Published on The Brunei Times (http://www.bt.com.bn/en)
Chinese remember their ancestors on All Souls Day
Liz Price
KUALA LUMPUR
Friday, April 4, 2008
FOR 10 days either side of today, Chinese visit the graves of their family and ancestors. Over this two-week period cemeteries are busy as people go to clean up the grave sites and prepare for the festival, which is named Cheng Beng or Qing Ming, commonly known as All Souls Day.
The festival was originally held as a celebration of the mid spring equinox, on the 104th day after the winter solstice, or the 15th day from the spring equinox. If it is a leap year, as is the case this year, Qing Ming is on April 4, today. Quite often on this day the sky is cloudless, hence the name Qing Ming or the Hokkien variation of Cheng Beng, which translates as "clear and bright".
In ancient times, the Chinese would take advantage of this nice day and spend the time outdoors enjoying the fine weather. Over the years, they started to clear the graves of their ancestors and pay homage to them.
The festival has a variety of names. These include Clear Brightness Festival, Festival for Tending Graves, Grave Sweeping Day, Chinese Memorial Day, Tomb Sweeping Day, Spring Remembrance and All Souls Day.
In Malaysia Cheng Beng is known as All Souls Day and is the time to pay homage to the dearly departed ancestors. Families also hope to instill a sense of filial piety amongst the younger generation. Whole families will visit the grave, retaining the family bond. Weekends are particularly busy when people clean up the grave, spruce up the surroundings and maybe repaint the lettering on the tombstone.
Nowadays the festival has become more commercial. In the past, only joss sticks and "hell money" were burnt as offerings. Today this has changed, and families buy perfect paper replicas of essential modern items to offer the dead. These include electronic items such as mobile phones, televisions, karaoke sets, refrigerators and computers. Apart from the electronic items you can buy shoes, designer clothes and handbags. For the ladies there are boxes of jewellery items, and for the men shaving kits. For sustenance there are packs of cigarettes, cans of beer and liquor. Gift hampers containing herbs and food supplements are available. One can still buy the traditional "hell money", but nowadays a selection of credit cards is also available. The "hell money" notes are huge, and the ones I saw represented one billion units, but I don't know which currency the ancestors use.
Traditional entertainment is available in the form of mahjong sets and playing cards.
The luxury cars caught my eye. The most elaborate of all has to be the paper house. Not only a house, but a nice garden and pond, two luxury cars in the porch, and even a maid, guard and dog kennel.
These paper items will be placed in a paper chest which is sealed, and the deceased's name and date of death will be written on a piece of yellow paper glued on the chest in the shape of a cross. This has a similar purpose to an address on a parcel.
Apart from offering the paper items to be burnt, the families will give food, tea, and wine and maybe cigarettes to the ancestors. In China, people carry willow branches with them as they believe these will ward off the evil ghosts that wander on Qing Ming.
It is not just the cemeteries that are busy. People also go to the columbaria to remember their ancestors. A columbarium is a room or building with niches where funeral urns are stored. The word actually originates from an 18th century Latin word for pigeon house, derived from columba meaning dove.
Some of the Buddhist temples have a columbarium, especially the cave temples around Ipoh in Perak, Malaysia. These are a hive of activity as people burn their paper offerings in the massive fires. These fires are in specially built brick lined kilns. Food and flowers are put out for the ancestors.
Some temples ban meat — only vegetarian food is allowed to be taken in.
The temples are full of smoke from the incense sticks and the burning offerings. They are also a blaze of colour from vases of flowers. Counters lined with food look like a buffet in an outdoor restaurant, there are whole meals laid out, and snacks such as fried chicken. At the altars are the pink coloured buns, as well as apples, oranges and other fruit. Sparrows and other small birds dart in and out taking advantage of this free feast.
Chinese temples throughout the country will be busy as people go to give prayers and remember their ancestors. Many temples don't have places for burning, so the people just make offerings of fruit, flowers, incense etc.
In the olden days, people celebrated the Qing Ming Festival with various performances such as dancing and singing. Over the years, the celebration aspect has been toned down and has become more of a time to remember the departed relatives.
Although the Qing Ming festival originated in China, it is still widely followed in Malaysia as Chinese families remember their traditions and honour their ancestors.
The Brunei Times
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Source URL:
http://www.bt.com.bn/en/en/focus/2008/04/04/chinese_remember_their_ancestors_on_all_souls_day
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