Once Upon A Little China
A/N: Anything in bold is spoken in Chinese.
Warning: Slight gore there; I knew some of my readers on the other site weren't that comfortable reading the details, so be warned! :)
Chapter 4: The Art of Breaking a Neck
'Fuck' was the only word that spouted out of InuYasha's mouth as he made his way back to his room. It was bad enough that the bathroom was dirty, but to let that happen at four in the morning…that just killed everything.
"Good lord, you are so loud," Miroku grumbled sleepily as he heard his friend stumble into the room, cursing and stomping on the ground. "And you stink too. What happened?" He propped himself up on his elbow and squinted in the darkness at his friend's figure.
"You want to know? Go to the bathroom and see for yourself." InuYasha glared heatedly back at his friend.
"Ah, you must have been unfortunate enough to step in between the planks and drop your feet into the hole huh?" Miroku grinned back. He went to the bathroom yesterday and knew then that what was the 'toilet' was nothing more than a hole dug in the ground with planks laid over the top. Basically, people just stand on the plank and pour their waste into the hole. After the hole was filled to the brim with human feces and whatnot, the villagers would cover it and dug another new hole somewhere else as a new toilet. "That explains that funny smell you got on you. Must be a rich mixture you stepped into there."
"You -!" InuYasha was cut off abruptly when an old man rapped him over on the head with a ladle.
"Boys, time to wake up and prepare your breakfast," the old man – Kagome's grandfather – sang cheerily. "And you, young man," He tilted his head towards InuYasha, "can go and wash your feet."
"But it's only slightly over five! We usually wake up at eight," Miroku mustered his best puppy eyes.
"If you don't wake up early, you will have no breakfast," Kagome's grandfather replied stoutly and exited the room.
"I guess they make guests here work for their own breakfast," Miroku shrugged helplessly.
"Keh."
When they were finished dressing and for InuYasha's case, cleaning his feet in a water bowl, the two young men found Sango already waiting outside for them. Kagome and Kaede were nearby, busy herding a flock of ducks into a wooden pen.
"Where did the others go to?" Miroku asked Sango.
"I think the grandfather and the mother went to herd the cattles. They said something along the line of us getting to do the woman's jobs today since this is only our second day here." Sango nodded towards Kagome and Kaede.
"Great, we get to do the sissy's jobs today," InuYasha groused unhappily.
Just then, Kaede approached them and guided them towards short stools located near the duck pens. Kagome was already sitting on one of them with a duck between her hands and waiting patiently. When she saw InuYasha, her eyes automatically roam towards his feet. InuYasha could tell that she was trying to hold back laughter. So, she KNOWS what happened too huh.
"First thing first, you will prepare the ducks to be cooked." Kaede gestured for the guests to sit down beside Kagome. "Kagome will teach you how to do it. I'll go arrange the cooking implements. If you have any questions, just holler." She winked at the guests with her good eye and sauntered away.
Kagome turned her attention to the guests and greeted them in Chinese. "To prepare the duck is easy; you just need to kill it, bleed it and stripped it of its feathers. Then we can roast them later with spice." She talked as slowly as she could and waited as Miroku clarified what she said to his friends.
Sango's eyes widened. "We…have to kill the ducks? How? I don't see any tools about here that could do it…" Miroku translated what Sango said and Kagome's smile widened.
"It's easy, here-" She grabbed ducks from the wooden pen and handed each of them a thrashing duck. When she was sure that the guests have a good grip on the duck, she went on with her instructions: "just watch closely: First you place your fingers right below the duck's head. Count up to around four fingers. You should feel the pulse of the duck through its vein and there will be a slight notch. Gently wrap your hands around the notch and with your other hand, place it below the first one." She performed the instructions carefully, all the while allowing Miroku to clarify the instructions to the other two. "Then you give a quick, hard twist." She gave a deft twist and a loud popping sound could be heard from the duck as it went limp between her hands.
"Ouch, that was uncalled for." Miroku winced as he dropped his duck in surprise. The creature ran away, squawking something angrily back at him. Kagome merely handed him another duck from the pen and waited expectantly.
