The most memorable rule in my hometown is that women are not allowed to eat at the table when they come to relatives. In the past, my grandfather's birthday, on the ninth day of the Lunar New Year, my aunt, my mother and aunt were all busy in the kitchen, and my uncle and uncle were all drinking on the kang with their sleeves in their hands. The dish was also picked, and the wine was spilled. If there is more than one plate of vegetables, they will be left for children and women to eat, and most of them will be eaten only when the men on the kang are finished and the dishes are cold. With the smell of tobacco and alcohol, the food was so cold that it was hard to swallow. So I'd rather go hungry than eat leftovers. Or go home and eat the noodles yourself.
The funniest part was that my cousin was no more than two or three years older than me and could eat at the table. My aunt is married, and when she comes home, she is a guest but can only eat leftovers. At that time, it was the last time I wanted to be a girl.
My dad had a good face, and in that era when he couldn't serve two dishes, he often entertained friends with the few ingredients at home, and my mother would often open canned luncheon meat with my sister and me, and also relieve our hunger when scrambled eggs. Because I knew that my father was also very greedy and didn't care for his family, he usually ate all the dishes, and the women and children didn't even have to eat leftovers.
When my family needed to plaster the house in the later stages of construction, my two uncles went to help. In view of the limited ingredients, my mother told my dad not to go home at noon, she just entertained her brother, and my dad came home on time when the meal was served, and then ate most of the food by himself. Not only did my mom lose her right to be a guest, but she almost ran out of food to eat.
The most special thing is the grandmother next door, she encountered the same dilemma when she was young, but then she woke up and asked her brothers and sisters to be entertained when they went to relatives, and grandpa could accompany him if he wanted to eat, but he couldn't only be accompanied by grandpa. It's one of the few comforting moments I knew of as a child. It's still embarrassing to think about this experience now, but fortunately, my parents are not in my hometown, and I haven't needed to go back for many years to experience this kind of unkindness to women. I can only hope that in the future, even if others do not treat us, we will always see ourselves.