How to raise a father who is overly controlling of his daughter

The teacher grew angrier and more helpless with each draw. She sighed and decided to draw a student with above-average grades to recite, otherwise she felt like the whole class was a bunch of good-for-nothings.

"Xingzi, recite 'The Humble Abode Inscription'."

Rena's heart raced when she drew Kyoko's name, and she looked at Kyoko with some worry.

But clearly, her worries were unnecessary.

"The Humble Abode Inscription, Tang Dynasty, Liu Yuxi." Xingzi wasn't nervous at all and recited it aloud in a clear and resonant voice.

The teacher nodded in satisfaction. "That's more like it. Those other voices were like mosquitoes. I especially hate those guys who talk so loudly during and after class, but when it's time to quiz them on recitation, they sound like caterpillars!"

After Xingzi had completely recited the poem once, the teacher picked another ancient poem, which Xingzi recited fluently again. Only then was the teacher satisfied and allowed her to sit down.

"That's very good. You were really focused on memorizing it." The teacher nodded.

Rena breathed a sigh of relief and looked at Kyoko: "I thought you wouldn't be able to memorize it."

“How could that be?” Kyoko smiled.

Before Rena could even catch her breath, she heard the teacher say, "Rena, stand up and recite 'On the Love of Lotus'."

Rena immediately tensed up, and Kyoko also looked at Rena nervously.

Rena slowly stood up, feeling that her classmates were all looking at her and noticing the teacher's gaze. She felt extremely nervous and her mind went blank.

She could recite "On the Love of Lotus" from memory, but at a crucial moment, she didn't know what the next line was.

"On the Love of Lotus," by Zhou Dunyi of the Song Dynasty. Among the flowers and plants along waterways and in vegetation, there are many that are lovely...

Rena stumbled and misremembered the very first sentence.

"It's 'Shen Fan,' not 'Shen Duo'!" Xingzi whispered a reminder.

"Hmm?" The Chinese teacher frowned, and Xingzi immediately shut her mouth, not daring to remind her.

Rena glanced at Kyoko, then gritted her teeth and continued reciting. It was obvious she wasn't fluent enough; she memorized one line, but struggled to recall the next.

"Come on, Rena, don't be nervous!" Kyoko encouraged Rena in her heart.

But Rena was extremely nervous, and she couldn't continue reciting until she got stuck on "Chrysanthemum Love, Tao... Tao..."

"What are you talking about? You've been talking about pottery for ages," the Chinese teacher said coldly.

The students in the class laughed out loud because they found this statement amusing.

Rena pursed her lips in discomfort.

"I don't have time to listen to your rambling. Go outside and recite it! You're still talking even though you can't recite it well," the teacher said coldly.

Rena felt extremely wronged. She knew it by heart; she was just too nervous to remember. Looking at the stares of her classmates, she felt very uncomfortable and ashamed. She couldn't help but feel like crying. Biting her lip, she picked up her Chinese textbook and walked out of the classroom without saying a word.

“Rena…” Kyoko felt the same way and was also very sad.

Hearing the recitation coming from the classroom, Rena bit her lip and went to the corridor.

Most of the students in the corridor were the kind who lacked ambition and were just chatting idly.

"Rena." He greeted Rena when he saw her arrive.

Rena didn't respond and went to the deepest part of the corridor.

"Tch, what's so great about that?" Zhu Ke muttered under her breath, a little annoyed.

“I’m different from them, I can recite it!” Rena took out the book and recited “On the Love of Lotus” over and over again, holding her head high and squeezing back her tears: “I’m going to make that old witch pay!”

"I...I won't let Dad down."

Chapter Twenty: Cooking

Yiyue has just returned from grocery shopping.

I put the vegetables next to the cutting board, tied on my apron, and started thinking about what to cook for lunch.

"Let's make fried rice. Rena doesn't like vegetables, so if we mix the vegetables she hates into the rice, and add some sausage and ham, she probably won't be able to tell."

As Yi Yue spoke, she diced the carrot and ham sausage, took out a green pepper, cut it in half, washed out the seeds, and cut it into small diamond-shaped slices about the size of a fingernail.

“Rena hates green peppers the most, even though they’re not bad. If we remove the spiciness and cut them like this, she probably won’t be able to tell. We’ll gradually introduce them to green peppers once she gets used to them.”

Yi Yue thought for a moment, then took out another piece of beef and cut it into cubes the size of carrots.

Set aside the ingredients for fried rice, start rinsing the rice, and cook the rice in the rice cooker.

There were no leftovers last night, so I had to steam some fresh.

It's best to use leftover rice to make fried rice.

Because leftover rice has less moisture, the grains are firmer and less likely to stick together, making it tastier and with a better texture.

Freshly cooked rice is too wet and soft, making it difficult for oil and egg to adhere during frying. It tends to clump together and is not easy to separate, and it is also too sticky, which affects the taste.

To paraphrase a classic line from Stephen Chow's "The God of Cookery": "Too much moisture and the rice grains are too soft, affecting the texture. I can't believe you've forgotten even the most basic common sense about fried rice—you have to use leftover rice to fry it! You fried rice king!"

Izuki didn't have any leftovers, so she had to steam them fresh.

Some people might ask, what if there's no leftover food?

Actually, you don't need to worry about it too much. The reason for using leftover rice in fried rice is because leftover rice has less moisture.