"She wanted us to kill the duck…just like that?" Sango looked uncertainly back at their translator.
"Heck, if that means that we can be over with this sooner, I'll gladly do it." InuYasha said. He experimentally lifted his duck's head slightly and wrapped his fingers around the duck's neck. He looked back at Kagome, who nodded eagerly in approval. "This should do." InuYasha grunted and give a mighty twist, so hard that he felt slightly sore in his wrist. But to his horror, instead of dying like the duck in Kagome's hand, his duck flopped down with a twisted head and ran with its broken neck about the compound.
"You didn't twist it the right way!" Kagome lurched for the duck and end its life mercifully with another quick twist. "You have to be sure that you grabbed the notch firmly and twist it like this." She made motions of twisting in the air.
When Miroku finished translating what she said to InuYasha, he only fumed "I see no difference in the way she twisted the neck and how I twisted it!"
Kagome only shook her head in wonder at the irritated man. For all the strong built that he has, he can't even perform some of the easiest tasks. Boy, they haven't seen the men's jobs yet. Suddenly, Kagome felt hollow inside. Her father had died only two weeks ago, hence one of the reason why they were renting room spaces for tourists so they can earn extra income. Now that her father was gone, and with her grandfather too old while Souta too young…who is going to do the men's job in their house? They had yet to decide what to do with the vacant space that her father had left in their lives. She shook herself out of the depressing thoughts and focus on the jubilant bantering between her guests. First, the guests. Then she can worry about all the other things later.
After that, things went relatively smoothly, with the guests slowly mastering the skill of twisting the duck's neck. However, majority of the ducks were still killed by Kagome. All in all, they manage to end twelve ducks' lives. Next, they bleed the duck by slitting the throat in the area where the notch was and Kagome collected the blood with a basin. "For making blood cakes," that was the reason Kagome said for collecting the blood. Then they spend a few moments learning how to select and pluck the ducks' plumage out the correct way, discarding the mature feathers and opting for the downs. Those will be used for pillow fillings. After that, they carry the ducks to the back of the house, where Kaede had already prepared a barrel with boiling water. They quickly dumped the ducks into the hot water and cover the top of the barrel. Finally, after a few minutes, the ducks' carcasses were removed from the water, the excess feathers removed and they were gutted.
"That should remove any other excess feathers that was not cleaned properly," Kagome grinned. "You guys sure did a great job today." She squinted up into the sky and calculated for awhile. "Although it's slightly later than usual, I think we should be able to get breakfast ready an hour later. You guys can go wash yourselves, you definitely deserve it. See you an hour later." She shooed the guests off and went to find Kaede.
A/N: Uh yeah...I hope the details didn't disturb you guys that much. I guess it's one of those cultural differences things that I get used to after awhile. ^^;
Aside from that, I'm not sure if that's how they kill ducks in XinJiang. I know from where I grew up from, they just slit the chicken throat and dump it in boiling water. I really wonder whether it's the cut or the boiling water that killed the chickens. I would think it's the latter, because I could sometimes still hear the chickens screaming and kicking in the boiling water…and do people actually make blood cakes with duck's blood? I highly doubt so; I think its pig's blood that they used for making the cakes. But ah well, a little twist and invention won't hurt right?
IlonaBliss: Thank you for that kind compliment! Glad that someone enjoyed the story! =]
Caseclosed621: Believe me, the gang have a LOT of adjustments to make ;P And I never did clarify about the language part, did I? Stupid me! 3 Basically, aside from Kaede, Miroku is equally fluent in both languages; hence that's why he was able to translate some of Souta's ramblings. The only problem is that he studied standard Chinese (or to be more specific, Mandarin. Chinese is just a term used to describe the collective language in China and does not refer to any dialects in particular. What most people like to refer to as Chinese is Mandarin, by far the most common dialect used, but I thought I won't go into much more detail less it becomes too confusing. For convenience's sake, I will continue to use 'Chinese' in the fanfic unless a specification between the dialects is necessary.), so he's not quite knowledgeable about the accents, inflections and slight variation in word choices used across various regions. InuYasha and Sango both know a bit of Chinese, but they are nowhere being close to grasping the language as Miroku had.