Celebrations may be somewhat subdued this year but two of the most important festivals in Chinese culture take place in April. Here’s a look at the myth, folklore and activities surrounding them
PHOTOS COURTESY OF Pexels
Celebrations may be somewhat subdued this year but two of the most important festivals in Chinese culture take place in April. Here’s a look at the myth, folklore and activities surrounding them
PHOTOS COURTESY OF Pexels
CHING MING FESTIVAL
Ching Ming – also known as Grave Sweeping Day and Clear Bright Festival – is the day, and often the only day in the year, when Chinese families visit the graves and tombs of their ancestors. Ching Ming falls on the fourth or fifth day of the third lunar month (April 5, 2022), and has been a public holiday since the Tang dynasty.
When visiting the graves, families tidy the headstones, clear grass and weeds, light incense and make burnt offerings. Items burned include (fake) money and these days, paper replicas of laptops, mobile phones, air-conditioners, refrigerators and even luxury cars – anything that the ancestor may find useful in the afterlife.
Food offerings are also made and these too involve various time-honoured rituals. Typically, three bowls, filled with pastries, chicken and pork, are placed at a headstone along with three wine glasses and three sets of chopsticks. The head of the family then takes a glass of wine and blows on it three times before pouring the wine on the grave. The same procedure is repeated by each member of the family three times. Following this, the family shares the food in honour of the deceased.
Ching Ming Festival is first and foremost a day to honour ancestors but it’s also a time for families to get together to eat and also traditionally, to fly kites. Again, there’s plenty of superstition and symbolism regarding this activity. Instead of pulling back the kite after it has flown high, it’s important to cut the string and release it – by releasing a kite, you let go of any bad luck, disease or negative energy you have accumulated over the past year.
To understand the origins of Ching Ming Festival, you need to look back around 2,500 years to the Zhou dynasty, when emperors and noblemen performed rituals throughout the year to venerate their dead, hoping for prosperity, peace and abundant harvest in return. At this time, ancestor veneration was the preserve of the ruling elite because it was so costly. However, things changed in the Tang dynasty when Emperor Xuanzong (713 to 756 CE) decided to limit these lavish rituals to a single day, establishing the Ching Ming Festival tradition. He also made Ching Ming a national holiday and decreed that all subjects commemorate it in a simple way by visiting and cleaning the tombs of their ancestors.
TIN HAU FESTIVAL
Tin Hau’s birthday falls on the 23rd day of the third lunar month (April 27 in 2022) and in Hong Kong, Tin Hau Festival is one of the most vibrant celebrations of the year. Tin Hau is the Goddess of the Sea, and given that in the past Hong Kong’s livelihood was tied to the water, she is the unofficial patron saint of the city.
There are over 90 Tin Hau temples scattered throughout Hong Kong, and while they come in all shapes and sizes, they are typically small and low-key like the goddess herself. On festival day (not a public holiday), some of the liveliest celebrations are held on the outlying islands notably at the impressive, Grade 111, cliff-side temple at Fan Lau Miu Wan.
Fisherfolk worship Tin Hau as a bringer of calm seas and a plentiful catch, the rest of us simply look to her to protect our families. So, what’s the backstory?
Well, according to folklore, Tin Hau started out as a mortal named Mòniáng, born around 960 CE on the island of Meizhou in Fujian Province. One morning, her father and brothers went out to fish with the local fleet and a typhoon struck. Fortunately for them, Mòniáng immediately fell into a trance and astral-projected out to sea to rescue them. As she was bringing them back, her mother woke her, causing her to drop one of her brothers. The next day, only her father and all but one of her brothers returned, all of the other fishermen were lost at sea.
Mòniáng was so revered in life for her shamanism that after her death at age 27, the islanders continued to ask her for help, believing she had ascended to heaven to take her place among the immortals. Over time, more and more reports of the goddess intervening during crises at sea began to circulate among the fishing communities of Fujian and Guangdong. As her fame increased, her temples began to spring up all over Southern China and beyond.