilizers—which were probably the only kind available to them at the time.

As a result, people never had to worry about the food they ate: it was all organic, grown with their own hands.

en 1

Correct

Corrections

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Vegetable Plots

When I was a child, every family in my village had a small vegetable plot.

They couldn’t afford to buy vegetables, so they grew their own.

My village was square-shaped and surrounded by a small moat.

Outside the moat on the west side lay our vegetable plots—together, these plots were also square and divided into separate sections for each family in the village.

Unlike field crops, vegetables require more care.

So the plots must be carefully prepared based on the different types of vegetables to be grown.

At the very least, irrigation ditches are indispensable.

Since vegetables need watering almost every day, each plot had a well.

I consider these wells a symbol of people’s wisdom, thanks to the simple mechanical device each was equipped with.

The device typically consisted of three wooden sticks of different diameters.

A thick stick stood beside the well, and its top was connected to the middle of a slightly thinner stick.

One end of this horizontal stick was attached to a counterweight, while the other end was linked to a thin wooden stick.

A hook was fixed to the bottom of this thin stick; when people needed to fetch water, they would use it to hang a bucket.

Alternatively: "...they would hang a bucket from it."

This simple yet clever device made drawing water from the well much easier.

People grew a variety of vegetables, such as green onions, potatoes, chili peppers, radishes, carrots, Chinese cabbages, tomatoes, and melons.

They never used chemical fertilizers or pesticides when growing vegetables (I’m not even sure if such things existed back then).

Instead, they only used organic fertilizers—which were probably the only kind available to them at the time.

As a result, people never had to worry about the food they ate: it was all organic, grown with their own hands.

Jack

Sept. 26, 2025

Thank you very much.

Vegetable Plots