Today was agriculture day and we learned mostly about rice culture. Since this class is all about being hands on, we delved into the mud pits of tilled earth (read: doom), and actually put the knowledge we learned minutes before, to use. Rather than completely ruing my one pair of shoes, I went barefoot. The mud came up to just below my knee, thick and gooey. I had to really work to move forward – balance just right so that I didn’t fall over when I took a step. There was an awesome (sarcasm) suction-y sound when I pried my foot out and an equally awesome (just as sarcastic) glomp-y sound when I put it back into the mud. There was a knotted rope that ran the width of the field and at each knot, we planted a little rice seedling. First, we smoothed the mud with our hands, then placed the seed just under the mud. Rinse and repeat. The seeds we used had about 2 leaves, and when they grow, they’ll have 4-5 leaves. There are 4 factors when growing rice fields successfully: the age of the seed, compost (which is put into the water), water, and controlling the weeds.
