Rice Harvest

Harvesting Rice
I can hear the pounding of the pole in the large mortar just as the sun rises, which would be about 5:30. My neighbor woman must remove the hulls from the rice while it is just the right humidity. Rice, along with maze is a staple here; they grow them both. Just down the dirt road that runs by our place is an enormous field partitioned off to various women for planting rice. The month of June, beginning the dry season, is harvest time. I can see women everyday walk past with enormous sacks of rice on their heads, maybe up to 30 or 40 kgs, many with babies on their backs. Sometimes my children offer to help them carry it to their homes or up the road to catch a chapa. If I am driving during this time of day I will offer to transport them, sometimes very old woman carrying too much on their heads. They are always grateful.
When they get it home they must take a portion and cook it then they spread it out on a capalana (the cloth they use for skirts and many other things) and let it dry in the sun before removing the hulls. As it is drying they must make sure the chickens don’t mess with it and in it.
The harvest was great this year. The rains had come at opportune times and the stocks were loaded. Unfortunately heavy rains also had come at an inopportune time during harvest causing the remaining stocks to lie down in the water and be lost.
Seasons and rhythm are keys to life here and rice is no exception. Watching them pound the hulls off is quite a site. Sometimes 2 women or children will have their poles going for a long time without hitting the other like hands on a drum. After the hulls are mostly off they toss it in a flat basket to let the hulls blow away or shake off the edge. This is another rhythm that takes talent; shaking and tossing just to the edge of the basket, not loosing a grain of rice but just the hulls.