My name is Chen Maisui, born and raised a farmer’s son. My greatest ambition in life is to lie in the sun on a field ridge, snack on sweet potatoes when I’m hungry, fish for shrimp when I’m bored, and live happily as a layabout who eats his fill and waits for the end.
Unfortunately, my mother is stubborn as a mule. She chased me across three field ridges with a rolling pin, determined to sell everything we owned if that’s what it took to make me study for the imperial exams. She kept saying that only studying could bring glory to our ancestors, and that I couldn’t spend my whole life digging in the dirt and growing crops.
I was a hundred percent against it. I goofed off and dozed through class, then ran straight to the fields after school to tinker with the crops. I only went through the motions when it came to studying. All I wanted was to make flowers bloom in our little patch of land and earn enough from farming to get by.
Who could have guessed I had a naturally quick mind? I found ways to improve the soil, grow high-yield crops, and start little farm businesses, turning our poor household into a thriving one. Forced to take the imperial exams, I planned to slack off and fail, but somehow kept scraping through by sheer luck, advancing from licentiate to scholar and then provincial graduate.
The tutor at the village school called me a genius who kept his talents hidden. The neighbors went from laughing at me to singing my praises, while greedy relatives came looking for handouts and left speechless after I put them in their place.
Others studied by lamplight through long, cold nights to earn official titles. I farmed and goofed off, stumbling my way through the imperial exams. Even after entering officialdom, I never lost my slacker nature. I picked no sides and played no political games, relying on practical skills and plainspoken honesty to rise against the odds.
From a village layabout to a name on the imperial examination rolls, I farm with a hoe in my left hand and pursue officialdom with brush and ink in my right. I make money from farming and pass the exams without missing a beat, becoming a laid-back winner in life and the most comfortable scholar in all of Dayong!
