“My family will also contribute a net! Grandpa…” Before Paul Foster could speak, Paul Grant came over again, and after speaking, she even glared at Paul Foster. Paul Foster could only nod in resignation.

“My family only has one net, but we’ll contribute it too!” Ethan Brooks looked at his own son, gritted his teeth, and decided to go all in. Luckily, Eric Brooks was off in the distance whispering to his fiancée Henry Shaw, not knowing that his grandpa had already donated his fishing net.

“It’s getting late, let’s go to the sea!” Paul Foster was rather stubborn; he didn’t think much of Brian Carter’s idea. For generations, they had always cast nets to fish—he’d never heard of setting up some kind of ground cage and just waiting at home for fish to come aboard. But with Ethan Brooks and Henry Hayes supporting Brian Carter, even though he felt bad about giving up his own net, he could only endure it. With resentment in his heart, his face didn’t look too pleasant.

“I’ll stay and weave nets!” At this moment, Paul Grant piped up again, always eager to get involved.

“…％￥￥#” This time, Paul Foster simply muttered something in their Tanka dialect, probably scolding his daughter. But it seemed he couldn’t really control her, so he just buried his head and jumped onto the small boat.

“Brother, don’t be upset. Whether this kid’s idea works or not doesn’t matter. Your girl Amy Grant has her eye on him. Trading a few fishing nets for a son-in-law—why be angry? This is a good thing, hehehe!” Henry Hayes, along with his two sons, also climbed onto the small boat one after another. Then he quietly exchanged a few words with Paul Foster in their Tanka dialect, and even gestured toward Paul Grant on the big boat, before cheerfully raising the tattered sail.

“Uncle is right, our little sister has someone now!” Paul Miller, after hearing his uncle’s words, immediately understood and grinned widely.

“Grandpa’s getting senile, but uncle sees things clearly. Little Harris, start singing, let’s go!” After hearing Henry Hayes’s words, Paul Foster turned to look at his youngest daughter on the big boat, finally realizing what was going on. He immediately broke into a smile, quickly hoisted the tattered sail, and shouted out loud.

“Big rain falls, water floods the street,

Brother carries firewood to sell in town.

Sister-in-law goes out wearing flowered shoes,

Flowered shoes, flowered socks, flowered belt.”

Paul Harris stood at the stern, rowing with his brother, and sang loudly in the Tanka dialect. The song, carried by the sea breeze, drifted far away. Influenced by them, several other Tanka boats heading out to sea also began to echo with various songs.

“What are they singing?” Brian Carter couldn’t understand a word, so he had to ask someone. But who? Looking around, Ethan Brooks had slipped away at some point, Eric Brooks and Henry Shaw had also rowed out to sea, and the women were busy washing and taking care of the children. Only Paul Grant’s big eyes were nearby.

“My brother is singing a saltwater song, our Tanka boat song. Does it sound good? I can sing too!” Paul Grant was extremely outgoing, unable to hide anything—whatever she thought showed on her face and in her words.

“Let’s wait until we catch a lot of fish before singing. For now, let’s make the fishing net.” Brian Carter understood her thoughts well. Faced with such a simple fisher girl, he didn’t even have the courage to lie, so he just found an excuse that sounded decent.

The Tanka people weren’t forbidden from going ashore; it was just that the authorities didn’t allow them to buy land or build houses on land. They could chop firewood, trade goods, and go into town to buy and sell things. Paul Grant was very capable. She and Brian Carter loaded three fishing nets onto a small boat, then called over her two sisters-in-law and two cousins-in-law. Together, they rowed to the beach, left Brian Carter to watch the boat, and the women, barefoot and wielding machetes, headed into the woods by the shore. Soon, they returned with two large bundles of firewood and lit a bonfire on the beach.

Next, the women used machetes to split open a bamboo stalk, then chopped it into strips. After scraping off the nodes and burrs, they followed Brian Carter’s instructions: roasting the strips over the fire while weaving them together. In the end, they made thick bamboo braids, each as thick as an arm and five or six meters long. This was beyond Brian Carter’s expectations—he had planned to use simple bamboo slats for support, but Paul Grant said slats weren’t sturdy enough, and that woven bamboo strips worked better. Once soaked in seawater, they were so tough that even a knife could barely cut through them. As long as the parts that needed to bend were charred over the fire, they wouldn’t deform. Brian Carter tried out a finished bamboo braid and found it very flexible—truly the wisdom of daily life.

Chapter 9: Afraid of Suffocating

Under Brian Carter’s direction, the five women quickly used hemp rope to fix eight bamboo braids inside the large net cylinder, forming the basic structure of a ground cage. As for Brian Carter’s request to cut openings in the net and sew in funnel-shaped entrances, the women gave him another surprise. Using only shuttles and hemp rope, they quickly wove a funnel-shaped entrance directly at the designated spots, leaving no trace of any cuts in the net. A perfect ground cage was finished before noon, without even delaying lunch.

There was no seafood hotpot today—just a big pile of taro and salted dried fish, which left Brian Carter staring in disbelief. He wondered if eating too much of this stuff would make it impossible to poop. Speaking of personal hygiene, Brian Carter was also helpless. Tanka women, when urinating, would take out a bamboo tube split in half, squat at the stern of the boat, and take care of business. Then they’d wash the half-tube in seawater and scoop up seawater to wash themselves.