In your hometown, what are the customs of Qingming Festival?
Coordinates are Chaozhou.
It is more traditional, more "superstitious", and rich in food and spiritual culture.
What traditional customs do we have during Qingming Festival?
1. Eat
Throughout the ages in Chaozhou Township, on the eve of the cold food festival, cold snacks are sold in the streets and alleys, which are favored by Chaozhou people. The Chaozhou poem "Qingming Sugared Green Onions" includes: "The peach blossoms are scattered and the mountains are red, and it is overcast for five days and the wind is windy every day. I have no other plans to keep spring alive, and I sell sugared green onions in the deep lanes of Chaochao." Tangerine rice cake. Scenes of cold food are described in the poems.
"Chenghai County Chronicles" records: During the Qingming Festival, Chaozhou people follow the custom of eating "pancakes" and "Pu Zhi Cake", which not only commemorates the ancient custom of cold food introduced by Jiezi, but also is a unique seasonal delicacy in Chaozhou .
Candied scallion pancake: more delicious than Shandong pancake, and healthier
The pancake is divided into two parts: crust and filling. The dough is made by mixing refined flour with an appropriate amount of warm water, then mixing it thoroughly and kneading it into a lump. Place it on a frying pan (flat-bottomed iron pan) over the fire and bake it into round sheets of cooked dough, which are as thin as paper. There are two types of fillings: salty and sweet. The salty filling is made from eggs, meat, liver cured meats, mushrooms, bean sprouts, leeks and other cooked ingredients; the sweet filling is made from white sugar and maltose that have been specially processed to become "candied green onions". When eating, roll the stuffing into a cylinder with a thin pancake skin and eat it.
Pu Zhi Kueh: If you like matcha food, you can try it. It can also eliminate phlegm, lower Qi and remove dampness
Pick the leaves and fruits of Pu Zhi (commonly known as Pu Zhi), mash them, and mix them with rice Poison together into powder and sift out powder essence. The hackberry tree is a deciduous tree with oval or oblong leaves. The fruit is round, shaped like a large mung bean, has a sweet taste, is non-toxic, and has the effect of eliminating phlegm and lowering qi. During processing, white sugar and baking powder are added to the rice flour. Add appropriate amount of water, stir evenly and fully ferment, then add pottery peach-shaped or plum-shaped tree seals. Place in a steamer (cooker) and steam until cooked. The fragrant naked product is light green, which makes it a high-quality, fragrant and beautiful Puzi tree.
Mai Kueh: Teochew style pancake
Wheat is ground into wheat flour, and after being fully stirred with white sugar or brown sugar, it can be kneaded into a bag shape (called wheat buns) or rolled into Flakes are steamed in a steamer or fried in peanut oil on an iron tripod. Wheat is sweet in taste, can relieve polydipsia and dry throat, facilitate urination, stop sweating, and nourish liver qi and heart qi.
These three kinds of rice cakes are mainly eaten during Qingming Festival. The usual red rice cakes/rat shell rice cakes are also made during the New Year and festivals.
2. Sacrifice
Chaozhou is mountainous, and people in the past were mostly buried in the ground. There was no special cemetery. Instead, a "Feng Shui Master" was asked to look at the Feng Shui and choose a place to build a tomb. Every Qingming Festival is a day when families go to the mountains to visit tombs and worship their ancestors. Chaoshan is commonly known as "hanging paper".
The poem "Cold Food Ambition" by Bai Juyi of the Tang Dynasty goes: "The wind blows the paper money flying in the wilderness, and the ancient tombs are full of green spring grass." The poem "Qingming" written by Gao Juqing of the Southern Song Dynasty also wrote: "There are many tomb fields on the top of the mountains in the north and south. During the Qingming Festival, Sacrifice and sweeping are different..." Since the cold food and fire ban are closely connected with the Qingming Festival, Chaozhou people have the custom of going to the mountains to sweep tombs and pay homage to their ancestors during Qingming. Since ancient times, people have often called cold food and Qingming together, and tomb sweeping is generally called "Guo" among the people. "paper" (Chaozhou customs can be divided into "spring paper" and "winter paper".) In ancient times, Chaozhou people went to the mountains to sweep tombs during the Qingming Festival. Due to the cold food and fire ban, paper money was not burned but hung on tombs and tombstones to prevent paper money from filling the sky. It is flying, so it is called "hanging paper".
To sweep the tomb, you need to renovate the cemetery, and use silver beads and sand green (red and green paint) to carefully fill in the engraved words on the tombstone (commonly known as the word "make up the tombstone"). The yellow and white paper strips are also pressed tightly with "Tuge mud", etc. These are all ancient customs.
It is worth mentioning that the ancient customs of "banning fire" and "hanging paper" are more consistent with today's strong promotion of civilized tomb sweeping and forest fire prevention.
However, photography is generally not allowed.
3. Outing
Since it is spring, when spring flowers are blooming, Chaozhou people also go to parks and mountains for outings.
The beautiful scenery on Phoenix Mountain in Chaozhou is breathtaking.
The West Lake has a clear blue sky.
Xiangzi Bridge during Qingming Festival.
In fact, Chaozhou also has beautiful scenery and delicious food. Tomb-Sweeping Day is not only a day to commemorate our ancestors, but also a day for us to work hard and enjoy the current life.
Chaozhou Qingming Tomb Sweeping "hanging paper", mountain fires occur from time to time. Nowadays, outings and sending a bouquet of flowers have increasingly replaced the previous custom of offering chickens, ducks, geese, incense, candles, paper money (underworld coins) to sacrifice.