If you have freshly cooked rice, use chopsticks to fluff it up and prevent it from clumping together, increasing the surface area for heat dissipation. Then place it in a well-ventilated area, and after about an hour, it will be ready for fried rice.

If you find that troublesome, you can use a fan or a blower to cool it down, which will be even faster.

That's what Yi Yue did: she picked at the cooked rice with chopsticks and put it under a fan to dry.

"We can make fried rice in a little while, but there are no side dishes. I wonder if they will have enough to eat."

Yi Yue frowned. It didn't matter to her, but Ling Nai Yi Xue was still in her developmental stage, and one plate of fried rice probably wouldn't be enough for her.

He took out the shrimp he had just bought from the market, intending to make a spicy shrimp dish for Rena and the others.

The shrimp I just bought were still lively and very fresh.

Put the shrimp in water, add some fine salt to wash them, soak them for a while, and after they expel the dirt, scald them with some hot water to kill them, rinse them with cold water, and then take a cloth in your hand to pick up the shrimp and shake off the water.

When catching and cutting shrimp, it's best to avoid touching them with your hands, as you can easily get pricked by their sharp points. When I first started cooking, I often got pricked while handling shrimp.

Later, I learned my lesson and used a cloth to touch the shrimp's body, then used scissors to cut off the shrimp's head and tail, and peeled off the shell.

Peel and wash each shrimp, then remove the shrimp vein with a toothpick.

Yi Yue prepared the ingredients and began stir-frying the shrimp.

Before long, a fragrant dish of shrimp was presented to Yi Yue.

"Mmm, it smells delicious, but I wonder if one dish isn't enough?"

Izuki thought about it and realized that Reina and the others had eaten quite a lot. Her hands were itching to take out some frozen crucian carp and steak from the refrigerator.

Crucian carp is used to make soup; how can you have vegetables without soup?

The steak is going to be pan-fried.

These steaks were bought when I went shopping with Rena and the others last time. Rena loves steak and keeps asking me to make it for her every day.

But Izuki was worried that Reina wouldn't be able to control herself and would eat such high-calorie foods every day.

"It's okay to eat it once or twice occasionally, right?"

Yi Yue smiled, "The exams are coming up soon, they must be very tired." She lowered her head, looking somewhat dejected, "There's nothing I can do to help my daughter, except cook her something nice to eat."

It's 10:30 now, and Yi Yue has been cooking until 11:15.

"Rena and the others finish class at 11:40, so there's still some time."

Yi Yue, worried the food would get cold, covered it with a bowl. Still restless, she remembered she had bought some fruit.

"Let's make some fruit juice while we have this little bit of time."

Yi Yue cut the mangoes she had just bought into chunks, juiced them, added water, sugar, and milk, divided them into two cups, and put them in the refrigerator to freeze.

"It'll be just the right time for them to come back." Izuki was very happy. "I think Rena and the others will really like it, especially Rena."

Looking at the clock, it's already 11:30.

Yi Yue immediately went to get the car; any later and it would be too late. He didn't want his daughter waiting in the midday sun.

……

The school bell rang, and the Chinese teacher came out of the classroom. She saw Chen Mingzhen and his group of good-for-nothing students chatting amongst themselves instead of reciting their lessons. She was furious and thought, "They're not reciting, and they even dare to talk!"

As soon as Chen Mingzhen and the others saw the teacher, they immediately pretended to recite.

One of the bolder students even dared to ask, "Teacher, can we leave now?"

"Go?" The teacher laughed angrily. "Can you recite it yet?!" One by one, they looked over, and all of them lowered their heads.

"You can only leave when you can recite it! Hmm, someone's missing?" The teacher's gaze swept over and noticed Rena was gone. "Where is she?"

Rena emerged from the depths of the corridor: "I'm here."

"Why did you run so far inside? Were you afraid someone would see you?" The teacher was furious. "Can you even recite it?"

"Yes." Rena nodded, handed the book to the teacher, and asked the teacher to check it.

“The Bamboo Grove Pavilion,” the teacher sneered. The page Rena had turned to for her was “On the Love of Lotus,” but the teacher wasn’t buying it and turned directly to the next ancient poem to test her.

Reina was a little surprised. She thought the teacher would only ask her to recite "On the Love of Lotus" again, so she recited it over and over until she knew it very well. She didn't bother to memorize the other ancient poems.

But Rena had memorized it before, so she still remembered it.

"Tang Dynasty, Wang Wei. Alone I sit in the secluded bamboo grove, playing the zither and then letting out a long sigh... Deep in the forest... Ah, deep in the forest, no one knows, only the bright moon shines upon me." Reina stumbled and staggered as she memorized the poem, narrowly escaping disaster.

The teacher glanced at the book and tested Reina on two poems: "Miscellaneous Poems in the Mountains" and "Hearing the Flute in Luoyang on a Spring Night." Reina memorized the first poem quickly, but the second one was very slow. She memorized the first line, but then spent a long time thinking about the second line.

The teacher shook his head in dissatisfaction and drew the third poem: "Song of the Moon over Mount Emei".

"Uh..." Rena's mind went blank; she had no recollection what the poem was.

"What are you babbling about?" the teacher frowned. "Hurry up and memorize it."

Rena couldn't remember at all, so she pleaded, "Could you remind me? Even the first character will do."

"When you took your high school entrance exam, did you ask the proctor or the student in front of you for a hint?" the teacher sneered. "That would be cheating." He handed the book back to Reina. "Keep memorizing! You're still not familiar with it! Come back to me when you've mastered it!"