All About China > Chinese Culture And Festivals

holiday this monday

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rockycoon:
Willy, I have a back-hoe you can borrow, you know how tiring digging is.  We can "back fill" tomorrow....:icon_cheesygrin:

It's an extend-a-hoe, for the "really deep ones". :icon_cheesygrin:

Chong:
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Here in Kaiping, visiting the gravesites have been going on the past three weeks. April 5th is the last day to do it. Last Friday, we visited 10 gravesites on my wife's father's side of the family.We started at 9 am till 4 pm.  Walking through the hills in waist high bushes isn't easy. Carrying a whole roasted pig, roasted gooses, pastries etc etc isn't easy but locals have been doing it for years. IMHO, I had a concern about the food bacteria. At the last gravesite, the local villagers [ non-family members ] gathered and waited for the food trays to be passed out. The ritual at each site is clean the area [ often using a back hoe to clear the bushes & weeds ], unpack & offer the food, stick incense sticks into the ground, shave sugar cane, offer a boiled egg, burn paper money, light firecrackers and then pack up everything for the next site.

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On Sunday, I visited the gravesite of my great great grandfather, my great grandfather [ both on a small hill in the middle of a vegetable field ], my grandmother [ on a high hill behind a pig slaughter house which was constructed after her burial ] and two unknown family gravesites. People chose their burial sites on hills based on what fortune tellers told them regarding a good luck site. Before headstones, they constructed a centered sand mounument with three smaller ones around it. A brick size "Hua Hu' would have been placed near the gravesite marking the person's name and village. Gravesites on hills are not allowed now. In Kaiping, cremation is the law now.

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I tried to visit my great grandparents gravesites on my mother's side but their gravesites was last visited 6 years ago. The bushes and weeds are neck high right now and it would be almost impossible to find a two feet high sand monument amidst the large hill.

The younger generation tend to visit only their parents, grandparents & great grandparents. To visit all earlier generations would take too much time. Unless those locations are recorded, those sand monuments [ usually unmarked ] will fade away in memory. Once my wife and I moved back to Toronto, we can visit my father's site in Toronto, his father's site in New York and my mom's parents in San Francisco. We probably won't be able to return to China annually for Qing Ming.

.

Irishman:
The agencies will be closed on Sunday and Monday also so bros should keep this in mind if expecting emfs.

Arnold:

--- Quote from: 'mustfocus' pid='35973' dateline='1270175933' ---
Hi Ted,

The holiday is called Qing-Ming (depending on who you talk to )
--- End quote ---


Yes , I will celebrate Qing's and her brother Ming's special day on the fifth . I alway make fun of this Festival with my Wife .:angel:

ttwjr32:
Arnold,

you make fun of this festival??? thats not very nice. its a day to honor those who have died
much like we honor the veterans on veterans day only with family. not nice to make fun of that.

as they would say in China  " BAD ARNOLD"

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