Little Yan eats the last of her sticky rice, which the Nong family cooks in five colors using vegetable dyes for the Tomb Sweeping holiday on the third day of March on the lunar calendar.
Apr
27
2010
27
2010
Photo: Polishing the Tombstone
An elderly villager of Danong (大農村) wipes off the tombstone of an ancestor's grave on the Zhuang Tomb Sweeping day on the third day of March on the lunar calendar (農歷三月初三). For most in the countryside there is no such thing as a "graveyard." The tombs are scattered throughout the fields in any un-planted spot available, and many are marked only by a pile of stones.
Apr
26
2010
26
2010
Photo: Solemn for Some
For the Nong (農) family children, the Zhuang (壯族) Tomb Sweeping Day (三月初三) seemed to be a celebration -- a reason to be out of school and romping through the fields with brothers, sisters and cousins. For the next generation, the day seemed to be more of an obligation -- a thing to be done because that's the way it's always been done, even though some admitted they didn't understand all the proceedings. But whether due to a greater attachment to tradition or the realization that before long their families might be burning money for their own use in the afterlife, the elderly generation took a much more reverent approach to the traditional holiday on which the living care for the dead.
Apr
24
2010
24
2010
Tomb-Sweeping Feast With the Nongs (農家三月初三大宴)
By Evan
…a continuation from the last post.
Alexis and I with the Nong men, by Andy
After a day of tomb sweeping, all able adults set themselves to preparing the food, and we, changed into normal clothes by now, were set outside on chairs with the kids, chickens, and dogs all running around they way each is liable to do. They gave us as a snack a plastic bag of the five-colored glutinous rice, which they had made just that day using natural ingredients to cook the five batches into five different colors, and then we were left with the kids. I held up my end of the trade with my buddy Xinwei, who had continued his lengthy interrogations on and off through the entire afternoon, with a five Hong Kong dollar coin, which he immediately dropped, setting the kids on a thirty minute search.
As we sat watching the kids — of whom there were maybe twelve, aged four to fourteen — it occurred to me that these kids were unusually mature for their age. Maybe because they grew up in the country, or maybe because of traditional Chinese parenting, but none of them acted out, and the old ones all took care of the younger ones like little parents-to-be. The boys broke out their plastic rifles and started playing commandos around the farmhouse while the girls braided each others’ hair — just as I’d expect to see at a family gathering back home. Alexis played with the cutest little four and a half year old girl you’ve ever seen, and Andy alternated between chasing the dogs up a mound of sand and reading news on his iPhone. (more…)
Apr
22
2010
22
2010
Rites and Reunions: Zhuang Tomb-Sweeping Day
By Evan
*See all of Andy’s great tomb-sweeping pictures here
The Nong family going through the tomb-sweeping ritual for their deceased father in Guangxi, by Andy
So picking up back in Guangxi, we spent the first rest day of our new 5-day cycle plan in the county seat of Jingxi (靖西縣). Fate, seeing us on a tight schedule, decided to strike Alexis down with an intestinal malady that kept us in place an extra day… the best laid plans, as always. The next morning, he had regained most of his energy, and it was decided that we should progress an easy 30 km to a new town after the requisite coffee stop.
Now, that plan was made in full knowledge that this was the third day of the third month of the Chinese lunar calendar (三月初三), the most important holiday of the Zhuang people (壯族), through the heart of whose territory we happened to be passing. We had heard only that there was a holiday and had no preconception of what form it might take, but we hoped we could join in some sort of festivities that night. (more…)