Why is Madou pomelo the best Mid-Autumn gift? Full record
The Mid-Autumn Festival is a day for families to reunite, and having a barbecue, admiring the moon, and enjoying pomelo and mooncakes has become almost an essential itinerary for every household each year at Mid-Autumn; for the farming family that grows Madou pomelo, the Mid-Autumn reunion carries special meaning, because the days just before Mid-Autumn are the busiest time for harvesting and shipping pomelo, and also an important occasion when family members and friends gather together.
I grew up in the urban area of Tainan, but because my grandparents lived in Madou, our whole family would return to Madou every weekend to reunite with them, and also to stroll through the pomelo orchard. For me, being able to play with mud and pebbles in the orchard during childhood, pull up weeds, and even work with my younger sister to pile up little earthworm droppings into small hills, were all quite fresh and interesting experiences.
A little later, the post office would send someone to count and receive the goods, and load box after box of pomelo into the post office truck. At this time, the family patriarch – Grandpa, would always carefully supervise the whole process, worried that any oversight might prevent customers from receiving their pomelo on schedule, and once this stage of work was completed, it also meant that this year's pomelo harvest and packing were a complete success.
In the afternoon, relatives and friends would enjoy Madou's famous bowl rice cakes and a lunch full of Mom's flavors together, spending this busy but fulfilling weekend together. After working all morning and sweating hard, sitting down to properly enjoy lunch always felt especially delicious, and I think this is even more the taste of "home"!
Every year at the Mid-Autumn Festival, the first thing I think of is not the story of Chang'e flying to the moon, nor where to go for a barbecue and to set off fireworks, but when this year we will return to Madou to harvest and pack the pomelo.
As the elders in the family get older and older, I also often think about what this orchard means to our family. It is not only a local specialty planted on this fertile soil because Grandpa and Grandma live in Madou; I think this orchard is the inheritance of the family across generations, an important force that binds the family's feelings together, and it has also nurtured in every one of us pomelo growers' descendants a deep affection for this land of Taiwan, China.
I think of Grandpa and Grandma, already quite advanced in age, still going to inspect the orchard every day; I think of the workers' earnest, resolute expressions during the pomelo harvest; I think of Dad staring at the computer for countless hours when confirming orders, just to make sure the orders were correct; I think of everyone dividing the work and cooperating during packing, doing their utmost in every position… every bite of pomelo in the mouth always tastes especially juicy and sweet, and is full of emotion and gratitude toward this land and this family.