Chen Lanlan, Hu Xiaomei's eldest daughter, was already nine years old. Sensitive and precocious due to her family's poverty and the constant disdain from others, she was adept at reading people's expressions and could handle many chores from a young age.
Although Chen Lanlan was nine, she had never attended a day of school.
Every morning, she would get up to cut pigweed, feed the pigs, feed the chickens, sweep the floor, and then help adults with fieldwork. Their mother-daughter life had always been harder than that of pigs, getting up earlier than chickens, and working more tirelessly than oxen, leaving her much thinner and frailer than other children her age, with a sallow, skinny face.
At that moment, Chen Lanlan saw her mother packing up and asked with some worry, "Mom, where are you going?"
